User:Solearnick/Feminism and media/Bibliography

Social Media
In recent years, social media platforms like Twitter and Facebook have led to widespread discussion on issues ranging from domestic abuse to street harassment, catcalling and abortion. In 2012, Feminists in Turkey created Facebook groups to organize and mobilize protests and marches against legislation of a nationwide abortion ban. Feminists in other parts of the European Union began to take notice and promoted the issue in their respective Facebook groups and the legislation was eventually dropped from the legislative agenda.

In the wake of the Ray Rice domestic abuse scandal, in which video evidence showed the Baltimore Ravens running back knocking his then fiancée, Janay Palmer, unconscious, writer Beverly Gooden started the Twitter hashtag #WhyIStayed. This hashtag highlighted personal experiences of herself and other women who stayed in abusive relationships. This quickly spawned subsequent hashtags including "#WhyILeft" which many used to describe the final incident of abuse or reason for leaving.

In 2013, The Representation Project created a mobile app called #NotBuyingIt which allows users to connect with each other and quickly tweet or otherwise engage sexist media ranging from advertisements to soundbites and quotes from public figures. It is often used during football season where Super Bowl ads are notoriously deemed sexist. In the aftermath of the University of California- Santa Barbara shootings, thousands of women across the internet began tweeting experiences of sexism experienced in their daily lives with the hashtag #YesAllWomen. In June 2014, as a response to the US Supreme court's decision in Burwell v. Hobby Lobby, there were thousands of tweets containing #HobbyLobby, #JoinTheDissent and #NotMyBossBusiness expressing emotions ranging from disdain to rage at the Supreme Court's decision to allow employers not to cover certain contraceptives on a religious basis. According to Matthew Slutsky at Change.org, social media has opened the forums on these issues to not only feminists and other activists, but to anyone who wants to discuss them.

In addition, celebrities such as Emma Watson have also taken a pro-feminist stance through social media. In 2014, the UN Women's Ambassador stated, "I am from Britain and think it is right that as a woman I am paid the same as my male counterparts. I think it is right that I should be able to make decisions about my own body. I think it is right that women be involved on my behalf in the policies and decision-making of my country. I think it is right that socially I am afforded the same respect as men. But sadly I can say that there is no one country in the world where all women can expect to receive these rights." Her speech also goes into depth about the negative connotation the word feminist has because of social media and how we as a society can take a stand for gender equality.

Studies into political campaigning have proven that women tweet more aggressively than their male counterparts, as platforms such as Twitter allow women to bypass traditional media and bring attention to their own raw narrative. In 2018 the use of feminist social media came to the forefront in the referendum to appeal the abortion laws in Ireland. Grassroots campaign groups, like TogetherForYes, strategised their social media to campaign and influence a positive 'yes' vote to amend abortion laws. When tackling these feminist issues, social media can bring somewhat traditional private issues into the public, an exposure that can encourage positive change as emotions are mobilised across an online network, reaching people who can not only vote, but also those who can encourage voters, to support their women counterparts.