Last week UN Women released a report entitled “Cyber Violence Against Women and Girls.”

Having heard horrifying stories about teenage girls and boys blackmailed and scammed on the internet, my first reaction was a sense of relief.

After last year’s “He for She,” the most useless campaign in the history of feminism, I thought the UN was finally trying to help real victims.

I guess I was wrong.

Two of the guest speakers at the event where the report was launched were familiar faces: Anita Sarkeesian and Zoe Quinn, “cyber violence survivors.”





If you are not familiar with these two names, Zoe Quinn is an inept game developer who used sex to get positive coverage in the gaming press -To better understand what I mean by inept you can find her game here–

Anita Sarkeesian is a youtuber who based her career on finding sexism anywhere, from Legos to Eternal Sunshine of a Spotless Mind.

They are not violence survivors, if anything they are criticism survivors -which could be said about any content creator in history.

What do we talk about when we talk about violence?

According to the UN report “cyber touch is recognized as equally as harmful as physical touch.”

This is a statement that can make sense, as long as what counts as “harmful cyber touch” is reasonable, and clearly defined.

Sexual coercion, sex scams and revenge porn are example of how cyber violence is not different from any other form of violence.

Being forced to engage in sexual behaviours in front of a webcam should not be considered any less harmful just because it is not happening “in real life.”

This is why there are people like Wayne May, CEO of scamsurvivors.com, who help victims of online blackmail and sex scams to get justice.

There are two reasons why it was Quinn and Sarkeesian who spoke at the UN, and not Wayne May.

First of all, he has a penis.

Second, he would have mentioned that -as you can read in more detail on his website- most sex scammers pretend to be women and target young boys.

This happens because it is incredibly easy to obtain naked photos from a teenage boy who thinks he is chatting with a beautiful girl.

But does this report give a clear definition of what we are fighting against?

Here is an extract from Sarkeesian’s speech:

Harassment is threats of violence, but it’s also the day-to-day grind of “You’re a liar” and “You suck”, making all of these hate videos to attack us on a regular basis and the mobs that come from those hate videos.

Real cyber violence kills, and now it is compared to being told “you suck”?

Sarkeesian’s statement is ridiculous, but the UN takes it seriously and that is disturbing.

This definition however explains the claim that 73% of women have experienced cyber violence.

I am sure anyone, woman or man, who has ever published any sort of content on the internet has been told that they suck.

Having such wide definitions of violence and harassment can get quite confusing.

When even an established magazine like Wired calls a Second Life avatar being raped “a traumatic experience”, I wonder whether words lost their weight.

The article reads



“There is no question that forced online sexual activity — whether through text, animation, malicious scripts or other means — is real; and is a traumatic experience that can have a profound and unpleasant aftermath, shaking your faith in yourself, in the community, in the platform, even in sex itself.”

What worries me about this is that by giving too importance to an avatar getting raped -online sexual activity through animation- we are undermining actual sexual harassment online.

Someone coerced into behaving sexually -through text messages, video chats, and photographs- is in no way comparable to an avatar being forced into sexual interactions.

Raping a Second Life avatar is just like killing a family in The Sims: completely harmless.

In The Sims 3 there are 16 different ways a character can die. It’s entertaining, and it isn’t real.

But then we have people like Elisa Chavez, who say “when bad things happen to women in video games, they’re really happening to me.”

I’m sorry Elisa, I had no idea. Should I turn myself in for that time I gathered all my Sims in a swimming pool and deleted the ladder?

Being a public figure

What Quinn and Sarkeesian confuse for harassment is better known as being a public figure.

What Youtube has created is a new generation of celebrities, some of which have the same exposure and popularity of established actors and musicians.

Anita Sarkeesian is featured in the TIME Magazine “100 Most Influential people” 2015 list, where she is mentioned before Bradley Cooper, Angela Merkel, Hillary Clinton and Pope Francis.

How does she expect not to become victim of criticism, and even harassment?

Do we really believe that the amount of negative attention she has received has not been received by anyone else on the TIME Magazine list -regardless of gender?Vladimir Putin is on that list!

Public figures have dealt with stalkers and harassers since the beginning of time.

Just think about David Letterman, who was stalked for years by an insane woman.

She would break into his house on a regular basis and was even caught driving his car, claiming to be his wife.

And what about Regan? He was almost killed because some guy was obsessed with Jodie Foster and wanted to impress her.

Not to mention John Lennon.

I do not know who told these kids that the internet could make them visible without any of the dangers visibility can bring, but I sure as hell would like to know.

So what?

Social Justice Warriors should be aware that online censorship goes both ways.

Nobody seems to care about “cyber touch” as long as it touched people they did not agree with.

Click on any of the following names to have a better sense of what I am talking about.

Nicole Arbour – made fun of fat people

Tim Hunt – made a joke about women crying

Stephanie Smith – loved her boyfriend and made him sandwiches

Matt Taylor – wore a shirt feminists did not like

Anonymous attendee of the PyCon conference – was overheard by a feminist making a joke about “big dongles”

And while people get outraged over cat fights on Twitter, one in ten ex partners are being threatened to have their naked photos shared on the internet.

While Anita Sarkeesian wants the UN to stop people from telling her she sucks. In the US 27 states still do not have laws against revenge porn.

I’m finishing this post with a video of porn performer Mercedes Carrera released a few days ago. It says it all.