Aram Zucker-Scharff

The Emma Watson Naked Photo Countdown Was The Work Of Serial Internet Hoaxers:

The media blames a viral marketing company for the stunt, but the truth is far more disturbing.

Here’s the thing, if you’re threatening to leak nudes of someone, and you don’t have any actual intent to, but you don’t *tell* anyone that. Isn’t it still a threat? Isn’t the intended chilling effect on someone’s speech and actions still there for the duration of the hoax? And isn’t the fundamental point of such an act, to make others think twice about speaking out, still the case?

What I’m saying is… does it really *matter* if 4chan was threatening with intent or some pranksters were threatening without intent? Isn’t it still fundamentally abusing others for power? Is it any less wrong because there were no photos to release?

“Those three problems – women being threatened, women being pressured to change their own behavior to avoid sexual assault, and women being told that they don’t deserve protection unless they stay pure and ladylike – are all individually terrible. But together, they add up to something even worse: a vicious cycle that pressures women out of public life. When we tell women that the threats and attacks they experience are their own fault, for failing to be sufficiently chaste or failing to take “responsible” precautions, we are telling them that they are on their own: that they cannot rely on society’s protection against those crimes. How many women hear that message and decide that they have no choice but to give up that activist campaign or to turn down that higher-profile job or to hold off on writing that article? How hard will it be for UN Women to recruit its next Goodwill Ambassador?”

– The sexual threats against Emma Watson are an attack on every woman.

“Currently, the biggest scholarship program exclusively for women in America requires you to be unmarried, with a mint condition uterus, and also rewards working knowledge of butt adhesive technology.”

10 Stupid Arguments People Use To Defend Comic Book Sexism:

Every time someone brings up the problem of sexism of the comics industry, there are always a few people who are oddly incensed. “It’s bullshit! A double standard! You’re the one with the issues!” they yell. They’re wrong on all counts. Here’s some helpful logic that proves why.

We can be better.