Monday 12 November 2012

Feminist bloggers and online harassment: my research and how you can help

So about half an hour ago, I asked the Twitterverse if there were any feminist bloggers out there who would be willing to talk to me about their experiences of being bullied or harrassed online.

My Twitter just exploded.

A massive thank you to the @VagendaMagazine and everyone else who subsequently RT'd my request. My research is for my MA, in particular a Women and Gender Studies seminar on feminist social movements. I'm planning to discuss how the harassment and violence feminists experience online leads us to choose between safety and freedom, but I also want to consider the many innovative ways we have responded to trolling, harassment and bullying.

As I'd like to respect the privacy of those willing to share their experiences, I thought I would post the questions here and then if there are people out there would like to respond privately, they can contact me on Twitter, or send me an email address and I'll get in touch.

If you'd like to share publicly, I'd like to enter the comments section of this post as evidence in my research.

Thanks once again.

Please consider these questions more as guidance and don't feel free to answer them all.

1. Have you ever felt unsafe as the result of an interaction you have had with someone online?
2. Would you describe yourself as having been the victim of online harassment, bullying or threats? Can you describe what happened?
3. How did you respond? If the posts were on a collective blog site or other community site, how did the site respond? How did the other community members respond?
4. Do you think we can ever stop online harassment and bullying? What steps would you like to see taken to reduce these experiences?
5. In an ideal situation, how would interactions and exchanges take place online?
6. Would you ever consider writing under a pseudonym or blogging anonymously?

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

2 comments:

  1. PS if you've already blogged about your experience and would just like to leave me a link to check out, that would also be highly appreciated. Thanks again

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  2. "They wrote that they were going to come find me and make me "pay". They started to encourage their friends to harass me too. One man said he wanted to "kick me in the vagina" and his friends liked the comment. The men declared they were going to find out my details, share them on 4chan and come after me."

    One of the first responses I had on Twitter was from Sian, who sent me this link to her story: http://m.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/feb/09/closure-of-hooters-breastaurant-welcome?cat=commentisfree&type=article

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