‘Back to the kitchen, cunt’: speaking the unspeakable about online misogyny

TLDR

Gendered vitriol online, termed e‑bile, consists of graphic threats, ad hominem invective, and unapologetic misogyny, and while it is widely reported in the media, it remains under‑studied in academia. The author argues that this discourse must be spoken of in its unexpurgated entirety to adequately assess its nature and ethical implications. The study employs unexpurgated ostension as the primary method to map the parameters of e‑bile and to inform further ethical inquiry and potential remedies. The author contends that only through unexpurgated representation can the misogynistic hostility of e‑bile be properly understood and addressed.

Abstract

This article explores the signal characteristics of gendered vitriol on the Internet – a type of discourse marked by graphic threats of sexual violence, explicit ad hominem invective and unapologetic misogyny. Such ‘e-bile’ is proliferating in the cybersphere and is currently the subject of widespread international media coverage. Yet it receives little attention in scholarship. This is likely related to the fact that discourse of this type is metaphorically ‘unspeakable’, in that its hyperbolic profanity locates it well outside the norms of what is regarded as ‘civil’ discourse. My case, however, is that – despite the risk of causing offence – this discourse must not only be spoken of, but must be spoken of in its unexpurgated entirety. There is, I argue, no other way to adequately assay the nature of a communication mode whose misogynistic hostility has serious ethical and material implications, not least because it has become a lingua franca in many sectors of the cybersphere. Proceeding via unexpurgated ostension is also the best – arguably the only – way to begin mapping the blurry parameters of the discursive field of e-bile, and from there to conduct further inquiry into the ethical appraisal of putative online hostility, and the consideration of possible remedies.