It's no secret that Twitter has a massive harassment issue. The social media platform is infamous for its abuse problem, as well as its minuscule attempts to maintain safe spaces for women (i.e. Leslie Jones). That's why my good friend and Esquire contributor Eve Peyser was shocked to find that Twitter actually took a real, concrete step by actually shutting down the account of someone who sexually harassed her online. Shocker!
Initially, Peyser thought that Twitter had taken down the account of a man who tweeted a death threat at her; in reality, the notice was about an account who had tweeted a video of him appearing to grope the breasts of her Twitter avatar.
"I'm surprised Twitter took down the account," Peyser told Esquire, adding that the company did so after Good Housekeeping beauty editor Sam Escobar asked their followers to report the perpetrator.
Peyser has dealt with a large volume of harassment on Twitter, but this is the first time the company has actually taken action against a dude being terrible in her mentions. "I'm actually way more surprised Twitter took this guy's account down because although it's obvious harassment, it's not as straightforwardly threatening as 'you will die,'" she said.
Peyser added that she is "unfortunately pretty immune" to dealing with cruelty on the internet. "[It] feels so symptomatic of being a woman online," she said. "...Especially when it comes to sexual harassment—death threats are different—I get too many people in my mentions telling me I deserve it because I tweet sex jokes."
Ah, being a woman on the internet. How grand.
