Sick of being told to suck it up
Speaking of misogyny, and threats against women – Jessica Valenti has felt compelled to leave social media because of threats to her daughter age 5. Valenti is a writer, remember – social media are part of writers’ equipment now. Being forced off social media is crippling. It’s a figurative form of kneecapping.
On Twitter, popular writer Jessica Valenti wrote: “This morning I woke up to a rape and death threat directed at my 5 year old daughter. That this is part of my work life is unacceptable.”
Valenti, author of 2007’s Full Frontal Feminism and co-author of Yes Means Yes: Visions of Female Sexual Power and A World Without Rape in 2008, becomes the latest in an increasingly long line of women who have been harassed and threatened online by anonymous stalkers from SNL cast member Leslie Jones to Gamergate targets Anita Sarkeesian, Briana Wu and Zoe Quinn.
In a series of tweets, Valenti lamented the daily barrage of attacks and threats online by people who are threatened by feminism, while also slamming law enforcement for not taking online threats seriously.
She also hammered social media companies who did little to police vicious and threatening commenters.
Little or nothing. Mostly it’s nothing.
https://twitter.com/JessicaValenti/status/758347558003544065?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw
It gets very, very sick-making.
Here’s a good news-bad news story for you about online threats.
The good news is that it’s a story of the FBI and the U.S. Attorney taking online threats seriously, to the point of arrest and even opposing a bail request.
The bad news is that the authorities probably took action because a large corporation reported the threats.
Still, I think on the whole it’s a positive development. One of the obstacles to getting authorities to act is that not enough investigators and prosecutors have experience with these kinds of cases.
The dirty secret is that “harassment is part of the product being offered.” Twitter & Facebook & the rest don’t call it that, of course. They like to use words like “engagement.” But without the huge and constant pile-ons, the traffic figures would look a lot more anemic.
Of course, when harassers target the wrong people, or those with a platform, like movie stars or possibly Jessica Valenti (we’ll see), the companies make feeble motions to slap a bandaid on that particular mess.
But heaven forfend they should actually apply the blocks necessary (for instance, see here) to prevent the garbage.
Also, remember Kathy Sierra years ago, Trouble at the Koolaid Point. One of the best tech writers in the business, writing about being harassed into silence way back then (2007?). Talk about being deprived of your free speech rights.
I am a writer, but I do not use social media, which impairs my ability to market my work effectively. It shouldn’t, but that’s the way it is now. But I cannot be on social media. I have struggled with depression my whole life, and this sort of abuse would possibly put me over the edge. I hate that I lack the courage to take this on, but at some point, we have to decide whether we can do it, and I for one cannot.
How many other women are in the same boat? How many women are unable to make a full commitment to try to achieve their dreams because of the hate? I know it’s way more than a few.
Is Valenti famous enough to get anything done about it?