For Women, Vicious Online Abuse is Just a Twitter Troll Away

Trolls on Twitter are a sad reality. But trolling against women is particularly vicious and misogynistic.

Trolls on Twitter is a sad reality. But trolling against women is particularly vicious and misogynistic.

(Photo: The Quint)

(This story was originally published on 21st May 2016 and is being republished from The Quint’s archive in view of recent abusive trolling faced by women journalists on Twitter.)

Internet trolls have become a part, an indelible part, of our millennial, tech-savvy lives. Originally known as the mythical, ugly cave-dwelling creature; a ‘troll’ has almost become the modern equivalent of an omnipresent, hard-to-ignore monster. And nowhere more so than on Twitter.

Just on Wednesday morning, TV journalist Barkha Dutt tweeted about an abuse campaign that targets her by mass-sharing her contact details, filling her inbox and life with sexual slurs of the most vile sort.

Also read: “R**di TV ki R**d Anchor...”: Barkha Dutt, Trolls & Sexual Slurs

‘You Slut!’: The Anonymous World of Twitter Misogyny

If you are a public figure, like a journalist or an actor, chances are that with everything you say on the Internet, there will be more brickbats waiting for you than bouquets. However, if you are a woman, statistically the brickbats will be harsher and more vicious.