I am a female and I have a social media presence. As such, and like any other person in the world who is both of these things, I have experienced unprecedented levels of harassment online.
This harassment ranges from poorly spelt compliments (‘Hellu sexi”) to pictures of a rather sad looking, flaccid erection. Add in a number of requests for coffee (“I just want to understand you”), propositions of sex, and even requests for money or visas, and you have just a little part of what it is like to be a woman online in 2018.
Over the last week, I have received a total of 1239 friend requests on Facebook, and countless DMs all from Albanian and Maltese men. On the whole, I ignore them, glancing quickly at the pathetic attempt to engage a lady, but sometimes, just sometimes I reply.
One particular gentleman asked me If I wanted to talk. I ignored his message and continued about my day but over the following two hours, he sent me a total of 32 messages, pleading with me to talk to him and demanding to know why I was ignoring him. I finally replied and said “Thank you for your message. I would prefer not to speak to strangers over the internet, furthermore, I am in a happy and fulfilling relationship. Please respect my privacy and wishes.” Of course, this neanderthal didn’t want to take my rejection lightly and proceeded to beg, plead, and even become aggressive. What is so difficult about understanding that no means no, you pathetic and cretinous degenerate?
Most of the men that I do not reply to, continue to text and text and text and even call over Facebook without my permission. I find this highly intrusive and offensive- it is almost like they believe they have the right to demand my attention, and the fact that I am not interested in them is mind-bogglingly incomprehensible.
Furthermore, something that disturbs me greatly is that a number of these men are married or have girlfriends- some even have profile pictures with their wife and children. What on earth makes you think that I am going waste an iota of my time, speaking to some lowlife who thinks it is ok to sexually harass women on the internet whilst he has a wife and child at home? You should be ashamed of yourselves and if you harass me online and you fall into this category, I will screenshot your sleaze and send it to your other half- don’t test me.
I also have to wonder what exactly they are trying to achieve. I mean, statistically, what is their success rate? How many women go weak at the knees over a picture of a man with his wife and kids? How many try to jump into bed with them after receiving approximately 725 messages that they didn’t reply to? How many women fall in love with men who text them saying “show me your body”? My guess is, not many.
Can you imagine it;
“So how did you two meet?”
“Awww well he sent me a picture of his micropenis on Instagram and that was it, I just knew it was love from that moment on.”
Said no one ever.
It is this false sense of entitlement that really gets me- men believe that they have the right to demand our attention and that we must drop everything at a moment they deem necessary, in order to speak to them. For them, there is no logical reason why we wouldn’t want to talk to them, and they see our refusal as a challenge- verbally beating us into submission (or so they hope).
This all stems from the fact that men in patriarchal societies see women as their property, as a commodity, as something that can be bought, sold, shared, discarded, and controlled. They believe that fidelity only applies to women, and we must be welcoming of their advances and honoured that such a strong, virile man would take an interest in us. The concept that we find them utterly repulsive is completely lost on their tiny little minds.
Furthermore, people seem to get this confidence online that they do not have in real life. Can you imagine sitting in a cafe and some man walking over and flopping his cock out on the table? In my mind, there is one rule that you should really consider- if you wouldn’t do it in real life, or if doing it would get you arrested, don’t do it online.
I also have quite a big issue with Facebook- it seems highly likely that my profile is appearing as a suggested friend in my local area. This algorithm is encouraging mass harassment and intrusive behaviour from anyone with a penis and a sex-God complex in a 10-mile radius- do the same algorithms exist for men? I doubt it. Furthermore, it is literally impossible to stop them- Facebook have removed the ability to block friend requests, and even with my setting stuck on “friends of friends only”, I am still getting besieged 24-7. More needs to be done to protect users from unwanted attention, and privacy settings need to be increased in such a way that we can really lock down our profiles to avoid getting harassed. Facebook should be doing more to protect its users, instead of facilitating the systematic sexual harassment on an enormous scale. If Facebook has facial recognition for pictures, why can’t it have dick recognition for dick pics and automatically block such images from being sent, especially if they are sent from an account that you are not connected with?
So, in conclusion; Dear men of the internet, harassing women online is not going to get you laid. Your pathetic attempts will be screenshotted and shared amongst friends who will ruthlessly take the piss out of you. We might also share the screenshots with your wife or girlfriend, but more than anything, we will pity you. You will be ignored, blocked, and deleted and you will remain as insignificant to us as you are to everyone else.
Don’t get me wrong, I don’t hate men. I have a wonderful, respectful boyfriend that I adore, and many male friends that I love spending time with- my problem is the hordes of blokes who think that social media is like one big lucky dip and that by sending out masses of creepy messages, someone will give in and hop on.
Have some damn respect for your friends, sisters, mothers, and daughters, and stop treating women like objects- we are not and never will be interested in sleazebags like you.
Yours sincerely,
Women
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