Despite what popular culture will tell people, the internet is not always accessible to everyone. This leads to several groups being left out of the digital conversation. The group with the most presence will be the most heard, in turn giving the illusion that this is the full truth. Since there is a lack of this left out voice, there may be many content gaps throughout the entire internet leading to the spread of misinformation.
The people who seem to be the most heard on the internet are the ones who come from the ‘majority’ group: cis, white people. For example, in The Intersectional Internet: Race, Sex, Class and Culture Online Jessie Daniels speaks about a white feminist, Sheryl Sandberg, who became popular after the release of her book and TED talk surrounding what she believes as feminism. (Daniels, 2016). This popularized form of feminism only allowed room for people who were in the ‘majority’ in essentially every other category of their life except for gender. The entire idea of intersectionality was abandoned as well as the populations that believe that intersectionality is an essential part of feminism (which it is). Like it says in the book, Sandberg basically said that it was the woman’s job to change for the system, not the system’s job to change to be equal and equitable for everyone.
In doing this and popularizing this idea of feminism, Sandberg essentially committed lateral violence to every woman who was not mentioned. She taught women that they need to “choose the right man” and speak up at work, but what about those who are not able to find time to date because they have three children at home and a full time job or those who are not able to get a job because they did not go to college. This is a classic example of how those who are able to access the internet may deal damage to populations they are attempting to help because they do not understand nor care about the full picture because it may not be a part of their identity.
References
Daniels, Jessie . “The Trouble With White Feminism: Whiteness, Digital Feminism, and the Intersectional Internet.” The Intersectional Internet: Race, Sex, Class, and Culture Online. New edition edition, Peter Lang Inc., International Academic Publishers, 2016.
