Cry for Help
CNN and feminist bloggers have picked up the story of a sixteen-year-old girl who has posted a whistleblower video that begs for help from the public and the authorities in pursuing justice in her sexual assault case against a twenty-three-year old.
Unfortunately, the following sample of incredibly abusive misogynistic viewer comments from the past hour seems to prove the point that Sam Gregory makes about the problems with using YouTube as a channel to air pleas for victims' rights.
Poverty? Webcam:check. functional PC:check. Broadband:check
Suburban brat:check.
I don't believe you have poverty.
Enjoy your trauma.
like i said in my comment come around my way n talk that shit and youd get your face busted in bitch. unles youve been raped shut the fuck up and get a life!
"I want something done!"
SOB, CRY
"I want help!"
Quit being such a cunt. You weren't raped. Stop whoring for attention and accept responsibility for your actions.
Put up some nude pictures and I'll donate money to ya. Do it the way all of the other "rape" attention whores do it.
why isn't this stupid whore in the kitchen
well, first of all you have to realize that you're nothing more then a slutty spermbag that's just asking for raep
I smell bullshit.
Grats on losing your virginity
You can't live in that terrible of poverty, you have a nicer camera than I, and obviously a computer and internet connection.
Ummm... Didnt you put yourself in that position? Its a no brainer what was going to happen. Your just gonna have to use this experience to learn and move on. Theres nothing else that could be done. 23 years old... Common sense = Success!
Many of these postings manifest the "spoiler" mentality that Henry Jenkins describes as being a distinctive aspect of the sensibilities of many online communities, such as the anti-illusionistic Survivor spoilers in Convergence Culture, those who -- it could also be argued -- manifest the dark side of "collective intelligence."
Despite viewer skepticism, it appears to be a genuine case, as the victim has linked her page to the government website of the Florida Orange County Clerk's Office and the records for the case dropped against an actual defendant.
Labels: government websites, justice system, youtube rhetoric
posted by Liz Losh at 2:40 PM
3 Comments:
I would have to put out the proposition that asigning something significant to the use of digital avenues of disemintion of data or information misses the point that humans have used whatever means available to attain influence. Study of the paths used may be advised, but we must be careful not to think that basic behavior is different because the paths used have evolved, and are evolving. Just different ways to do the same thing.
Beyond the hateful speech found there which lowers possibilities for conversation and community, in my work on YouTube, I have also been concerned to learn how user-censoring stunts conversation. Videos with non-normative positiions are often and easily flagged by users, and then pulled off the site by Youtube (or self-censored as a result of hate speech, among other things). This connects to my fear that we have yet to communally understand a YouTube ethics, but that one is quickly being produced for us (at great expense). Alex J
self-censoring, outside-censoring, hate-speech,love-speech, spin, misquoting, ethical and unethical, opinion, truth, half-truth, and more have been employed since the begining of human desire. While the speed, nature, and volume of these things has changed, and thier study critical to our understanding and development, the purpose for thier use has not. If one believes in Frank Lloyd Wright's famous axiom, "FORM FOLLOWS FUNCTION", it is relativly easy to deconstruct any form to reveal it's function. Using this in an expanded beyond archatecture way we can decern the purpose behind any form. The forms of digital uses reveal the function of use. The challenge is to guide the purpose (function) to create the form. We know that the purposes are not always altuistic in nature, so the forms of behavior are not either. Maybe this is why someone, even if bound by a non-disclosure and non-compete statute, should be monitering code and it's purpose and effects. Free speech does not mean anything goes. Conversation and community can be enhanced or lowered in many ways so objective, vigilent oversight may be warranted.
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