Today I wanted to offer some comments in relation to an article entitled The police response I never expected, by Nina Funnell (18 August 2016). This article was prompted by the now highly-publicised discovery of a web site that is alleged to contain many nude photos of Australian high school girls.
The web site that was the focus of recent Australian media attention went off-line for a time only to re-emerge ten days later. The author of this article claimed that “police managed to have it taken down“, although I have found no evidence of that being the case.
Nina bemoans the ‘fact’ that Australian authorites are not taking the problem seriously, and that the action they did take included warning girls not to take compromising photos of themselves. The latter action is apparently not seen as constituting ‘education’ but rather ‘victim-blaming’.
This is the default feminist response to the issue of taking responsibility for one’s own actions, and doing what one can to minimise risks to oneself. This aspect, in the context of online porn, was addressed in an article by Corrine Barraclough. Articles detailing the feminist perspective on this issue can be reviewed here and here.
By way of background, articles *very* similar to those that recently appeared in the Australian media have regularly appeared in other western countries in recent years without generating much in the way of a fair and meaningful response. A cynic might suggest, given the salacious appeal/guaranteed outrage of the subject, they appear on a cycle as per gender wage gap, etc.
It is dubious whether Australian police can wield any power in relation to the ongoing operation of the web site. And even if they could – presumably via cooperation with foreign law enforcement agencies – they would still need to identify those photographed and prove they were underage at the time they were photographed. No small task, especially when it appears that very few of those whose photos featured in the web site have lodged police reports. Perhaps, realistically, all Australian police could do was to warn young people of the danger of allowing themselves to be photographed whilst naked.
It’s ironic that various articles use the term ‘victims’ to describe the girls whose pictures are featured in the web site, whilst running photos of the girls within their articles (see for example).
The article contains a quote from Sharna Bremner, from ‘End Rape on Campus Australia‘:
“I agree we must be talking to young people about these issues, but we should start by talking to potential perpetrators about the consequences of their choices, rather than always putting it on girls to manage [and prevent] their own exploitation and victimisation”
Wait a minute – time for a reality check, for we know that:
Most of the nude photos published online are taken with consent, and are of people who are not underage
Where the photos were taken and/or uploaded without consent (e.g. revenge porn), again both perpetrator and victim may be male or female
As a consequence, Ms Bremner’s implication that “potential perpetrators” = men/boys is incorrect, as is the implication that girls have a monopoly on “exploitation and victimisation“. I might note here also whilst implied, it has not been verified that the web site in question only contained photos of nude women/girls.
Ms Bremner was also quoted as saying that:
“To direct parents to warn their daughters, without also directing them to talk to their sons is inappropriate. This stems from the same logic that tells girls not to get drunk or wear short skirts, while failing to spend even one second talking to boys about consent”
I agree that parents and other authority figures should talk to both boys and girls, but they should give the same message to both, in the knowledge perpetrators/victims aren’t split along gender lines.
This reminds me of ‘respectful relationships’ programs in schools, such as those run by the White Ribbon Campaign, that lecture boys about respecting girls but not necessarily the reverse. This despite that fact that Blind Freddy can see that girls can, and often do, disrepect and abuse boys.
Nina then proceeds to hold up the highly contentious Canadian public ‘awareness’ campaign known as ‘Don’t be that guy‘ as a good example of how authorities should take a more active role by educating (=shaming) people (=men/boys) into not posting online photos of people (=nude girls).
This despite the fact that the value of public awareness campaigns in changing errant behaviour is generally considered to be dubious, as is discussed in this post.
Nina claims that the Canadian campaign led to a 10% drop in the number of rapes in Vancouver BC. This article may be the source of her claim, but the evidence is hardly conclusive.
I do agree with her though that, in general terms, education campaigns targetted at specific groups in the community are more likely to be effective than broad-brush public campaigns. You just have to make sure you target the right groups based on objective evidence rather than ideological persuasion.
And yet curiously feminists lobby for/support broad-brush public awareness campaigns in the case of domestic violence, sexual violence, sexual harassment/discrimination, etc. And although these are directed at the community generally, they still routinely imply that perpetrators/potential perpetrators are male, whereas in fact they are invariably either male or female.
And to close off this discussion, just one example of the double-standard that invariably goes hand-in-hand with any feminist position on gender:
The internet has provided a haven for those inclined to strike out at people in anonymity and usually without fear of repercussion.
The purpose of this blog post is not to propose solutions to this problem, but rather to take a step back and call for an objective, measured and truthful discussion of the relevant issues.
There’s no doubt that women are often targets of online abuse, although there does appear to be a tendency towards embellishment and exaggeration with regards to the nature and extent of such abuse. The author of this article, for example, would have us believe that life on the internet is unbearable for women due to the oppressive behaviour of male trolls.
What is generally absent from articles on this subject is an honest admission that a considerable amount of online abuse is directed at men, and that a substantial proportion of those perpetrating abuse are women/girls. Have a look at the information provided in the chart below, extracted from a 2014 paper by PEW Research. (see 2017 updated here)
Why do so many commentators and ‘experts’ fail to acknowledge these significant points?
Surely not the desire to support the feminist narrative of women as the perpetual victims of an unyielding male patriarchy?
The findings of a survey by Norton painted a different picture. Unfortunately however the results were compromised by poor methodology, a common problem with pro-feminist research. In this instance the researchers failed to include questions about male victimisation via online abuse.
So why has this issue garnered a large and increasing amount of attention in recent years? Are people becoming nastier? Is that nastiness becoming more gendered in nature?
There are a number of significant factors that need to be considered here.
Further along the scale one encounters behaviour that does not involve actual threats, but is so persistent and pervasive as to be genuinely threatening in nature.
At the other end are interactions that are little more than assertive dissent in relation to a particular idea or opinion being put forward.
More and more we are witnessing the definition of terms such as online abuse and ‘trolls’ expanded to include behaviour and people who seem undeserving of these pejoratives. Also troubling is the fact that the same types of behaviour decried as abuse or trollish when used by conservative/non-feminists, are seen as acceptable or even noble when used by feminists/leftists/SJW. This issue of finessing definitions to suit a narrative is discussed in another blog post.
Why do people, particularly in this case feminists/SJW, so readily misinterpret online communication in this way? I’d suggest that in part it is a deliberate strategy, whilst at other times simply a misunderstanding.
It has been suggested that feminists interpret relatively innocuous messages as hurtful because online communication is a forum where women are truly treated as equals. Men speak to women online as men would speak to other men in real life. It is said that many women are unaccustomed to this gloves-off banter, and interpret it as vindictive rather than as heartfelt and direct. I believe that there is an element of truth to this, although again it is but one of several factors in the mix.
One other reason for exaggerated claims of online hate and abuse is that it provides an excuse to instigate progressively harsher and more intrusive forms of censorship. Censorship is a recurring theme in real-world feminist tactics, and one which I address in another blog post.
Turning again to feminist research, let’s examine a project called the University of NSW ‘Cyberhate Project‘, which is being supported by the Australian Research Council (‘ARC’) with AUD$372,095 of public funding.
I was more than a little concerned to learn that this research project will only survey women. That looks an awful lot like a research project designed with a particular conclusion already firmly in mind. I immediately took this up with the ARC, who dismissed my complaint regarding this obvious ideological bias in the following manner:
“Proposals for ARC funding undergo a rigorous peer review process involving experts in their fields who assess the quality of projects and the capabilities and achievements of applicants. The planning and management of ARC-funded research projects is a matter for individual researchers and institutions (in accordance with ARC funding agreements).”
I’m left wondering just how many of those peers were likely either fellow feminists or sympathisers. Hands up who else thinks that this might not be the most effective vetting process in the case of a polarised issue such as this?
As is virtually de rigeur at The Conversation, readers comments that were deemed unsupportive of the feminist author’s position were quickly excised. In this case that amounted to at least one in four comments. Of the many I read before they disappeared, none of these were in the least bit threatening or abusive.
I posted one of those comments removed by the moderator. It simply stated:
“Emma, Is it not a fact that men are subject to more online harassment than are women? Is it not a fact that many of the perpetrators of online abuse are women? … Might it therefore not be more accurate to say that the real online divide is one between trolls and the rest of us, rather than between men and women as your paper implies?”
Given that men are subject to a considerable amount of online harassment, they should not be excluded from research on this subject. The fact that the finger of blame is often pointed at men alone, when we know full well that many women perpetrate online harassment/abuse, does tend to stick in this writer’s craw. One might consider at this point the example of Australian radfem Clementine Ford.
As with domestic violence and various other topics, feminists persist in labelling issues as “gendered” when they are not, in order to create support for their global war-against-women conspiracy.
What now follows is a collection of links to articles that provide various perspectives on the issue of online harassment/abuse:
Constructing the cyber-troll: Psychopathy, sadism, and empathy (December 2017 edition of ‘Personality and Individual Differences’) This study asserts that most trolls are male, but I suspect that the findings may have been compromised by one or more of the following factors:
* small sample size with 2/3 of respondents being women, and who were possibly self-selected
* incorrect assumptions (by survey respondents) regarding the gender of trolls
* differing and possibly gender-based judgments as to what constitutes trolling
The media dangerously misuses the word ‘trolling’ (3 July 2017) This article conveniently neglects to mention that this ‘problem’ has been primarily brought about through misusing the term ‘trolling’ to describe reasonable dissent against the prevailing leftist/feminist narrative.
Australia tackles revenge porn with new eSafety Commission (23 November 2016) AFAIK this agency’s brief was initially gender-neutral but it quickly assumed a pro-feminist stance, making its focus the online harassment of women and girls.
The top 20 Australian politicians, with respect to receiving online abuse, are all right wing males (1 July 2016) Australia. Typical feminist take on this issue, for e.g. mis-labels harassment as “online violence” and “sexual violence”, does not provide corresponding statistics for men/boys harassed online, nor divulge that much abuse is perpetrated by women/girls. The implication is, as always, men=bad & women=men’s hapless victims.
Eight things not to say to someone facing online abuse (20 April 2016) See point 4 in this article by misandrist Laura Bates: “Silencing is the end goal of the majority of abuse”. Erm, so all those feminists systematically lodging bogus reports to have people’s social media accounts closed, they would be online abusers then?
Girl gets Instagram revenge on cheating ex (25 March 2016) Reverse the genders in this story and “one poor lass” becomes ‘online harassment by abusive former boyfriend’
“A new survey by the Internet security company Norton (for which I’m an ambassador) shows that nearly half of all Australian women (47 per cent) experience online harassment. That rises to a staggering 76 per cent for women under 30. Unsurprisingly, 70 per cent of women believe online harassment is a significant problem and 60 per cent believe it has got worse in the past year.” And nowhere in this article will you find corresponding statistics in relation to men – the survey didn’t include questions about male victimisation. I wonder why not?
Online harassment of women at risk of becoming ‘established norm’, study finds (8 March 2016) Australia. Guardian article drawing on the Norton survey which air-brushed out male victimisation/female perpetration, and thus robbed the findings of social context. No doubt a good thing from a feminist perspective if that would have diminished the victim status on which their ideology is based.
Were examples of specific rape threats made public? No. How about a formal complaint to police? Apparently not. “Oh look, another politician ginning up fake threats to boost her feminist cred. Never seen that before….” (Source)
Emma Watson: Trolls threatened to publish nude photos of me (8 March 2015) This article quotes Emma as saying most of those posting threats were other women, yet this article (in pro-feminist news.com.au) claims that men were to blame. As mentioned earlier, this represents an all-too typical bending of the facts to suit the narrative.
#womenagainstfeminism receive hundreds of threats (Scroll down their Facebook timeline to 16 August 2014 for details) Somehow I don’t think it would be men issuing most of the threats … but surely not women?
This June 2014 reddit discussion thread, and linked newspaper article, is about female Twitter trolls
