By Saritha Irugalbandara
Image Credit: Feminism in India
“Men are trash කියන්න හොඳයි? ගෑණුන්ට බඩු කියන්න හොඳ නෑ? එහෙම කොහොමද?”
For this piece, I screened a year’s worth of Sri Lankan social media discourse using a list of 30 keywords, most related to the dreaded f-word and the patriarchy that, upon hearing it, opts to mask its fear by masquerading in a misogynistic, sexist tirade. This particular Tweet was an important one. It translates to “So, it’s okay to say men are trash? But we can’t call women badu (object)? How is that fair?”. In less than 280 characters, this user perfectly encapsulates the fundamentals of what this article attempts to address: the patriarchal construction of womxn and the feminine, how this construction is challenged, and the inevitable friction as these two realities coincide in the vast digital space.
Whether it is an unfamiliarity with the base concept of feminism or a refusal to admit to one’s own role in the patriarchal system, which leaves womxn and sexual and gender minorities at a perpetual systemic disadvantage, there is a routine conflation of criticisms of the patriarchy and the behavior it fosters as some mass indictment of men and their individual treatment of womxn. ‘Men are trash,’ notably, refers to how this system privileges, rewards, and excuses forms of sexism and misogyny. It is inherently a political sentiment utilized not just by women but also by LGBTQI+ individuals. Yet, a world conditioned to think in binaries often wrongfully assumes an anti-men rallying cry orchestrated by the dreaded feministas. As this particular Tweet elucidates, protest is met with counter-protest even on the vast internet, generally through tactics of silencing, dismissing, objectifying, and harassing into submission.
The bottom line is that the outrage over the divisiveness of this sentiment overwhelms any fruitful consideration of the sexism its protests.
Global movements such as #MeToo and regional movements such as #NiUnaMenos are examples of how the internet has become a pivotal modality in challenging oppressive gendered structures of treatment. Notwithstanding the inherent questions of intersections, access to online spaces, and the slippery slope of presuming womxn, and ergo their needs and wants, as monolithic, these movements are a salient indicator of how resistance and mobilization take shape in the age of the internet. To those empowered by this newfound collectivism that transcends physical, geographical barriers, the internet is becoming a space of resistance. By providing both a public space as the cover of anonymity if one so desires, it is a popular half-way home for both activism and digilantism.
Where principles of collectivism characterize the former, digilantism against online violence – or e-bile – could be inspired by collectivist thought but is usually enacted on a case-by-case basis, rarely engaging broader themes of equality. The success of this digilantism in dismantling systems by focusing on the individuals instead of the system is limited. Yet, it is becoming a popular act of ‘micro resistance,’ especially to achieve some form of informal justice.
Liechty posits that modernity is “an external condition” which provides the novelty of ‘a freedom that is simultaneously viewed as pivotal to the construction of the self as modern but is also a source of fear’. With modern technology, this fear is married to its role as a modality of disruption, mainly the imbalanced structures that determine who has agency, voice, and the right to exercise both (Nepal). The internet naturally threatens the patriarchy and peddlers of it and the wide platform it affords for resistance – the form in which this fear is articulated, however, is vastly varied.
For this piece, I looked at Tweets and Facebook posts within the time period of 12 March 2020 to 12 March 2021 discussing gender, violence, patriarchy, feminism, and resistance. The purpose was to understand how these acts of microresistance – whether in form of statement, criticism, or mobilization – is perceived, and how the patriarchy manifests in the counter-resistance that follows. It is a very small snapshot of how patriarchal constructs are reinstated, weaponised, and utilised in the online space, specifically of how women’s agency in the online space is challenged. Of the data collected, 30 posts were manually coded for the following analysis.
13 posts were located which criticized a flurry of ‘feminist’ activity online that was condemning several individuals for the targetted gender-based harassment of a womxn based her statement on romantic relationships with ‘toxic (cis) men’. The collective outrage was met with widespread criticism positing that feminism was ‘blowing things out of proportion’. There was also much stipulation by users that the patriarchy ‘doesn’t strike as much of a problem’ to them, personally, despite increasing online discussion. Much is also said about ‘feminist bullies’, particularly in instances when womxn would come to the aid or defence another womxn. Such rhetoric was prominent in 4 separate exchanges, where there was a womxn being sexually harassed and objectified by men, and other womxn defending the womxn in question. 1 of the instances that garnered significant discussion was of a womxn dancing, resulting in various vulgarities, misogynistic slurs, body shaming, and prominently the stipulation that feminism is incompatible with the performance of sexuality online ‘for attention’.
Much like offline feminist spaces and activity, patriarchal counter-resistance against not just feminism but also gender-based collectivism takes on the forms of tone policing, dismissing, and belittling. The gaslighting that womxn go through for expressing discomfort can now be leveled at increased capacity, converted into calculated and targeted harassment based on expressing opinions that challenge the patriarchal status quo. Notably, the collectivism and how the internet amplifies this is specifically reviled and dismissed, that somehow womxn speaking up is the problem and not the sexism that necessitates it. Needless to say, the policing is most prominent where women’s sexuality and sexual expression is of salience—the idea of womxn performing this for attention heightened due to these engagements happening on the internet. The performance of gender and sexuality is an act of resistance for womxn, yet the patriarchal policing of womxn’s bodies in and of itself continues to overwhelm this resistance.
Womxn taking a direct, strong stance against a form of violence or discrimination, including sexual violence, access to education for girls, and systemic barriers faced by women in the workplace, were met with tone policing, harassment, and targeted attacks in 5 instances. A specifically disturbing incident was noted when a user, in response to a man who wrote about how cultural norms have prevented Muslim girls from realizing their full potential, posits that preventing “too much education” was a wise choice to prevent young girls from becoming ‘too vocal’ like “Sri Lankan Twitter women.” This response, albeit misogynistic, is quite measured compared to how the same user engaged with several womxn on the same thread, including a rather disturbing Tweet in which he stipulates that while men who abused women were cowardly, one must not blame the man in this instance because the womxn in question deserved it for being loud and opinionated. In another exchange, a male user posits the sad state of affairs, which requires an aggrieved womxn to make a public plea to convince the public to stop harassing her over an intimate video. While most engagements were generally in agreement, two specific interactions stood out.
One labeled her public appeal a ‘cheap cliche that ignoring the problem would have been the wiser option, whilst the other stipulated this was “a bloody good (publicity) stunt” for an upcoming song. In the first instance, we observe the comparison between how men and womxn advocating for equality might be treated differently, how counterresistance often takes on a viscerality centered on sexual and gender identity when directed at the latter. In both these cases, the conception that women somehow deserve the violence and trauma inflicted on them is apparent. As such, when women access and exercise their agency in a public space such as the internet, the pushback tends to demand womxn’s silence and conformity.
In a similar vein and authored in response to a larger discussion on gender parity, several Tweets were observed of users insisting that women should strive for the ‘right’ place instead of an equal place in society. Except for 3, the other tweets were posted by users who identified as men. Interestingly, the Tweets of this nature by womxn focused more on how the patriarchy did not affect them personally, how ‘feminist’ voices in the online spaces seemingly served little purpose, while those by men generally attempted to discredit the premise of equality based on biological sex difference, and that the root of inequality was in-competing between women instead of men and masculinity; little to nothing is said of patriarchy. Once again, womxn displaying agency is met with efforts to suppress. The ‘right’ place is perhaps the perfect patriarchal metaphor for sequestering womxn to the private sphere, invibilised and forced to be content with the unequal status quo.
The postulation that certain manifestations of patriarchal masculinity treat womxn’s bodies as “not that deep” was also a recurring theme. In one exchange, a user whose online presence was largely progressive and ‘pro-women responds to a Tweet by a womxn on patriarchal structures of power and gendered codes relating to consent, as ‘I have a boyfriend’ has more success in rebuffing the advances of men than simply saying no. The user keeps insisting that it’s “not that deep,” that this is only a case of not wanting to pursue a ‘taken’ woman. On Facebook, 8 posts were observed where womxn had documented online encounters with men who would relentlessly message and harass them, often despite an overt expression of disinterest. While the comments under these posts were usually positive and supportive, some comments engaged in victim-blaming. These comments strongly criticize the womxn for publicizing the harassment they’ve faced, suggesting that ‘it’s not that deep, that they could just ‘block and delete,’ and stipulating that these womxn were simply looking for attention.
In one instance, the harasser was soliciting sex and asking the womxn to meet in person. A comment by another womxn says that the victim should have met the harasser and confronted him in person, alleging that the womxn’s refusal to do this means that the harasser would continue this behaviour with others. The blatant dismissal of women’s experiences evident in both these instances indicate how womxn’s resistance is generally belittled as hyperbolic expression of minor inconvenience. While the internet has given way for women to carve out individual and collvective brands of digilantism, it is evident that the onus to not be harassed and violated continues to fall on women. The suggestion continues to be for women to police or alter their presence and behaviour, instead of attempting to understand the depth of patriarchally mandated behaviours and how these are intrinsically linked to the patriarchal construction of womxn and womxn’s bodies. Even on the internet, where womxn who have access to it may carve out space to exercise their agency, the counter-resistance is often “no, not like that”.
What I looked at in the article is only a microcosm of a vast digital landscape, accessed by 10.9 million Sri Lankans as of early 2021. Where our traditional institutions fail to hear marginalized voices let alone support them, the internet and social media can help some womxn to carve out and propagate important networks and spaces within which expression, collectivism, and individual activism and dissent often enmesh together in a way that is more difficult to achieve offline. However, as with offline ecosystems, online ones too are governed by patriarchally gendered structures that prevail. The most common one, as I observed, involves policing womxn’s resistance itself, from belittling modality to stripping issues of nuance and context to flat out rejecting the validity of resistance based on nothing of substance. While this behavior can get quite violent, most of it is blissfully unaware of its own misogyny. In fact, the misogyny and sexism are almost obscured by focusing less on the person and instead of picking at the seams of the acts of resistance itself. Where policing bodies becomes more difficult online – due to the lack of an institution of enforcement and the visibility that could invite backlash – policing how these bodies resist the patriarchy seems to be a better, easier option. But I did say it is almost obscured because the patriarchy is as transparent as it is fragile.
With the visibility that the internet affords, this transparency is evident as it blurs the boundary between public and private. And when you look right through, the message is a familiar one; sure, here you may be heard, but the speaking must still be on our (the patriarchy’s) terms.
About the Writer
Saritha Irugalbandara is a social media analyst at Hashtag Generation, focusing on recording and reporting gender-based dangerous speech and eliminating sexuality and gender-based cyber sexual exploitation and violence. She is also a freelance journalist and writer, and her areas of interest lie in the intersections of gender, sexuality, race and ethnonationalism, and the politics of memory. Saritha is a recent graduate from the University of Aberdeen and aspires to branch out into research on gender and racial justice in Sri Lanka.