Facebook's violently sexist pages are an opportunity for feminists
..why is Facebook so committed to supporting gender hate speech? One possible explanation is that its company culture has naturalised sexist norms to the point where its members truly believe, along with the creators and users of pages such as Raping Your Girlfriend, that violently misogynistic content is acceptable and funny...
There's all sorts of stuff wrong with capitalism, but one thing I'd miss if I woke up in an economic utopia tomorrow is a good boycott. Offended by something racist, homophobic, classist or sexist about a company's product or advertising? Boycott. Tell the company why you're boycotting. Encourage others to boycott. If enough people agree with you, companies change the way they behave. Yay! If only there were as straightforward a way to react to ALL the racist, homophobic, classist, sexist arsery one encounters daily. But it's hard to boycott society (though God knows there are times I try).
Then there's Facebook. Facebook is a special case. On the one hand, it's a profit-driven corporation, but on the other, it's a corporation that makes its profits through provision of a platform for people's interests, beliefs and social habits. And when it stops being that platform, it stops making money. Sadly, we live in a society in which many people are interested in rape jokes, believe violence against women is funny and habitually consume cultural products that depict women as glossy sex things. And so, Facebook is full of pages and groups that graphically depict and explicitly condone violence against women.
As Tuesday's open letter to Facebook on behalf of more than 65 gender equality groups points out, Facebook routinely removes content that is violently racist, homophobic or Islamophobic. The company – quite rightly – would ban a group that showed two gay people lying unconscious at the bottom of the stairs with a caption like, "Next time, don't hold hands". While it'll approve content that condones tying women up and raping them, it certainly wouldn't tolerate an equally "humorous" page that riffed on the lynching of black people.
In spite of complaint after complaint, Facebook continues to deem content encouraging violence against women inoffensive. When journalists publicise a particularly indefensible page (usually a page that Facebook has already been made aware of by users), the company tends to act by shutting down that particular page. Without protocols in place to combat gender hate speech, however, this is pointless.
The question that arises is why Facebook continues to allow this kind of content to be published. It emits unconvincing chirps about being anti-censorship, but trips itself up by moderating, as pornographic, images of women breastfeeding, or body-positive pictures of post-mastectomy female torsos. This blogpost cuts wittily to the heart of the issue. The author lifts a typical porny pic from another Facebook page, Photoshops in a smattering of pubic hair, and posts it to her own group. Result? Overnight decision – a 30-day ban.
So, the censorship explanation falls flat as a beautifully tattooed post-mastectomy chest, and the question remains: why is Facebook so committed to supporting gender hate speech? One possible explanation is that its company culture has naturalised sexist norms to the point where its members truly believe, along with the creators and users of pages such as Raping Your Girlfriend, that violently misogynistic content is acceptable and funny. At base, there's little difference between classing these pages as inoffensive humour and saying: "Lighten up babe – some women can take a joke. Do you know what would sort you out? A good raping – ha ha."
But Facebook has a brand and has money to make. The #FBrape Twitter campaign is hitting where it hurts,.. read more:
