Advocating for industry despite attacks

She said these individuals and groups were determined to portray farmers, exporters, employees of the live export trade and anyone who supports the trade, in a negative fashion.

As someone who has been on the receiving end of this behaviour, Ms Matthews said while people may dismiss the actions of these trolls as being mostly harmless, the lasting impact of death threats, bullying by individuals and groups and ignorance of the truth, can result in very serious consequences.

She said it was important for everyone to remember there was another person on the receiving end of personal attacks, something that was easy to forget when they never met them - and the repercussions could be more damaging than many realise.

"It is not the language necessarily, it is the tone and the intention or insinuation," Ms Matthews said.

"It can also be misinterpreted easily and people are mislead by the false claims or horrific images that are very outdated.

"That is why it is so dangerous."

Ms Matthews is a farmer, has her own agriculture contracting business, as well as another business selling high quality Australian and New Zealand Merino wool clothing and products, as well as being a qualified and experienced onboard stockperson for live export vessels - and is a much-lauded social media agvocate.

Hailing from a farm an hour inland on New Zealand's central North Island, in the hills near Whanganui, Ms Matthews fell in love with Australia and in particular WA about 11 years ago.

Having grown up in the industry, coming from a family of farmers on her dad's side, she has always been a passionate advocate for farmers, the industry, best practice management and wool.

This inherent connection to livestock - and in particular sheep and wool production - was the driving force behind becoming an agricultural influencer, or 'agvocate'.

It all started with Instagram before adding a TikTok account to the arsenal - and in more recent times X (formerly Twitter) to spread her enthusiasm and industry truths to a wider audience.

"I started posting pictures to Instagram to show how picturesque farming and the Wheatbelt can be and then I started posting videos to TikTok to show people why we do it, what we do, and what we're doing to improve our systems," Ms Matthews said.

As an agriculture influencer using her popularity on social media to help educate people on the various aspects of rural life and the livestock industry, she has become 'viral' on social media.

Ms Matthews said the popularity of her accounts came about organically and led to 15,600 Instagram followers and 453,600 TikTok followers where her videos have been viewed more than 114.9 million times.

Unfortunately in an endeavour to tell the truth, she has become a prime target for trolls and cyberbullying.

While many would argue the solution is to stop sharing her stories on her social media accounts, Ms Matthews will not let the trolls win.

She said it was not fair to let the bullies force people into submission, especially when she was just sharing the truth.

"It's just being open and honest about our industry," Ms Matthews said.

"Honesty is the best policy.

"I think people respect the raw truth, not the sugar-coated, edited version.

"I just started by posting random videos from the farm.

"Once I started seeing some of the comments from people about the industry, I realised there was a need to create a connection between urban areas and the country."

Through her role working on live export ships as an onboard stockperson, Ms Matthews has been on four long-haul live export voyages, giving her plenty of time to experience and document the conditions of the vessels and their precious cargo.

This footage and her subsequent commentary has been the basis of her social media content.

She said online trolls who were against the industry and want it closed, did not like the imagery and video proof of the dramatic improvements, clean conditions and high standards of animal welfare that were presented in the posts.

That's where the trolling started.

"It really ramped up when the MV Bahija was in the news," Ms Matthews said.

"People started posting nasty comments and I even had a picture of me in an abattoir photoshopped.

"It was also then that one of the activists, who I had spoken to a few times at port and she has admitted to being slightly manic, decided to post death threats and told myself, another onboard stockperson and a truck driver, that we should be shot in the head."

In the online attacks, Ms Matthews has been called a psychopath, an insane person, unhinged, an absolute idiot and of course had threats made to her life, just for posting footage and comments that are not provocative, threatening or fabricated.

Ms Matthews said her posts were there to show the truth and the reality of how the industry worked.

While people against the industry have disputed her information, particularly with outdated information, footage and photos, she said she was extremely lucky to have had the support of so many people who help her cope with the intimidating and threatening behaviour.

Ms Matthews said The Livestock Collective's leaders workshop was invaluable in teaching her how to have conversations with people who might not completely understand the industry - or who disagree with some of its more controversial aspects.

More than 100 alumni have been put through the course which helps young people working in agriculture, advocating for their industry via social media.

"It's been a really supportive network for me and really helpful when my own social media blew up," she said.

"It helped me to manage how I responded to people's different views.

"It is all about using shared values as a conversation.

"A lot of the stuff that gets posted or said about me doesn't hurt, it is just frustrating."

Ms Matthews said unfortunately not everyone had the benefit of this kind of training and being the target of an online comment could lead to a drastic deterioration in an individual's mental health, WA producers are experiencing challenging seasonal conditions on top of what has been a tough year because of falling sheep prices, uncertainty caused by the phase-out policy and other cost pressures like the impending biosecurity protection levy.

She said online trolls had created another level of stress for farmers and people in the supply chain.

Ms Matthews mentioned a former veterinarian involved in the industry who is constantly referenced by activists.

She questions how much knowledge any person who has not been involved in the industry for a long time is credible, with a lot of changes since put in place.

This is just one of the many examples Ms Matthews has, also saying there are frequent social media account changes and new accounts being developed all the time to try and discredit the work being done in the live export industry.

Acknowledging that a lot of time does go into being a social media influencer, she said it was important to provide an industry platform to deliver relevant information in a popular format.

"It has given me so many opportunities and I wanted to show people how great the industry is and educate them by being honest and capturing it in real time," Ms Matthews said.

"The people and the practices are something to be proud of - they are so advanced and different to the outdated footage and incidents the activists are always using to get sympathy for something that is not the reality anymore.

"I think farmers appreciate seeing the support for their industry and also having the onboard perspective, what it's like for the animals and their comfort, it gives them more confidence in the industry."

Ms Matthews said she spoke out when others couldn't and her insights show the public what they can't access - educating people about agriculture, the sheep industry and the live export industry.

She does not use filters on her images but said her messaging was up against people using artificial intelligence and other software to present an alternative view.

"The trouble these days is the way the algorithms of social media apps are," Ms Matthews said.

"It is led by clicks and when you have a large number of people working together to frame the industry as being bad, it skews it to their favour.

"Some people just can't accept the truth either and they blindly believe the false information.

"No one bothers to fact check - they assume because one story has more likes, it makes it true."

Ms Matthews said it was important for the industry to keep sharing its stories and for people to not be afraid to post to social media, knowing their was support available.