Content warning for mention and discussion of sexual assault and harrassment.
As social media develops and changes, so, too, do the ways in which people unite in the name of social progress. In the past few years, Internet culture has facilitated a number of incredible steps forward on the path to social justice: #BlackLivesMatter, #YesAllWomen, and Trans Day of Visibility are some favorites that come to mind. Unfortunately, Internet culture has also given oppressive users the ability to be even more vocally against the progress made by women, people of color, queer/trans people, disabled people, and members other marginalized groups. Occasionally, these parasites are so loud that they are able to start entire movements such as the men's rights movement, meninism, and straight pride.
While it's usually easy for those of us on the web, who are committed to actual social justice, to filter out or casually make fun of the noise, occasionally it actually affects us. Betrayal can really rock a movement and it seems like it's happening to Internet feminism more and more as the Internet makes conversations and people accessible and vulnerable. In recent years, popular internet "feminists," like Tumblr's Josh Macedo and YouTube's Tom Milsom and Mike Lombardo (who were associated with John and Hank Green) were revealed to have preyed on young girls. Youtuber and accused rapist Sam Pepper even attempted to use feminist politics as a scapegoat for a video in which he sexually harrassed women in public. And now, writer Grace Spelman has outed Muggle.net and Feminspire co-founder Ben Schoen as a harrasser for his aggressive attempts to court her via Twitter and Facebook.
At best, when these men are called out for their behavior, they will deny or excuse themselves altogether. At worst, they will reveal their true colors and denounce or disparage feminism as a whole. In a response to The Daily Dot's piece on his interactions with Spelman, Schoen wrote:
"I have done more for the cause of advancing women’s rights than any of the people who are criticizing me. This so-called crisis is manufactured by Ms. Spelman as a way to increase her profile as a social justice warrior. I grew up without a father and I spent years protecting my mother from scummy men and dealing with all of the difficulties that come with not having a male role model."
Schoen's logic, that it is acceptable to harrass a woman just because he loves his mother, is downright scary. Even scarier, this line of reasoning is hardly unique; when called out for abuse, many men write off their accusers by citing the things they've done "for" women (e.g. Sam Pepper). Similar to how some straight people think they've given something to queer people for not murdering them, women are expected to thank men for treating them like fellow human beings.
Behavior like this is about power. Men in online feminist communities refuse to acknowledge or believe that they have power over their "fellow" feminists (women and non-men alike), and so they feel entitled to use that power to gain access to those people. It's hard for women to say no to men, especially ones they themselves or others look up to. Men who fail to acknowledge that--or who decide to capitalize on it--are inherently dangerous.
So, when abuse like this is so common, can we trust men to be in our communities at all? Some say no, although many writers (like Katie McDonough at Salon and Kate Stoeffel at New York) argue that men should have some kind of place feminist movement. It's important to note, however, that most of the women who push for men's involvement in feminism believe there are things men need to do, or ways they should behave, to "earn the label" of "feminist." However, when so many men in online feminist communities are abusing those spaces, perhaps asking if men can be feminists is not enough. Instead, we need to reflect on whether or not men should be feminists. Not for the sake of their egos, but for the sake of feminists who are not men.
(Author's note: I don't like writing anything about feminism in which men are the main focus, even if I'm critiquing them. As a palette cleanser, I encourage you to look at the awesome work being done by a group called Uplift, as well as YouTuber thegeekyblonde, who are doing work to protect women from abuse within online communities).
