A first for Laura

An article by PhD candidate Laura Thompson (supervised by Prof Ros Gill), entitled “I can be your Tinder Nightmare: Harassment and misogyny in the online sexual marketplace“, has been published in a special issue on feminisms and social media in the journal Feminism and Psychology 28(1), 69–89. The article looks at screenshots of online abuse and unwanted images that have been sent to women over dating apps and then shared over Instagram accounts Bye Felipe and Tinder Nightmares. The analysis demonstrates how heterosexist and gendered discourses are used by men to harass and punish women for sexual rejection. It identifies two main themes to the abuse, termed the ‘not hot enough’ discourse and the ‘missing discourse of consent’, arguing these reflect the ideological underpinnings of a hostile and patriarchal sexual marketplace.