Perspective
With the recent news coverage of sexual harassment allegations, the internet has played an important role in publicizing the terrible culture of men using their position of power to harass and intimidate women.This is a positive example of the use of digital media in supporting women who have experienced sexual harassment. But, in this article about online harassment, Soraya Chemaly discusses the way digital media creates an environment where women are subjected to intense verbal and emotional abuse.
Men and women both experience online harassment. According to the survey mentioned in Soraya’s article, one of the key differences in their experiences was that women were more likely to “experience particularly severe forms of online harassment.” This includes a higher rate of sustained abuse, sexual harassment, and stalking.What’s sad about this finding is the fact that the act of being aggressive and intimidating towards women has found a compromising space online. The conversation around sexual harassment mostly discusses it happening in the workplace. With the rise of movements like #Gamergate on the internet, online harassment has made its entry into mainstream consciousness as an ugly side effect of the unregulated use of the Internet.
Social media sites like Reddit, Twitter,and Facebook are very reactive in their approach to dealing with the problems of online harassment. Instead of creating preventative policies, these sites deal with online harassment only after its escalation has either been publicized or caused significant damage to victims. Although social media sites have yet to find solutions, if they’re trying, Chemaly points out that an overwhelming majority of the “tech” jobs at these companies are held by men. How are these companies supposed to deal with a problem they can’t fully define or understand because they lack a diversification of perspective? When dealing with important and widespread problems that perpetuate online harassment, companies need to make big overhauls instead of providing small amendments that act as band aids.
digital feminisms 