Psychos and misogynistic online losers have been attacking Emma Watson after she gave an impassioned speech about gender discrimination.
The actress gave an impassioned speech on feminism and gender at the U.N. headquarters in New York this weekend to launch the “HeForShe” campaign which aims to galvanize one billion men and boys as advocates for ending the inequalities that women and girls face globally.
Watson’s speech, which was met with a thunderous standing ovation, not only called for action from male allies, but clarified a persistent misconception about feminism in general.
Unfortunately, not everyone was thrilled by her appeal and have been sickeningly active on that front. Attacking feminists was made popular by Rush Limbaugh back in the 90's, who instead labeled them "Feminazis" and has legitimized this form of abuse. But nowadays the attacks are becoming more serious and more dangerous to women all over the world:
On September 21, actress and UN Goodwill Ambassador Emma Watson stood up at the UN Headquarters in New York City and delivered a powerful speech condemning the harm that gender discrimination causes to both men and women, and inviting men to become active participants in the global struggle for equality. The next day, anonymous individuals from the message board 4chan set up a website targeting Watson with sexual threats, counting down the five days until, presumably, her private nude images will be made public. The threats against Watson are an attack on me — and I take them personally. We all need to.
The site threatening Watson was greeted with glee on 4chan and Reddit, where commenters explicitly stated their hope that the threats would force her to abandon her feminist campaigning. "If only her nudes got leaked and she had the load on her face. Her feminism kick would be over," a commenter wrote. "If this is true her recent feminism rally is going to be shutdown hard," wrote another. "Feminism," one 4chan user opined, "is a growing cancer."
How twisted are these people who refer to feminism as a "growing cancer?"
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The global struggle for gender equality is what caused this outburst. Something I would have thought so anodyne and predictable by now that nobody would even notice it. Instead it incited a furious response.
And I think we can dispense with whatever convenient delusions we may have had about the release of those pictures. It's not for harmless masturbatory fun. It's not a celebration of the human form. It's not adolescent hijinxs. It's humiliation, plain and simple.
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But in modern America overt misogyny does have a very important Godfather, validator and inspiration. This guy, who routinely decries the "feminization" of America and refers to feminists as "feminazis." He's feted and honored by some of the most important members of our political system. It's not as if these online woman haters have any reason to believe that their ideas are outside the mainstream. They clearly aren't.
Threatening to release explicit photos of Watson and other women apparently is becoming the new norm and it's horrible. I tell you this, I stand with Emma and Amanda Taub when she says this:
Regardless of whether any photos are released, the threats against Watson are already an attack on all of us. And we should all take it personally.
