Is it me, or is this a stupid idea? Re 'Beard' award.

[LRDtheFeministDragon]

Just read the article here: www.theguardian.com/technology/2014/aug/07/misogny-online-charles-leadbeater-barrier-social-good-internet

Apparently, there's an idea of starting an 'award' to promote safer spaces for women on the net. The article claims it's 'for women who succesfully contend with online abuse'. Admittedly, the person suggesting it phrases it very differently, and says it'd be 'to support people who are supporting women to be able to use the internet safely'.

The first is a really fucking awful idea IMO. What's next - 'wahey, you got raped and reported it, good girl!' (as opposed to 'boo, you didn't report and just felt horribly traumatized, you failure').

The second - if it's an award to support 'people who are supporting women' strikes me as unpleasantly paternalistic.

Am I missing something?

I wonder what he'd say if we said what we need is women-only space?

Surely you're just slapping the 'winner' with a great big target on their back? And yes very patronising.

When I read your topic I assumed the 'beard' award would be for the person with the most luxuriant beard. Which would be epic (and I think there are some places that do beard awards, but a world championship would be great).

I agree with you that the award seems a bit paternalistic. Also it is not really addressing the problem, which is cultural. A better idea would be some sort of award/ system where websites could be incentivised to avoid sexual steriotyping for either gender (ie websites primarily targeting women not covered in pink and having articles like 'how to please your man by shutting up'. ok that was a bit over the top but have read articles that that has been the subtext).

isn't it sort of accepting that women will experience this abuse, and then rewarding them for being "robust" or "strong" in some way decided on by men?

surely supporting/encouraging site owners and ISPs to clamp down on misogyny and abuse in the first place would be a better use of time and money

Yes, exactly!

I'm just stunned by it ... what a useless idea.

it's like a primary school having an award for the child who was most bullied that year

misses point entirely

Reads article still doesn't get it

There is a Beard World Championship , FruitSalad

www.worldbeardchampionships.com

Is part of it to applaud sites which have a policy that they apply in regards to sexism in the same way that most have a policy around eg racism that gets applied? That wouldn't be a bad thing I think loss of women would be interested in knowing where they can post where the mods well react to out of line stuff by deleting banning etc as on mn

Being serious, I just feel it's really patronising that a man feels women need special protection. Surely women are just as capable as a man of pressing delete and sending twats to the trash icon.

I agree moderators should have a policy of quickly blocking these lowlifes, but not especially to protect women, but because they stop forums being able to have proper debates.

seven - I'm sure that would be part of it, reading the article. I just think it could backfire horribly. MN is a target for MRA trolls because they know for lots of us it's a relatively pleasant, female-dominated posting environment.

I think the whole internet needs to be properly policed. It's not just about forums, it's about harrassment law needing to catch up.

Certainly there needs to be a clear stance that harries ment and stalking laws apply to Email, texts, social media and the wider web, just as they ably to phone calls and letters.

However, we must always be very weary of 'policing' the Internet becoming a back door to censorship.

@poupeedeson ooooh nice.
Sorry for getting off topic

This is a horrible idea.

It would be a slap in the face for women who haven't coped well with online harrassment. We are not all Mary Beard. I have no doubt that some women's lives and MH have been really seriously affected by online abuse.

Something like a kitemark for sites or forums which don't tolerate online abuse of women and who moderate vigorously would perhaps be more useful. I don't know how you'd do it in practice: maybe have a "gold-standard" set of moderation rules that individual sites can sign up to abide by.

I think the police need to be better informed about online harassment too. Perhaps it would even make sense to have a specific police site or number you could report online harassment to.