Naomi Wolf, Wikileaks and Inconsistency

Naomi Wolf has written a piece on the Huffington Post about the "lost cojones" of America's journalists who refuse to defend Julian Assange against the American government in the Wikileaks leaks issue. This post does not discuss the alleged sexual crimes Julian Assange is said to have committed, so I don't really have much of an issue with this post, in fact, Wolf and I are in agreement when it comes to a lot of this. She rightly points out that he is wanted for very similar things to what journalists often see as their work - exposing secrets of the government, acting as the watch dog against the powerful and the mighty in society, ensuring that they do not abuse their power.

As always, there are people who would be in disagreement with this view of the media's role, but the media can be an effective tool in exposing power abuses. The problem in that is that media in and of itself becomes a power player holding the sole power to expose scandals and shape the opinion of the people. Media, too, can become too powerful. Just take the Murdoch imperium, for instance, which owns a significant amount of the media in the US as well as the UK; media which is quite well known to engage in a lot of right-wing rhetoric and opinion building (Fox Entertainment Group, is one example).

But enough about that. Let's get back to Naomi Wolf.

After arguing about the hypocrisy of all the American journalist (apart from herself, I suppose), she asks the question:

So why do all these American reporters, who know quite well that they get praise and money for doing what Assange has done, stand in a silence that can only be called cowardly, while a fellow publisher faces threats of extradition, banning, prosecution for spying -- which can incur the death penalty -- and calls for his assassination?

A valid and interesting question, but not nearly as interesting as the answer she herself offers immediately after:

One could say that the reason for the silence has to do with the sexual misconduct charges in Sweden. But any serious journalist in America knows perfectly well that the two issues must not be conflated. The First Amendment applies to rogues and scoundrels. You don't lose your First Amendment rights because of a sleazy personality, or even for having committed a crime. Felons in jail are protected by the First Amendment. Indeed the most famous First Amendment cases, the ones that are supposed to showcase America's strength and moral power, involve the protection of speech most decent people hate.

Say what, now?

Once again, the frustrating woman has done what Jessica Valenti has criticised her for earlier: claiming not to read the internet, but somehow still find out all the criticism against her and then utterly fail to engage with it in her next piece but somehow try to correct it anyway. It is just that the woman never faces the criticism. She just ends up arguing against herself, as she is in this case as well.

Naomi Wolf has over and over managed to make Wikileaks and the rape charges against Julian Assange synonymous, which they are not, as I have written about over and over. I will try it one more time. Wikileaks the organisation is not Julian Assange the person, and everyone would do better in understanding this, supporters of Wikileaks just as much as the US government who are seizing the opportunity to bring Julian Assange to trial for completely unrelated accusations.

Back to the point. So Naomi Wolf is now criticising all the journalists in the United States of America for not being vocal enough about the horrific things that the US government might do to him (which they should criticise) because of their incapability to separate the sexual assault accusations against Assange from the organisation Wikileaks, while she has herself not been able to do that throughout the entire debate. I don't know if I should be happy it seems she has taken criticism to heart, or frustrated that she does in no way try to correct the blatant rape apologia she has been spreading. To be honest, I think that this new insight on her part will only last as long as it doesn't suit her purpose to write a provocative article again. As soon as the trial for extradition starts, I am sure she will be back to her rape apologetic self, calling the women jealous, petty and liars again.

What is more, and what is really, really relevant seeing as Naomi Wolf is a self-proclaimed feminist who has been held in quite high regard in feminist circles is her use of cojones in the headline. Cojones is a vulgar Spanish word for testicles denoting courage. While this word is relatively accepted and mainstream when it comes to talking about courage, much like 'balls' is, it is a word that refers to the male genitals meaning that females cannot in any possible way have these, i.e. courage. It is a word that is grounded in male/female gender roles with the male as the courage, active protector of the weak, passive, incapable female. Females cannot have cojones, nor can they have balls in the sense that they are being used synonymously with courage. Cojones and balls are not female, they are male, and exclusively so by biology. Courage is male, by biology, it implies, and it is physically impossible for women to gain it. It does not take a deep level of gender analysis to see this, and that Naomi Wolf has failed to do so is nothing but embarrassing. Granted, the headline could have been set by someone else, as often happens when articles are published, but in that case I really do hope that Wolf engages in a very long and heated lecture on why this particular word is inappropriate to use.

Someone mentioned in relation to her previous pieces and appearances on rape and Wikileaks (both separately and in relation to each other) that she is arguing what she is arguing in an attempt to revive a down-spiralling career. This latest addition seems to say so too. Unfortunately for Naomi Wolf is that if she doesn't engage with the criticism she is receiving, and respond to it appropriately, she is unlikely to gather much support. Judging from her performance on BBC World Have Your Say three weeks ago she is not likely to engage with anyone criticising her soon, but rather keep on patronising and ignoring them. It seems she is digging her own grave.

Egypt: A Revolution With Invisible Women

Egypt is going into its fifth day of protests against the Mubarak regime today. It is following the example of Tunisia who successfully toppled their government and replaced it with a new one that has said it will respect civil and political liberties to a greater extent than the previous government.

Interesting in violent uprisings like these is how the women are largely invisible. Firstly, this is because men are the primary perpetrators of as well as participators in violence in political uprisings (see The Gendered Society by Michael Kimmel as well as Cynthia Cockburn (2001) 'Gender in armed conflict and peace processes',
in The Cyprus Review), but it also has to do with the focus of conflicts and violence as male.

There is coverage of women in the revolution, for instance this piece on women in the Egypt revolution or this shorter piece kindly given to me by Twitterer @trishzanetti. The major news outlets' coverage of women is, however, shining with its absence.

I have mainly been watching the Al Jazeera coverage of the Egypt revolution because of its presence in the region and the availability of a live stream of video coverage rather than text, but I have also followed the news on various web sites, such as the Guardian's live blog as well as the BBC's live blog. What has struck me as really obvious is the lack of women in the commentary on the revolution. While Al Jazeera has had women reporting on the revolution, the experts and commentators from the ground have been heavily over-represented by male views. The Guardian's coverage is mainly by men, and in the expert comments provided on their live blog through Reuters three out of four are male.

In coverage of revolutions and violent clashes like these it is important to point out the absence of women. Militarism and violence are both attributed to masculinities by female and male masculinist and feminist scholars alike (again, see Kimmel above); it is a male system built on a male perspective that ironically relies on both males and females for its continuation. Males take an active part in violence, both in war and political revolutions, and females take over the male responsibilities while this is going on, added on to their usual continued responsibility for the family sphere as well as the bearers and rearers of culture (future and present children).

What is more is that males and females experience conflicts differently (see Caroline Moser, 'Victims, Perpetrators or Actors: Gender, Armed Conflict and Political Violence') in their respective roles. In a period of civil and/or political unrest and during violent conflicts, gendered violence, including domestic violence, increases (see any of the references above, as well as official UN documents on conflict) and this violence is perpetrated by men toward women.

During situations like this revolution in Egypt, women's movements tend to organise and join together for peace and progress in society (Cynthia Cockburn has written extensively on women's organisations in conflict). Where is the coverage of this? Where are the representatives of these organisations, and why are they not invited to comment on the revolution? Peace-promoting women's rights organisations have been organised for decades, and they are represented in the Arab world, so why do we not hear their voices?

United Nations Resolution 1325 stresses the importance of including women in (re)construction of societies in order to ensure that women are being sufficiently represented and that their concerns are voiced, included and implemented in social policy. This resolution has been drafted in the way that it has because it has been recognised that women experience conflicts differently and that they are heavily underrepresented in the (re)construction of a society, leading to their exclusion from the (re)constructed society in the wake of a conflict. Resolution 1325 is supposed to be a way to ensure that women are being considered and included in a society that is going through (re)construction, because a society cannot be fair and equal and guarantee people their rights if the entire people is not heard.

While what is going on in Egypt presently is not a war in the classic sense, it is hopefully an end of an oppressive regime into one where the people's concern is taken into consideration. Considering that women are also people, it is surprising and disconcerting that their voices are not heard more in the media. If 85% of the speakers, commentators, experts and news anchors are male, all sides of the conversation is not covered. It will inevitably become a skewed coverage working within a framework of male perspectives. The female perspective is invisible - it exists, but it is not heard. Consequently, what is heard is not the people's voice, it is the male voice.

I have written over and over about the importance of rhetoric. This includes the inclusion and the exclusion of voices as well as the normative framework one chooses to operate within. If this revolution is to ensure the Egyptian people's rights, it needs to include women too. Media can start by helping out to bring them onto the agenda, instead of allowing them to remain invisible.

Update
These links to women in the revolution were posted in the comments section:
A Facebook album of women participating in the protest
The Humanitarian Space has also raised concerns over the invisibility of women in the Egypt revolution, with more specific references to women's movements in Egypt.

Murdoch slagging the media

My friend pointed this out to me. I have to say, well done, Mr Murdoch!
I especially enjoy the bit about the American study:

Murdoch continued: "Mr. Rather and his defenders are not alone. A recent American study reported that many editors and reporters simply do not trust their readers to make good decisions. Let's be clear about what this means. This is a polite way of saying that these editors and reporters think their readers are too stupid to think for themselves."

To be fair though, the media in America created this stupidity they find in their readers through constantly manipulating them. I'm not saying European media is much better, but I'm just saying there is a reason why we know where Australia is and a surprising amount of Americans don't.

In any case, he is right. The blogosphere is massive, and the right people can exercise an astonishing amount of pressure.
Unfortunately, this also tells us how susceptible we all are to the media, something which is quite scary.