Cyber Dystopia
The following article is an excerpt from our latest printed Ecosprinter titled Reclaim Your Rights! – The Social Issue. We decided to bring you the articles from this edition in a digital form as well.
by Sophie Walker
Back in the 90s, Nicholas Negroponte of MIT professed that increasing accessibility to the internet would ‘flatten organizations, globalize society, decentralize control, and help harmonize people’. Like him, many people believed the new realm of cyberspace would usher in a utopian society: a post-identity space that could sustain true democratic participation. Yet 20 years on in the UK, the internet is being used to undermine democracy. British politicians are being forced out of politics as they face unprecedented levels of violent, sexist, racist and other discriminatory harassment online.
As Britishpolitics has become increasingly polarised, we have seen a huge increasein abuse aimed at all membersof parliament, but it’s becoming clear that this increase is disproportionatelyworse for women. During the lead up to the 2016general election, Labour MP Jess Phillips received 600 rape threats inone evening alone. She was alsoexposed to Twitter conversations from mendeliberating whether or not they would even wantto sexually assault her. Mhairi Black, MP for theScottish National Party, has received similar abuse.“I have been assured multiple times that I donot have to worry because I am so ugly that no onewould want to rape me,” she told the House of Commonsin 2018. Diane Abbott, Labour MP, has beenno stranger to racist and sexist abuse during herthirty-year career. However, Amnesty International revealed during thiselection campaign she received45.1% of all online abuse aimed at MP’s.
It’s easy to dismiss online abuse as being only ‘virtual’ as if it has no actual consequences in the ‘real’, offline world. This is simply not the case. As a feminist writer, Laurie Penny argues “The inter-net is public space, real space; it’s increasingly where we interact socially, do our work, organise our lives and engage with politics, and violence online is real violence.” And those who remain in politics are increasingly aware of the physical danger that comes with this decision. Just last month, Jess Phillips received online death threats and a man was arrested for harassing her at her office calling her a ‘fascist’ and banging on her windows.
Phillipsrecently tweeted about her fear of being hurtor killed. Some may dismiss this fear as being dramatic but it iscompletely reasonable in thewake of the brutal murder of Jo Cox in 2016. TheLabour MP for Batley and Spen was shot in thehead and stabbed repeatedly, as she arrived forher surgery, by a man shouting ‘Britain first’. Whilsther murderer was not an active member of theonline community, he was an avid reader of right-wingrhetoric and violent hate speech.
Currently, womenmake up just 32% of the British Parliament. A figure that’s not highenough. Yet with theannouncement of the 2019 election, manyMP’s have announced they won’t be standing for re-election. Of the MP’sstepping down 30% are women soat first glance this appears proportional. If we look closer, the maleMP’s stepping down aretypically retiring but the women are leavingpolitics much earlier in their careers (on average,10 years younger). Many women have saidin their resignations that abuse is a main factor.Labour MP, Gloria de Peiro, who previously steppeddown as Shadow Minister, said she is not runningfor re-election partly due to “toxic political debate” and “grim” onlineabuse. MP’s Dame CarolineSpelman, Heidi Allen and Nicky Morgan havealso said that they are quitting because of theimpact abuse is having on their families.
While the UK population mewls about how preventing Brexit would be ‘undemocratic’, representatives of half the population are being forced to rescind their democratic participation because of rape and death threats. With every female MP who steps down because of harassment, the message is reinforced that women are neither safe nor welcome in politics. We cannot continue to dismiss harassment until it turns into ‘real violence’ - by that point, it is much too late.
Sophie is a gender specialist and women’s rights activist from Manchester. She is currently working with Opt Out, an open-source tech movement tackling gender-based violence online.