We dove into the Lockheed Martin Twitter drama so you don't have to

Is there a better example of what the Twitter hellscape is than the Lockheed Martin-nepotism hire-ableism controversy currently being hashed out on the timeline? In case you’re wondering why a defense contractor is trending this Monday, buckle up.

In late July, Ana Mardoll, a prominent and controversial Twitter personality and trans and disabled writer of young adult fiction, first began stirring the pot when he claimed that the idea that writers should read books was ableist. The take was mocked by some online, but Mardoll became Twitter’s main character of the day on Monday morning after being exposed for being a long-time employee and nepotism hire at Lockheed Martin, the major defense contracting corporation that generates most of its revenue from supplying weapons to the U.S. military.

Mardoll addressed the chatter, admitting on Twitter that he got his job working in software licensing for a “large corporation” because his family works for the same company, before scrubbing his account and going into private mode.

“I got this particular job because my family works for the same corporation,” he wrote in a since-deleted tweet. “I stay because I’m on an unusual part-time arrangement for medical reasons. It’s hard to find a remote WFH job that will give me medical insurance but let me work 10-20 hours a week.”

The reveal over Mardoll’s employment history is particularly shocking in how at odds it is with his online reputation: while frequently serving as what some have deemed as a “woke-scold” (who has reportedly weaponized his large online following to attack other authors in the past), Mardoll was a legacy hire at a company that is supplying the means for global warfare. The job reveal was even more egregious to some considering the fact that Mardoll has crowdfunded from his following in the past for his projects. Others were also shocked by Mardoll’s presumed age: while he calls himself a “trans boy” in his Twitter bio, leading many to believe he was far younger, he said in his tweets through this controversy that he had worked at his job for 15 years.

Meanwhile, after Mardoll went quiet on Twitter, his supporters have lashed back at the backlash, noting that he was being doxed and that information around his personal life was coming out of a controversial 4-chan-esque site, KiwiFarms, while criticizing what they see as an unfair conflation of Mardoll’s need for health insurance with Lockheed Martin’s arms-dealing.

Most of the rest of the internet, though, is hopefully scrolling past another Twitter rabbit hole that is best left unexplored.