You know those occasions where you see something in the popular press or on that Internet, and the content of the prose makes you so cross that your only response is to threaten to rape the author?
No, me neither.
I'm a pretty liberal cat, but even I think rape is bad; wrong even. Whilst I can't argue about its ability to get the point across, it's not the most subtle of argumentative tools. What's wrong with opening a debate, putting your collective points across and agreeing that ultimately it's a futile argument; Chelsee Healey is fit and THAT'S THE BLOODY END OF IT, OK?
I need not tell you this whole rape kerboodle started when a female MP had the temerity, the brass neck, the sheer bloody-mindedness, to campaign to have the image of a female on the back of a new bank note. Now, as far as feminist ideals go, this is towards the bottom of the scale in my mind. It's not as if they're women-only bank notes, usable only by the fairer sex. Nor does it represent the final emasculation of the male species, as the last image of a man is finally scrubbed from our currency as those bra-sporting period-havers finally wrestle control from men and bring in their terrifying regime.
The reaction to this woman's ultimately successful campaign was misguided at best; concerning at worst. Numerous threats of rape were made against this woman within minutes of the news breaking. Not belittling her cause, not slagging her off for her choice of woman to appear on the bank note, not even congratulation. No, "I'm gon' rape you, dog" was the gist of a myriad misogynists' responses.
Thankfully, the Feds haven't hung about, and a couple of arrests have already been made. What perhaps surprises me most about this is that tweets or Facebook posts are widely available and pretty damning in their content. If you were to threaten to rape someone in the street, you could at least play the 'he said, she said' card. If you go and write it down and broadcast it on that Internet, your defence is at best shaky.
I'm not naive enough to think these people didn't already exist, although I imagine the majority of the posters in this story are probably cowards, just trying to fuel their knackered confidence by threatening to forcefully deflower some poor, unsuspecting politician. That said, I think the time has come for some organisation, be it the police, the Government or the coastguard, to step into this online abuse debate and start kicking some ass and imprisoning people, if only to make the next berk thinking of making such a threat to think again.
It's either that or people growing up and accepting other people's points of view. Zing!
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