The Augmentation of Digital Violence during COVID-19

Whitney Jordan Adams

doi:10.52885/pah.v1i2.66

Abstract

The abrupt onset of the COVID -19 pandemic brought devastating consequences to society as we know it. Connected to the obvious medical, societal, and economic changes, the pandemic also ushered in a world of isolation. Within this world, both media and violence are connected to imposed quarantine and confinement. During the pandemic, many studies indicated the rise of gender-based violence. For example, Mittal and Singh (2020) study the rise of quarantine violence in India. Equally disturbing is the rise of gender-based violence in digital spaces. Anon-IB is an image-based discussion board where anonymous images are posted. However, the board has become a hotbed for revenge porn and incel activity. Dutch police shut the site down in April 2018 (Vaas, 2018), but during the pandemic Anon-IB was able to find loopholes to restart itself. Users can also post headshots of a woman on the site and then ask for “wins,” which translates into nude photos. Anon-IB is location-based, and users often ask for photos of women in the surrounding area. The site also reaches aninternational audience. One example is a past thread from The University of Georgia in Tbilisi, Georgia. This paper discusses the rise of extreme online violence and revenge porn during the pandemic through a discourse analysis of Anon-IB. A discussion of incel culture will also be discussed, using the work of O’Malley et al. (2020) and others as a framework to discuss the internet’s role in ideological extremism and violence.

Highlights

The abrupt onset of the COVID -19 pandemic brought far-reaching changes and modifications to everyday life
The Augmentation of Digital Violence during COVID-19: Incel Culture, Vol 1, No 2, Dec. 2021 the pandemic ushered in lockdowns
In terms of COVID-19, the rates of domestic violence soared in many countries—these elevated rates highlight how domestic violence is not an isolated issue or one that is contained to one specific region or country

Summary

Introduction

The abrupt onset of the COVID -19 pandemic brought far-reaching changes and modifications to everyday life. Individuals were encouraged to isolate themselves for the common good of others, but with this isolation came an abundance of other issues Within this new world of isolation, forced quarantine and confinement augmented both internet usage rates and gender-based violence. Confinement was necessary to stop the spread of the virus, quarantine, coupled with the pandemic, bolstered many inequities—inequities already present in day-to-day lives These inequities cross cultural lines, with one prominent example being that of gender-based violence. The fear of contacting COVID prevented many women from reporting abuse or leaving home to seek refuge at a local shelter, an issue that Mittal and Singh noted in India. Societal structures and patriarchal mores dictate that nude photos of women are to be seen as sources of embarrassment and shame These patriarchal mores transcend cultural lines, resulting in a hegemonic bias against the image of nude women’s bodies

Freedom and Revenge Porn

Incel Culture and Violence

Connections to Broader Ideological Violence

Conclusion