5 - Walking Alone Online: Intersectional Violence on the Internet

Summary

THIS ARTICLE DISCUSSES the targeting of women and minorities on the internet, specifically focusing on matters which have arisen within the digital humanities community in the Global North. I explore the connection between Milo Yiannopoulos's key role in Gamergate, the online harassment of women journalists, and the targeted attacks against women academics working in digital humanities. The link between these phenomena is organic, with Yiannopoulos playing a critical role in attempts to terrorize women into silence and compliance. The article also elucidates the reasons why an online mob mentality can overrule social boundaries and shows how hatred is directed mostly at individuals who stand at the intersection of several marginalized groups. I explore how the rise of the far right, currently referred to as the alt-right, is directly linked to harassment that women academics experience and conclude that despite the internet's potential as an egalitarian space, the virtual plane is so profoundly tainted by hetero-patriarchal reality that it allows figures who should be marginal to take centre stage and orchestrate coordinated assaults against those who have become easy targets. I conclude that the threats of seemingly fringe individuals cannot be taken lightly in a world in which so many can be manipulated through the smoke and mirrors of the internet.

Background

The Importance of Gamergate

I have chosen to start with the events surrounding Gamergate because this controversy has become one of the most obvious instances in which women were publicly targeted, in this case for their perceived role in influencing game production. Gamergate made headlines in major newspapers as it brought the mainstream public into what became one of the ugliest battles fought online. Most of us did not know enough then to even begin to imagine what the future had in store. Now we know there was a backlash against achievements in terms of civil rights for minorities and women, a backlash which went beyond the gaming world and infiltrated politics with the use of trolls to enact political change that sustains the worst instances of traditional hegemonic power. Russian trolls interfered in Brexit, perhaps leading to the United Kingdom voting in favour of leaving the European Union.