Materiality and Discursivity of Cyber Violence Against Women in India

Gender, Space and Technology

The use of new technologies, such as smartphones, social networking sites (Facebook, Twitter and Instagram) and personal blogs is a ubiquitous feature of contemporary life. The use of these new technologies is expanding and has been recorded to be the highest among 18–34 years old in 2019 (Datareportal, 2019). The Internet has been described as a democratic space, in the sense of Habermas’s ‘public sphere’, where everyone has access and the freedom to express their ideas and opinions (Beck & Beck-Gernsheim, 2002; Castells, 2010; Giddens, 1992; Kaur et al., 2016). Some sociologists suggest that ICTs represent a space to construct identities outside the social constraints of social structures (Beck & Beck-Gernsheim, 2002; Oksman & Turtainen, 2004).

Assumptions around the Internet being a democratic space can lead to obscuring the impact of unequal gender relations in cyberspace (Faulkner, 2001; Henry & Powell, 2015). The public sphere is guided by style and decorum, which are markers of status; therefore, it is pertinent to consider this while discussing online participation as inclusive (Fraser, 1990, p. 64). Inclusive participation could be affected by the political economy of the Internet (Fuchs, 2017). There is a huge asymmetry in the visual representation of content (Fraser, 2004). For instance, analysis of the most viewed YouTube videos indicates that the corporate videos, which has other means of distribution, get more visibility as compared to independent content providers. Therefore, digital affordances of platforms impact the quality of participation (Fuchs, 2009; Fuchs, 2017). Therefore, it shows that pre-existing social, political and economic inequalities have an impact on the ability of people to participate in online cultures and the way that participation is realised.

Conceptualising Harms of Cyber Violence

The advent of social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter and Instagram have revolutionised social interaction, and the use of these platforms have increased over the years, with Facebook reporting over two billion users per month (Kemp, 2017). Yet as the Internet and ICTs are intersecting with social life, it is creating space to commit a range of gender-based crimes online by strangers and intimate partners such as gender-based hate speech, image-based sexual abuse, cyberstalking and doxing (Backe et al., 2018; Dragiewicz et al., 2019; Jane, 2014a, 2014b; Vitis & Gilmour, 2017). There was a 63.5% increase in the number of cyber violence cases reported in India in 2019 (Jain, 2020). #Gamergate is one of the examples of gender-based crimes by strangers, where women game developers, journalists and critics were systematically harassed by online users (Khosravinik & Esposito, 2018; Massanari, 2017). It was an online movement to critique ethics in game journalism, which turned into a misogynist, sexist and violent vitriol against women game developers, journalists and critics (Barnes, 2018). Women are generally subjected to hateful comments on Twitter for expressing their thoughts (Citron, 2014). This continued sexism permeated in the online space reflects a larger culture of technology that devalues women (Gray, 2015). Studies have shown how search engines reinforce oppressive social relationships leading to racial profiling by building into the very architecture of the Internet, thus, perpetuating the existing inequalities (Gray, 2015; Khosravinik & Esposito, 2018; Noble, 2018). For instance, Noble’s (2018) research on the algorithms used by Google reveals how racism and misogynist stereotypes are perpetuated. Concerns have also been expressed on how the Internet is used for crimes such as technology-facilitated domestic abuse, identity-thefts, image-based abuse and cyberstalking (Dragiewicz et al., 2018; Powell & Henry, 2017). It is pertinent to acknowledge that women benefit from technological innovation and the intention of this research is to not demonise the Internet but to explore the ‘effects of technological interactions, exclusion and violence’ (Henry & Powell, 2015, p. 763). This is an important area of enquiry, as cyber violence violates basic human rights to safety and freedom of expression.

Cyber violence represents an invisible mental, physical and sexual health threat to the survivor (Backe et al., 2018; Kaye, 2017). It has an impact on psychological as well as social and cultural dimensions of an individual’s identity (Khanlou et al., 2018; Pashang et al., 2018). Cyber violence leads to survivors internalising a range of symptoms such as depression (Kaye, 2017; Madkour et al., 2014; Park et al., 2018). Relatedly, anxiety and other trauma-related outcomes could be a possibility of cyber violence (Haynie et al., 2013). Many scholars maintain that various forms of cyber violence can have negative short- and long-term impact on an individual’s psychological state, physical condition (such as weight loss), cultural and social engagement (such as experiences of shame and ostracization; Button & Miller, 2013; Gillett, 2018; Madkour et al., 2014). Women experiencing sexual victimisation online may feel shame and embarrassment (Bates, 2017).

Apart from psychological impacts, cyber violence constitutes a form of social control that inhibits digital citizenship not just for women but for other marginalised groups as well (Powell & Henry, 2017). Survivors of cyber violence may withdraw from online spaces due to fear, and in extreme cases may lead to self-harm as well (Van Laer, 2013; Vitak et al., 2017). Online sexual harassment can also have an impact on an individual’s economic life. For instance, potential employers might refuse employment based on a person’s online history (Citron, 2014). This range of psychological, social and economic impact on women due to cyber violence may create a subsystem of fear, shame and self-censorship by which male dominance and patriarchy are maintained and perpetuated.

There is a dominance of research on various kinds of gender-based sexual violence in the Global North (Bates, 2017; Citron & Franks, 2014; Dragiewicz et al., 2019) and a lack of studies in the Global South. Most studies in the Global South explore the scope and prevalence of certain manifestations of cyber violence such as hate speech, revenge porn and cyberstalking (see, for example, Halder & Jaishankar, 2015, Jaishankar, 2019; Mirchandani, 2018). However, there are very few studies on understanding the experiences of cyber violence in the Global South. This research aims to address this gap by exploring women’s experiences of cyber violence in India, to ensure that experiences of violence are not separated from the cultural and social context.

Theoretical Framework

This research is situated within the theoretical framework of feminist standpoint theory (Harding, 2004; Hartsock, 2019). The key question within this approach is whether women can produce knowledge to answer their queries about nature and social relations (Harding, 2004; Hartsock, 2019; Kronsell, 2011; McClish & Bacon, 2002). This is an important approach to situate the present research since it considers that all knowledge is socially situated. Hartsock (2019) revisits feminist standpoint theory through Harding’s (2004) lens, where she posits that women who are oppressed may be disadvantaged through their experience but that can be an advantage in terms of knowledge. Further, as Haraway points out that this standpoint is rooted in one’s cognitive, psychological and political yearning and not a philosophical abstraction (as cited in Hartsock, 2019, p. 236). This research looked at the situated and the embodied knowledge of women survivors of cyber violence. For the purpose of this study, the research adopted Harding’s (2004) four ways to view an individual’s standpoint. First, each standpoint is embodied and visible from the thoughts and experiences of that individual. Second, each standpoint is socially situated, and therefore, the subjects of knowledge are embodied and cannot be reduced to a generalised point of view. Third, an individual’s standpoint is influenced by their cultural grounding, and therefore, it is not a narrative in isolation of other influential factors. Finally, narratives within this approach cannot be considered as homogenous and coherent. So feminist standpoint epistemology views the marginalised community’s narrative (in this study, the women survivors of cyber violence) as the concrete experience from which knowledge is built. It is imperative to place their experience at the centre because building knowledge from one’s own experience would help in exploring issues around it than reducing the narratives by homogenising it at the beginning itself (Collins, 2004; Hartsock, 2019).

Cyber Violence: An Invisible Form of Violence

Since time immemorial, research has shown how women have been subjected to violence on the basis of gender (UNESCO, 2015). Most women described their experience as dehumanising, aggressive and harmful in the online space. One of the participants, a 35-year-old woman, an avid blog writer, was very vocal about her opinions regarding issues surrounding social structures and about the objectification of women in media. Voicing her opinion resulted in a number of lewd comments and threats and one of the threats against her child made her retreat from blogging. She stated,

I was being constantly harassed with lewd messages like ‘I want to lick your pussy then probably your internal frustration would end you pseudo feminist’. I initially ignored it but it is hard to ignore when you know someone out there is waiting to do those things to you. During all this, I got molested in the bus and I was feeling as dirty, frustrated and annoyed. It made no difference where the violation is happening. (Participant 13, personal communication, 5 September 2018)

Cyber violence was not understood as something separate from physical violence but an extension of it by the women survivors. One of the participants said:

I started getting emails describing how I was looking in the morning on my way to the office. They were never exact description of what I was wearing, so I ignored assuming this is some prank. Then gradually the emails became very sexual in nature explaining in graphic details how he wants to have sex with me. I got very annoyed and disgusted and put that email in spam. For the next three months it kept coming in spam and I did not notice. But I wish I filed a complaint earlier then probably I would not have gotten raped. (Participant 1, personal communication, 10 July 2018)

This attitude towards cyber violence is what Herring (2002) called less prototypical violence. The concept of cyberspace and violation of one’s space and dignity within this medium does not conform to our existing understanding of violence. The prototype is defined as the mental depiction of a certain phenomenon (Herring, 2002) and, in this case, cyber violence. When one deliberates about violence, the immediate reflection is on physical aggression and not just mental trauma. Herring (2002) stated how the first mental projection is that of the behaviour, which has a physical consequence resulting in emotional trauma than just emotional trauma. This has been very evidently reflective among the participants. Twenty-five survivors of cyber violence in the list of participants are survivors of rape as a consequence of cyber violence. As discussed in this study’s theoretical framework, the survivor’s presence online is a reconstituted form of their physical body. Therefore, their discourse is an imaginative representation of the physical body and the embodied self. Their performance and discourse of the physical body and communication are believed to be a performance of the sensory system. For instance, few of the participants during the in-depth interview stated how their preconceived notion of cyber violence led to physical harm such as rape, which is also known as TFSV (Henry & Powell, 2015). Women survivors of cyber violence were narrating how technology was used as a means of threat for coercive sex and taking intimate pictures. For instance, one of the women stated how a consensual taping of their sexual activities was used against her to stay in the marriage. She stated,

After four years of marriage, I filed for divorce due to my husband’s temper. I could not take his verbal abusing and occasional hitting anymore. So, when I gave him the divorce papers, he slapped me and laughed at me and then showed our sex tape. During the first year of our marriage he had taped us having sex with my permission. And after four years, he used that to threaten me to not divorce him. He said he would post it online. (Participant 8, personal communication, 13 August 2018)

Similarly, another participant stated,

When I got to know that my stepfather took my nude pictures, I should have had the courage to tell my mom or at least report it to the police. Because of my delay, situation got out of hand and he got what he wanted. (Participant 20, personal communication, 13 September 2018)

Women in their narratives called cyber violence an invisible form of violence because most of them when seeking support for it did not know how to conceptualise the seriousness of it. Both Participants 8 and 20 were threatened to succumb to the perpetrators’ demands in order to avoid shame and loss of dignity in the society. In 25 out of 30 cases of cyber violence within the sample, violation online extended to physical harm. Having said that, the researchers acknowledge that sometimes cyber violence can also be an extension of physical violence. It is very evident from the narratives of the cyber violence survivors that physical violence against women and cyber violence against women feed into each other. Few of the participants used statements like ‘Everytime I received those lewd comments on my picture through emails, I cringed’ (Participant 9, personal communication, 30 July 2018) and ‘My whole body shivered everytime I thought of my intimate picture on the website with obnoxious comments’ (Participant 15, personal communication, 7 July 2018). These terms like ‘cringed’ and ‘shivered’ are reflective of how the body is not absent in this whole process of being present online. All the reactions are an embodiment of the physical body. Survivors conceptualised cyber violence as embedded in their everyday understanding as an invisible form of violence. In doing so, they also narrate how certain conditions are replicated (like using technology to threaten), which endure such violence by maintaining it through fear of shame and loss of dignity.

Cyber Violence—A Gendered Concept

Violence against women is a construction of the ruptures in the fabric of the structures of the society. Survivors in their experience explained that normalisation of cyber violence is not very distinct from the normalisation of other physical violence. All 30 survivors of cyber violence had faced an attack on their body and sexuality. Sense of inflicting abusive comments on a woman’s body is considered as a normal response to any action of a woman. For instance, the participants who were bloggers stated that their opinions on Twitter, blogs and Facebook were met with comments, which had inappropriate sexual connotations and threats of violence. None of the comments had any constructive counterarguments. Such as:

I wrote a piece on pink chaddi campaign and other such campaigns and tweeted them for covering wider readability. Within three hours I started getting comments like ‘you are a frustrated bitch, you need some action’. The next comment would be appreciating the previous comment and say, ‘we all can together fuck you to show you real sex’. (Participant 22, personal communication, 9 August 2018)

I cross posted an article on a rape of a tribal woman on Facebook and wrote a simple comment on how the police is not doing their job and that rape is not just a consequence of what you wear but it’s a systemic problem. One of my female classmates and her friends commented how I can understand rape since I am a slut and have been raped many times. (Participant 27, personal communication, 1 September 2018)

These narratives reflect how every form of violence is gender based, even the verbal abuse, which Jane (2014a, 2014b) has termed as e-bile. The survivors who faced gender-based sexual vitriol indicated how their attacks were an indication of how women’s body is polarised as two extremes. One extreme expects women to be virtuous and chaste while the other sees them as obscene, desirous and as a force of impropriety. These polarised extremes are defined by certain roles. If a woman does not abide by the roles prescribed by society for being chaste, she faces opposition through objectification and sexual threats. This is often termed as the mother/whore dichotomy (Kovacs et al., 2013).

Grosz (1994) and Nussbaum (2010) argue that this objectification is a way to imply that the objectified (in this case, the female body) is a personality with defamed and compromised status. Nussbaum (2010) stated that this objectification is associated with bringing shame as a form of punishment. The narratives of the cyber violence survivors of this study show how this shame as a punishment is used as a form of controlling sexuality and also as a form of leverage to inflict physical harm if the victims do not succumb to their demands. Survivors of cyber violence also felt that their perpetrators’ show of such power was due to the absence of physical contact sometimes. This power is amplified because of the ability to maintain anonymity and complicity. For instance, one of the participants said:

My manager was sending me lewd pictures and sexually enticing messages for six months because he is a coward who could not have had approached me directly like a normal man. He is a pervert; he just wants sex so he thought anonymity would give him an edge for harassing me. (Participant 19, personal communication, 30 July 2018)

Women survivors of various manifestations of cyber violence such as image-based abused, online sexual harassment, cyberstalking and gender-based hate speech are slut shamed not because they are involved in promiscuous practices (Shah, 2015). They are engaged in intimate practice with men they trust. The survivor’s image gets the tag of a ‘slut’ through its perpetual journey in the Web and the context in which they are read. Therefore, most survivors of cyber violence felt they do not become sluts as a result of engaging in sexual activities with men, but they become sluts by defying authority or confronting existing patriarchal structures online. In other words, as Hunter Moore, the founder of the revenge site IsAnyoneUp.com stated in an interview ² that pictures of women on the site do not become sluts because of their sexual activities but because they made themselves digitally available.

The Silencing and Exclusion of Women from Public Space

Most women survivors of cyber violence, in this study, discussed how cyber violence forced them to quit participating online. Few survivors stopped for a year while others stopped for a few months. Certain survivors also stated that they have become dormant online and try to be careful about what they post. Out of the 30 participants, 20 of them have withdrawn from the public sphere because of fear of their family’s safety, perpetrator’s anonymity and complicity of what they are experiencing. This is pertinent in the understanding of how cyberspace has become an extension of the physical space where women become vulnerable through subordination. These various cases discussed above clearly shows how these violations are a manifestation of male social dominance in both the physical and cyberspace. For instance, one of the participants said, ‘it’s like men never stopped harassing … now the perverts get to enjoy behind the screens’ (Participant 3, personal communication, 1 September 2018). Similarly, a blogger said:

With internet, people said it is an alternate space to voice your opinion. I did voice my opinion. However, it’s the same thing all over again. Men in my life find subtle ways of controlling me and now people from different parts of the continent find means of sexual harassment and threats to control my opinion….So when exactly can I voice my opinion? Now I am scared to voice my opinion online. (Participant 13, personal communication, 5 September 2018)

The construction of cyber violence by the survivors through their narratives reflects how they are pushed away from participating out of fear of the perpetrators and also the forum as discussed above. Harassment and other kinds of violence take place in both physical and online space, and it takes place with the backdrop of misogyny and sexism. As a result, most of the survivors stated in their narratives as to how it becomes a part of their everyday lives. Like, one of the survivors said during the interview, ‘I did not pay much attention to the porn friend requests I got, I just deleted them’ (Participant 4, personal communication, 20 July 2018). Another participant said, ‘I ignored those spam emails because they are emails you know…not someone pointing a knife at you’ (Participant 1, personal communication, 10 July 2018). Yet in both these cases, violence against women is aimed at a woman’s body in a sexually explicit and debasing way. It is also important to point out how the only solutions in the forums were to have their identity anonymous so that perpetrators do not identify them as women. Survivors in this study felt it as one way of silencing women and taking away their authority over their life and their agency to perform online.

Another theme that emerged in the study was ‘secondary victimisation’, which begins with gender blaming. There are four major ways of gender blaming that emerged from the narratives of the survivors, namely highlighting women misusing their freedom, holding them accountable for their victimisation, critiquing a survivor’s discourse of her experience of cyber violence and conceptualising cyber violence as disembodied resulting in invisibilising the trauma of the victim. Most of the survivors also said how they should have just taken the help of the civil societies since they would do things anonymously. Their experience of seeking justice was not how they expected. None of them felt supported. It was especially tougher for the one’s whose family also unconsciously ended up blaming them for the violent act. A woman whose identity is being configured by digital technology for reasons, which do not fit the hegemonic dichotomies of masculinity and femininity, renders her to be a ‘slut’. This is one of the reasons behind victimising the victim while she seeks agency from the law. In doing so, the focus is always on creating a moral panic. As a result of moral panic, the focus shifts to the superficial aspects of the cases of cyber violence. For instance, families, police officials and academicians used phrases like, ‘how does love have anything to do with sharing naked pictures’ (Respondent 35, personal communication, 30 August 2018), ‘problem is giving more freedom…they end up bringing the family name down’ (Respondent 33, personal communication, 12 July 2018). Such a chain of solutions motivates survivors to take up irrational coping mechanisms (Halder & Jaishankar, 2015). These moral panics resulting in victim blaming and secondary victimisation also lead to a reframing of the problem of violence with solutions, which can never be a long-term solution for addressing cyber violence.