Female Bloggers
Sexual Threats Stifle Some Female Bloggers – washingtonpost.com
Some female bloggers say their colleagues just need thicker skin. Columnist Michelle Malkin, who blogs about politics and culture, said she sympathizes with Sierra but has chided the bloggers expressing outrage now. “First, where have y’all been? For several years, the unhinged Internet underworld has been documented here,” she wrote, reposting a comment on her site that called for the “torture, rape, murder” of her family.Report the serious threats to law enforcement, she urged. And above all: “Keep blogging. Don’t cut and run.”
Whoa! This is a very scary day — the day I agree with something Michelle Malkin has said! Malkin is absolutely right, though — and she has been on the receiving end of some of the vilest crap I’ve ever seen directed towards anyone, man or woman, on the internet.
In the grand scheme of the internet, I’m nobody. I’m probably less than nobody. I have, however, been online a lot longer than most women (about 15 years now) and I often write about controversial topics. Over the years I’ve been insulted many times and threatened a few times. My experience is that the best way of dealing with that kind of thing is to make it public.
Being online is a lot like driving a car. I think you can really tell a lot about a person by how they drive. If they’ve got a hidden angry and agressive thing going on, they’re going to be the kind of person who’s a real asshole behind the wheel — or in the comments section of your blog. You can never be 100% sure, of course, but odds are that a person who acts like a jerk when they’re driving or commenting isn’t going to intentionally do anything to you in real life. (Unfortunately, creepy behavior behind the wheel is a whole lot more dangerous than obnoxious blog-commenting.)
Joan Walsh, editor in chief of the online magazine Salon, said that since the letters section of her site was automated a year and a half ago, “it’s been hard to ignore that the criticisms of women writers are much more brutal and vicious than those about men.”
As a former regular reader of Salon, I have to say that I haven’t seen that to be the case at all. I have, however, noted that Joan Walsh is a bit of a whiner at times so… I’m taking her claim with several grains of salt.
There, I got my gratuitous insult against a woman in. Do I get my prize now?
Posted by RebeccaHartong on April 30, 2007 under Uncategorized
A slightly different take on this from someone who has seen her share of commenter abuse:
http://www.shakesville.com/2007/04/online_offline_everywhere.php
She was also threatened in email as well as having someone actually come to her house and pound on the door shouting epithets.
There are way too many crazies out there. I personally would rather err on the side of caution and just turn over threats to the police so they can investigate and catch those who might actually act on what they say. And maybe those who won’t act will get the hint that saying stuff like that can get you arrested, fined, or jailed.
That article also references an incident with a woman who runs a computer tech blog who has had her picture posted with nooses around her neck, threats of sexual violence and more — all by people who just happen to disagree with her brand of happy tech advice. That’s some serious issues with scale of argument when you disagree that someone says your desktop should be bright colors by telling her you’re going to rape her guts out.
When I was in university, some guys who didn’t like me much ran me down and, when I went into my dorm room, began kicking in the vent on the door. I called the cops. The cops told me that if they didn’t get there in time and the guys break in, I’m in my rights to club them with a baseball bat. You can be damn sure I asked the policeman three times to repeat it and had witnesses he said it so when it did happen, I was covered.
Just crossing t’s and dotting i’s, that’s all I’m saying.
Oh absolutely. Crossing, dotting, all very good. You clubbed guys with a baseball bat? You go, Michael!
Hm. I read the shakesville.com post and McEwan seems to be saying some of the same thing I said: threats or especially vile posts should be made public. She makes a good point about the Washington Post story. The Post should have identified the web sites that made the threatening posts against Kathy Sierra. (Maybe their thought was to not give those creeps any more publicity?)
I do disagree with what I take to be McEwan’s attitude towards Michelle Malkin, though. She claims on one hand that there’s no excuse for anyone being threatening at all, but on the other hand she seems to be saying that Malkin has it coming for being such an obnoxious rabble-rouser and rich enough to afford security. I hate Michelle Malkin’s ideas as much as the next tree-hugger, but — no. Even Michelle Malkin doesn’t deserve some of what she’s received.
People who are incapable of debating ideas will resort to threats and personal insults.
The rest of us just use personal insults for their entertainment value.
Actually… something like this has just come up recently. I know… I’ll blog about it!