“I Was Grabbed by My Pussy and Its #NotOkay”: A Twitter Backlash Against Donald Trump’s Degrading Commentary

Abstract

The present study assessed how individuals used the #NotOkay hashtag on Twitter to respond to Donald Trump’s comments about grabbing women by their genitals. We analyzed 652 tweets which included commentary about the hashtag. Three main themes emerged: (a) users’ acknowledgment and condemnation of rape culture, (b) Donald Trump and the national state of sexual assault, and (c) engaging men and boys to end violence against women. Our findings emphasize that powerful political leaders can be salient symbols of rape culture, and Twitter is used as a public platform to organize and challenge problematic social discourse and call for action/change.

Keywords

sexual assault social media politics rape culture masculinity celebrity

Introduction

Celebrities’ perpetration of violence against women has infiltrated news headlines over the last 5 years. In 2014, footage of National Football League (NFL) running back, Ray Rice, assaulting and dragging Janay Palmer’s (his fiancé) unconscious body out of a casino elevator was viewed nearly 4 million times on YouTube. In 2015, 35 women were featured on the cover of New York Magazine for disclosing being sexually assaulted by Bill Cosby, historically endearing comedian and star of the situation comedy, The Cosby Show (Maas, 2015b). In 2016, footage of (then) presidential candidate Donald Trump was released saying he “[could] do anything to women,” including “[grabbing] them by the pussy” because he was “a star.” When asked to comment, he dismissed his behavior as “locker room talk” (“Kelly Oxford Sexual Assault Stories,” 2016). In response to the visibility of celebrity perpetration of violence against women, public discourse in this area has gained momentum as social media provide an outlet for active participation as opposed to passive consumption through newspapers and television (Kreiss, Meadows, & Remensperger, 2015).

Media scholars have investigated how celebrities are portrayed in media and how they influence a variety of issues, particularly health attitudes and behavior. When photos surfaced after hip-hop artist Chris Brown assaulted his girlfriend and fellow hip-hop artist Rihanna, Stephens and Eaton (2017) investigated Black girls’ perceptions of how different mediums attributed blame. Girls’ perceptions of blame attributions varied based upon the source of the news. For example, mass media was perceived to blame Chris Brown, whereas hip-hop media was perceived to be more neutral toward him. The research also showed that parents minimized the abuse and affirmed Rihanna “got what she deserved for acting up” (Stephens & Eaton, 2017). When National Basketball Association (NBA) player, Magic Johnson, spoke out about HIV, one study found that his fans had greater knowledge about HIV and more positive attitudes around HIV prevention and treatment compared to other NBA fans (Brown & Basil, 1995). Major League Baseball (MLB) player, Mark McGwire, was found to influence health issues for better and for worse. Those who were more involved (i.e., watched more, followed more) with Mark McGwire were more likely to speak out against child abuse when he came out for the cause (Brown, Basil, & Bocarnea, 2003). However, when he was caught using the performance-enhancing steroid androstenedione, his fans showed a greater interest in the steroid, compared with other MLB fans (Brown et al., 2003). These studies suggest that celebrity influence has the potential to both positively and negatively shape attitudes and behavior.

Today, social media platforms provide mechanisms for the public to comment on celebrity behavior with the potential for their commentary to have far-reaching impact. In response to the violence Ray Rice perpetrated against Janay Palmer, survivors of intimate partner violence shared their stories on Twitter through hashtags which illustrated #WhyIStayed and #WhyILeft abusive relationships (Cravens, Whiting, & Aamar, 2015). Twitter users also voiced their opinions about Janay Palmer and her decision to stay in a relationship with Ray Rice through the use of #WhyIStayed. Analysis of these tweets revealed a moral divide with users either accusing Janay of greed and mental instability or celebrating her as courageous and dedicated to her family (Davis & Love, 2018). In response to numerous women disclosing sexual assault experiences perpetrated by Bill Cosby (Maas, 2015b), Twitter users created pictures with text (i.e., “memes”) that depicted Bill Cosby as a rapist and linked them via the #CosbyMeme hashtag, a hashtag which was previously used to support him. The current study assesses the #NotOkay hashtag—a hashtag created by author Kelly Oxford in response to (then) U.S. presidential candidate Donald Trump’s behavior. The hashtag invited women to share their first experiences of sexual assault to validate the many forms of sexual violence against women. The #NotOkay hashtag facilitated millions of disclosures as well as commentary that supported survivors and challenged societal norms around sexual violence (“Kelly Oxford Sexual Assault Stories,” 2016). In response, www.notokay.ca was established as a source of support for survivors of sexual violence in Canada, suggesting that hashtags can result in activism beyond social media discourse.

The use of hashtags as a way for marginalized individuals to come together in discursive protest on social media through a united word, phrase, or sentence is known as hashtag activism (Yang, 2016). An enduring example of hashtag activism is illustrated by the #BlackLivesMatter movement. This movement has grown to sustain support for police brutality victims in response to the acquittal of George Zimmerman in July of 2013 for the death by gunshot of African American teen, Trayvon Martin. When hashtags are used to resist harmful narratives about violence against women, the process is known as hashtag feminism (Khoja-Moolji, 2015). In July of 2014, photos spread through social media of high school student, Jada, after her alleged sexual assault. Twitter users mocked her pose (one leg extended and the other bent exposing her genitals) with the hashtag #JadaPose. Feminists responded with a variety of hashtags in support of Jada: #StandWithJada, #JusticeForJada, #JadaCounterPose, and #SupportJada (Williams, 2015). The violence committed against Trayvon and Jada was a catalyst for Black activists to use Twitter as a platform for hashtag activism to combat violence against Black people, who have traditionally not had an equitable voice and representation in larger media outlets (Williams, 2015; Yang, 2016). Indeed, Black women are using Twitter as a site of resistance as the largest racial group on Twitter (Smith, 2014). However, hashtags have proven to be a source of resistance for women in general, not solely for Black women.

In accordance with a social drama framework (Turner, 1980), these hashtags serve as a form of resistance when social discourse peaks after dramatic crises unfold, providing a window of time where individuals cluster together based upon their interpretation of the “crisis” (McFarland, 2004). Celebrity scandals, including attention to their perpetration of violence against women, create a visible and dramatic crisis which occurs on a national level through media exposure. Social media provide an outlet for people to organize, voice, and connect their opinions, despite these individuals never meeting in person. The social drama crisis that originated from Donald Trump’s actions illustrates a culture that condones and perpetuates violence against women, often referred to as rape culture (Buchwald, Fletcher, & Roth, 1993). The #NotOkay hashtag serves as a window into the public’s perception of rape culture, which was brought to the forefront of public discourse following Donald Trump’s comments and his defense of them during the 2016 presidential campaign. The current study investigated how individuals used the #NotOkay hashtag as a form of resistance during the 2016 presidential campaign.

Method

The current study of publicly available Twitter data was deemed exempt by the Institutional Review Board at a large, Midwestern University. We used NCapture, an NVivo software attachment (Bazeley & Jackson, 2013), to collect publicly available tweets containing the hashtag “#NotOkay.” NCapture relies on Twitter to provide a sampling of tweets for analysis within the qualitative software NVivo. The sample that is captured is dependent on the number of tweets available as well as the amount of traffic on Twitter. We captured all tweets that contained #NotOkay from October 9th-11th, 2016, yielding 8,752 original tweets. Due to the ongoing presidential debates, we limited our analysis of tweets to the above 3-day time frame, in the likelihood that these tweets were in direct response to the leaked footage of Trump’s commentary, rather than a general response to the ongoing presidential debates.

The study team consisted of three researchers with expertise in media, violence, and public health: a graduate assistant and two undergraduate assistants. Due to issues of language interpretability with only one bilingual team member and coding linked content, the first step in our analysis process involved removing non-English tweets and tweets containing links to other content (e.g., websites, memes). Next, we took a random sample (15%) of the remaining tweets, which resulted in an analytic sample of 1,377 tweets. We began with 15% of the data, with the goal of drawing additional random samples if thematic saturation, or the point at which no additional themes emerge (Bowen, 2008), was not achieved in the 15% random sample. To identify those tweets that provided specific “commentary” about Trump’s “pussy grabbing” statement (vs. those tweets that focused solely on survivors’ disclosure of sexual assault as the initial purpose of the hashtag), we isolated and removed tweets that were solely disclosures of violence to focus on “commentary” (e.g., reactions to Trump’s statement, opinions) tweets.

Next, using thematic analysis (Braun & Clarke, 2006), five study team members (M.M., H.M., S.L., S.P., and E.S.) coded the “commentary” tweets for specific content. Coders met to discuss and sort codes into major themes. Discrepancies in themes were discussed and resolved via consensus until an initial set of themes was agreed upon. Next, tweets were coded by team members using the initial set of themes. Coders met again to confirm themes, with discrepancies resolved via consensus. The full data set was then coded using this codebook. Finally, the team sorted tweets into thematic categories and subcategories continually revising the names for the themes and subthemes to most accurately represent the narrative within the tweets.

Results

Among the commentary tweets (n = 652), three overarching themes emerged including (a) acknowledgment/condemnation of rape culture (f = 304), (b) Donald Trump and a national dialogue about sexual assault (f = 226), and (c) engaging men and boys to end violence against women (f = 122). These themes are described below, with exemplars for each theme. To uphold the integrity of users’ narratives, grammar and spelling errors within the tweets were maintained.

Acknowledgment and Condemnation of Rape Culture

Twitter users remarked that Donald Trump’s commentary about “grabbing women by the pussy” signified “rape culture,“ which was reinforced through “locker room talk,” sexual objectification, and harmful cultural norms about sexuality. First, Donald Trump described his comments, which occurred in the context of a conversation with a male media personality, as “locker room talk” (Diaz, 2016). A subtheme of “locker room talk” emerged as Twitter users identified this attribution as an excuse that minimized the severity of his actions: “Shut down the #lockerroom talk. It’s sexual assault. #notokay,” “It is not locker room banter. It is #sexualassault and it’s #NotOkay.” Twitter users called out the dismissal of this type of banter among men as “locker room talk” to be an example of rape culture: “This is the promotion of rape culture from a presidential nominee. #notokay #debates.” Users remarked on the danger of normalizing conversations about sexual harassment and assault: “‘Locker room talk’ implies that admitting to sexual assault is just something that guys do together. #notokay,” “The real danger is not that he said it, but that in his mind ‘just locker room talk’ is okay. #notokay,” and “DON’T normalize and defend the sexual abuse and objectification of women by calling it ‘locker room talk’ #notokay #heforshe.”

Second, a subtheme emerged with commentary on Donald Trump’s sexual objectification of women. Twitter users rejected the perception of women as something to be thrown away and dismissed as replaceable: “Girls and women are not parts. We aren’t tits, ass, legs . . . We are humans. Our parts belong to us and us alone. #notokay,” “#notokay @realDonaldTrump fliers, we don’t have signs saying “please take one’, we’re not swag. I was grabbed by my pussy and it’s not okay.” Twitter users also described a harmful perception that women are only good for sex or bearing children: “This is the reality of rape culture and men like Trump who feel that women are property, that we have no license over our bodies. #notokay,” “Trump once agreed his daughter is a “hot piece of a . . .” Are we really surprised that sexual battery is a part of his daily routine? #notokay.”

Third, as further expansion of the theme of rape culture, tweets that highlighted and attempted to resist harmful cultural norms about sexual violence were common. Traditional cultural norms or “sexual scripts” paint men as aggressors and women as gatekeepers in sexual scenarios (Simon & Gagnon, 2003), which excuses men’s aggression in sex and shifts the blame to women for not stopping the aggression. For example, one user shared, “Girls are taught it’s their responsibility to say no over and over. Instead of boys being taught to ask before they touch. #NotOkay.” Another user identified these harmful traditional sexual scripts in sexual assault prevention programming: “@kellyoxford 1st year, Penn State I attend seminar on how to avoid sexual assault on/off campus. Don’t walk alone or drink heavily #notokay.” As an extension of cultural norms that place gatekeeping responsibility on women, users also called out society’s routine victim blaming, which perpetuates the power structure supporting the accused and not the abused (Maas, 2015b): “Most girls/women don’t tell abt sexual assault because they think they won’t be believed or nobody will take action. They’re right. #notokay,” “Even more heartbreaking is the number of clients I have who were taught to think it’s ‘normal.’ It was them. Their fault. #NotOkay #Utah1in3.” Some remarked on the backlash women often receive when they disclose experiences of sexual assault: “Every time a woman points out she was assaulted by a man, she is somehow a man-hater. #NotOkay.”

Donald Trump and the National State of Sexual Assault

#NotOkay was also used to challenge Donald Trump as a presidential candidate, to challenge his supporters, and to comment on him as a symbol of the state of sexual assault in the United States. For example, users expressed, “Let me put this in perspective a little. You shouldn’t have to fear being alone in a room with the POTUS. #oneinthree #notokay @kellyoxford,” “I’m fatigued by the horror that is Donald Trump. I cannot believe we have a rapist running for president. #notokay,” “America r we really going to elect a SUPER PREDATOR as President? #notokay.” Other users commented on accepting this kind of behavior from a White presidential candidate but not Bill Cosby as an indicator of White supremacy in misogyny: “We vilified Cosby, but willing to except Trump as POTUS who admits he sexually assaults women he finds attractive. #racism #notokay.”

Other users directly challenged Trump supporters in their tweets. Some accused Trump voters of reinforcing the misogynistic power structure: “To anyone who is still going to vote for Trump . . . You are the reason this country faces a horrific rape culture. #notokay,” or questioned their rationale: “Don’t understand how any voter can be ‘undecided’ after what was revealed about Trump. They’re not ‘just words.’ #notokay.” Sexual assault survivors decreed their disgust with Trump supporters: “As a rape survivor, I am beyond disgusted that anyone would think that Trump’s behavior/comments toward women are excusable #notokay,” “As someone who has actually been pussy-grabbed by men like Trump, this should be the final straw for anyone on the fence. #notokay #fuckthat.”

The hashtag was also used to comment on national discourse about sexual assault. For example, users commented on Trump’s lack of awareness surrounding the pervasiveness of sexual assault: “#NotOkay that women have to tweet about sexual assault experiences to make a presidential candidate understand how pervasive they are. 2016.” One user commented on the strength of sexual assault survivors in the wake of national discourse condoning sexual assault: “The staggering courage of women voicing how their bodies were trespassed, abused & a country threatening again to condone assault. #notokay.” One participant thanked Kelly Oxford for starting the #NotOkay movement on Twitter: “@kellyoxford I’m saddened & sickened, but thankful for your vision. #notokay is a wake up call for the world, not just our troubled country.” Others described how privilege, particularly economic privilege, protects those who commit sex crimes, “In the US, rich people can rape anyone he likes. You can buy anything inn t he US. #notokay,” while survivors are ignored, “After being abused by men, women are being used as bullets in the US presidential race and will be ignored when it’s all over. #notokay.”

Engaging Men and Boys to End Violence Against Women

#NotOkay was also used to call upon men to end violence against women. For example, one user exclaimed, “All men should be required to spend the rest of October reading #notokay—heartbreaking and sickening. We HAVE to get better.” Men were also called upon to be bystanders and speak out against men who normalize casual conversation about assault or harassment: “Worst part is: #giuliani is right when he says this banter is common . . . other men need to step up and work to stop it. #notokay,” “The end of violence against women begins with the end of silence from men. #rapeculture #notokay.”

A plea to change the common narrative that paints all men as sexual aggressors was also evident in the tweets. For example, a user shared, “Boys being boys? Don’t insult ME. I’ve been a boy all my life and I’ve never did or said things like that before. #NotOkay #Never #AmWriting.” Another shared, “Men dont talk like this. Pathologically lying misogynists do but not men. Narcissistic orange scum bags do but not . . . #notokay.”

Discussion

Our study investigated the Twitter hashtag #NotOkay, which the public used to respond to audio recordings of Donald Trump admitting to kissing women without consent and grabbing women by their genitals. In addition to disclosures of sexual assault, #NotOkay tweet commentary aligned with three overarching themes: acknowledgment or condemnation of rape culture, Donald Trump and the national state of sexual assault, and a call to engage boys and men in the fight against sexual violence. Our findings highlight the potential impact celebrity behavior can have on lay audiences and the power that social media discourses can have to challenge problematic social norms related to violence against women.

Twitter users employed #NotOkay to acknowledge or condemn rape culture. Users discussed the expectation of sexual violence as a normative experience for women, which is consistent with prior research which revealed that women expect to experience some form of sexual violence or coercive sex, whereas men do not (Maas, Shearer, Gillen, & Lefkowitz, 2015). The #NotOkay discourse is another demonstration of the ability to widely circulate alternative interpretations of violence against women using social media platforms. In turn, there might be increased production of alternative responses, such as media coverage that more accurately depicts the culpability of perpetrators and the realities sexual assault survivors endure.

Indeed, prior work suggests that the accessibility and narrative logic of hashtags fuel their potential for organizing groups based on similar ideology for political growth (Clark, 2016). For example, studies have found that hashtags on Twitter can increase awareness about depression and cancer as well as facilitate support groups (Attai et al., 2015; Cavazos-Rehg et al., 2016). Therefore, it is possible that Twitter could be a tool to promote awareness of and definitions of sexual violence. With this said, we must bear in mind the potential for overexposure, desensitization, and even retraumatization of vulnerable victims for the sake of political causes (Woods, 2014). Research has also found that similar dialogues on Twitter that have generated tweets threatening physical violence at the continuation of tweets regarding violence against women (McCauley, Bogen, & Bonomi, 2017). However, despite the potential for harm, there is also potential for media outlets to report on stories of hashtag feminism and the possibility that such outlets will adopt feminist frameworks for interpreting such discourse on this popular social media platform. For example, when feminist activists responded to #JadaPose with #JusticeForJada, many news outlets reported on the case and gave voice to need for sexual violence prevention programming in high schools (Williams, 2015). In turn, more resources could be made available to victims (e.g., www.notokay.ca), more productive legislation could be passed, and more survivors could gain the confidence to seek support. Thus, there is great potential for the inclusion of celebrity scandals and Twitter in sexual violence prevention programming.

Twitter users also interpreted the leaked footage and Donald Trump’s defense of it as a measure of how poorly sexual violence is handled in the United States and called upon men and boys to change the status quo. This aligns with recent evidence-based programming intended to engage boys/men in preventing violence against women (Miller et al., 2012) and with programming on college campuses to increase men’s involvement in prevention efforts (Bonomi, 2017). Violence prevention programming that targets boys and men specifically can include the #NotOkay hashtag as a means for exposing boys and men to sexual assault disclosures and to initiate conversations about the role that boys and men play in sexual violence prevention, as #NotOkay prompted men to tweet about the need for other men to combat sexual assault. As a result, using #NotOkay tweets could be considered a virtual “manhood act,” or an act that challenges traditional masculinity (Schrock & Schwalbe, 2009). Such an act could be used to combat the denial of responsibility, a technique of neutralization that sustains the apathy of men in the prevention of violence against women (Sykes & Matza, 2002).

Our results suggest that Donald Trump holds symbolic significance for sexual assault within our society partly because he has demonstrated hypermasculinity through violence, which was evidenced in the leaked footage, but also during his campaign, where he encouraged violence at his rallies (Pascoe, 2017). At the peak of #NotOkay, Donald Trump was a presidential candidate. Now, he is the President of the United States. Given the social influence that celebrities have, what does this mean for sexual violence prevention during the Trump presidency, especially when our president demonstrates the hypermasculinity that sexual violence programs need to mitigate to be effective (McCauley et al., 2013)? Prior work has found that those who identified with Brazil’s soccer star, Diego Maradona (who battled substance use disorders), were less affected by a drug use prevention program than participants who did not identify with him (Brown & de Matviuk, 2010). Consequently, there is potential for Trump supporters to minimize sexual assault and to be immune to prevention programming. Thus, sexual assault prevention programs should be discussing Donald Trump and other celebrities accused of sexual assault to directly target attitudes that may be celebrity-influenced.

It is also important to note that the way survivors are treated in media reports (compared with the celebrities who are accused) might discourage others from coming forward, because there are few sanctions for perpetrators in our culture (Maas, 2015b). Our results also suggest that “locker room talk” is a salient symbol of our “boys will be boys” mentality that excuses aggression and violence from boys and men (Maas, 2015a). The perpetuation of these mentalities is a form of neutralization that promotes the denial of men’s responsibility for violence against women (Sykes & Matza, 2002). Thus, implementing programming, such as Mentors in Violence Prevention (Katz, 1995) or Coaching Boys Into Men (Miller et al., 2012), that challenge “locker room talk” and teach boys and men to intervene, may be a particularly powerful way to equip boys and men with the words they may need to shut down such harmful banter.

There are several limitations of the current study that warrant mention. First, due to the nature of Twitter data analysis, which consists of analysis of publicly available data, we were unable to collect additional demographic and other measures to assess whether there are shared characteristics, motivations, and experiences of people who engage in hashtag activism. Future research should survey or interview those who engage in hashtag activism to determine how their actions are linked to their mental well-being, as the process of participation might be a gratifying experience for those who feel powerless. Second, we captured tweets while they were trending within the 3 days of when the audiotapes were made public; therefore, we cannot determine how the conversation evolved over time. Finally, we did not include retweets in our analysis, and thus, we did not code what could be informative (or deleterious) interactive conversations facilitated by #NotOkay. Future research should address these limitations and should investigate whether popular hashtags have any impact on attitudes toward sexual violence or survivor help-seeking behaviors.

Our findings highlight the ways celebrities’ perpetration of violence against women can spark public discourse on this pervasive issue and how individuals can collectively organize on social media to challenge problematic social norms. Donald Trump’s actions prompted a vigorous discussion, and the Twitter “hashtag” proved to be a powerful platform for social discourse and a tool for survivors to disclose their experiences publicly. The survivor stories and commentary highlighted sexual violence, and particularly rape culture, personified in Donald Trump: “This is what we need to change. To someone like Trump, we are cattle to be used and discarded. We’re disposable. And that’s #notokay.”

Footnotes

Acknowledgements

The authors thank Elizabeth Schondelmeyer and Samantha Perry for assisting in the coding of tweets. They also thank Kelly Oxford for validating the experiences of millions of sexual assault survivors by providing an outlet for them to disclose their experiences publicly. Finally, they thank the brave sexual violence survivors for sharing their experiences online. (You have been heard.)

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The author(s) disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: This research was supported by a grant from the National Institute on Drug Abuse (F31 DA039603). The results and interpretations do not reflect the funding agency.

Author Biographies

Megan K. Maas, PhD, is an assistant professor in the Department of Human Development and Family Studies at Michigan State University. Her research focuses on the role of media in adolescent sexual development and sexual assault prevention. She has received consistent funding from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to apply her work to more vulnerable adolescents, namely, those who have been sexually abused. In addition to her work in academia, she is also a certified sexuality educator and invited speaker and training facilitator on the role of media in adolescent sexual development for parents, schools, and medical institutions across the country.

Heather L. McCauley, ScD, is an assistant professor in the Department of Human Development and Family Studies at Michigan State University. As a social epidemiologist, her research focuses on the health impacts of intimate partner violence, sexual assault, and reproductive coercion, with emphasis on victimization among marginalized (e.g., lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender [LGBT] and system-based) populations. She has authored or coauthored more than 50 peer-reviewed journal publications. She has received funding as Principal Investigator from NIH as well as a BIRCWH (Building Interdisciplinary Research Careers in Women’s Health) K12 career development award. She currently serves as senior consulting editor for the multidisciplinary research journal, Psychology of Violence.

Amy E. Bonomi, PhD, MPH, is professor and chair of the Department of Human Development and Family Studies at Michigan State University and chair of Michigan State University’s Sexual Violence Advisory Committee. Her research focuses on the health impacts, contexts for, and dynamics of intimate partner violence and sexual violence.

S. Gisela Leija, MS, is a doctoral student in the Couple and Family Therapy Program in the Department of Human Development and Family Studies at Michigan State University. She is committed to working with underrepresented communities of color and is an advocate for the dissemination of culturally sensitive interventions in both clinical and community-based settings. Her dedication to these underserved communities has resulted in acknowledgment from the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) as a fellow in the Minority Fellowship Program for three consecutive years. Her research is centered on creating and implementing culturally informed interventions with an emphasis on sexual health education in Latino communities.

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