DOCSLIB.ORG

Stockholm Cinema Studies 11

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
Stockholm Cinema Studies 11 ACTA UNIVERSITATIS STOCKHOLMIENSIS Stockholm Cinema Studies 11 Imagining Safe Space The Politics of Queer, Feminist and Lesbian Pornography Ingrid Ryberg This is a print on demand publication distributed by Stockholm University Library www.sub.su.se First issue printed by US-AB 2012 ©Ingrid Ryberg and Acta Universitatis Stockholmiensis 2012 ISSN 1653-4859 ISBN 978-91-86071-83-7 Publisher: Acta Universitatis Stockholmiensis, Stockholm Distributor: Stockholm University Library, Sweden Printed 2012 by US-AB Cover image: Still from Phone Fuck (Ingrid Ryberg, 2009) Contents 1. Introduction ................................................................................................... 13 Research aims and questions .................................................................................... 13 Queer, feminist and lesbian porn film culture: central debates.................................... 19 Feminism and/vs. pornography ............................................................................. 20 What is queer, feminist and lesbian pornography?................................................ 25 The sexualized public sphere................................................................................ 27 Interpretive community as a key concept and theoretical framework.......................... 30 Spectatorial practices and historical context.......................................................... 33 Porn studies .......................................................................................................... 35 Embodied spectatorship........................................................................................ 37 Queer, feminist and lesbian cultural production, activism and history.................... 40 Chapter outline ........................................................................................................... 42 2. Queer, feminist and lesbian pornography as interpretive community: research methods and material ....................................................................... 45 Research as activism and cultural production............................................................. 47 Research design and material .................................................................................... 51 Club LASH ............................................................................................................ 51 Pornfilmfestival Berlin............................................................................................ 53 Dirty Diaries........................................................................................................... 55 Films and other material........................................................................................ 56 Research process....................................................................................................... 58 Questionnaires ...................................................................................................... 58 Interviews.............................................................................................................. 59 Participant observation.......................................................................................... 62 Studying, reading and making porn ............................................................................ 66 Film production as research .................................................................................. 68 Research ethics .................................................................................................... 70 3. Constructing a safe space for sexual empowerment: political and aesthetic legacies ............................................................................................................. 73 Film production as politics .......................................................................................... 76 Sexual consciousness-raising on and off stage..................................................... 80 Politicizing pornography.............................................................................................. 86 Legacies of Sex Wars ........................................................................................... 89 Re-vision of porn and sexpert tradition .................................................................. 96 Politics as aesthetics ................................................................................................ 100 Avant-garde or documentary?............................................................................. 102 Sexual empowerment in private or public?.......................................................... 106 4. Affirmation and critique: reception contexts and situations ..................... 113 An affective scene for recognition............................................................................. 115 Relying on safe space ......................................................................................... 118 Claiming public space............................................................................................... 121 Dirty Diaries: public circulation and shifting address............................................ 125 Cinemateket, Stockholm, 17 November 2009 ..................................................... 130 Hamburg International Short Film Festival, 1-7 June 2010.................................. 131 Malmö högskola, 7 September 2009 ................................................................... 132 Intertwining intimate and counter public trajectories ................................................. 133 “I wanted to use my body in my queer activism”.................................................. 134 5. Carnal fantasizing: embodied spectatorship ............................................ 141 Gendered and sexualized body experiences ............................................................ 143 Carnal identification .................................................................................................. 147 Habituation to porn consumption......................................................................... 151 Queer, feminist and lesbian porn as fantasy............................................................. 154 Identification vs. desire?...................................................................................... 157 Discipline and (politically incorrect) play .............................................................. 160 “Every time we fuck we win” ..................................................................................... 164 6. The ethics of shared embodiment............................................................. 167 Inviting shared embodiment...................................................................................... 170 Shared spaces .................................................................................................... 176 Embracing trauma, imagining utopia ........................................................................ 180 7. The wave and the undertow: summary and conclusions ........................ 189 Appendix ......................................................................................................... 197 List of Dirty Diaries screenings ................................................................................. 197 Questionnaire ........................................................................................................... 200 Sources ........................................................................................................... 207 Index ................................................................................................................ 227 Acknowledgements This study is based on ethnographic fieldwork made up of interviews, ques- tionnaires and participant observation and would not have been possible without all the generous, personal and insightful contributions from the many research subjects who chose to participate in my project. I am end- lessly grateful to everyone that I interviewed – those who chose to partici- pate with their own names and those who participated anonymously – for sharing their thoughts and experiences with me. The efforts of everyone who filled out questionnaires have likewise been invaluable to this research. I am deeply grateful to everyone who participated in meetings during the produc- tion of Dirty Diaries (Mia Engberg, 2009) and allowed me to record our discussions. My own short for Dirty Diaries, Phone Fuck (Ingrid Ryberg, 2009), would not have been possible without the fantastic work of the per- formers Helena Lindblom and Helena Sandström, who are in the photograph on this book’s front cover. I dearly appreciate that they made the film hap- pen and thus become a crucial part of my material. It has been a true joy and a great privilege to pursue the research in contexts and with people that I share my queer, feminist and lesbian activist engagement with. I especially want to express my deep gratitude to Marit Östberg for her huge contribution to this project and for her friendship. I cannot thank my supervisor Anu Koivunen enough for her brilliant guidance and warm support. Without her firm belief in my project I could never have come to this point. She strongly advocated that I conduct field- work and participate as a filmmaker in Dirty Diaries and gave me the cour- age to design the project this way. I am so pleased about this. It has been a thrill! Anu’s sharp intellect and
Load more

Recommended publications
  • Emotions and Relations in Men's Encounters with Feminism in Sweden
    Ashamed of One’s Sexism, Mourning One’s Friends: Emotions and Relations in Men’s Encounters with Feminism in Sweden By Kalle Berggren Abstract One of the most important questions for feminist research on men and masculinity concerns how men can change and become more affected by feminism and less engaged in sexism. Here, men who identify as feminist, pro-feminist or anti-sexist have been considered to be of particular interest. This article contributes to the emerging research on men’s engagement with feminism by analysing contemporary writing about gender relations, inequality and masculinity, more specifically books about men published in Sweden, 2004-2015. Focusing on lived-experience descriptions, the analysis shows how a range of emotions are central to the processes where men encounter and are becoming affected by feminism. The emotions identified include happy ones such as relief, but a more prominent place is given to negative emotions such as alienation, shame, frustration, as well as loss and mourning. Drawing on Ahmed’s model of emotions as bound up with encounters with others, the article highlights how men’s engagement with feminism is embedded within interpersonal relations with others, particularly women partners, men friends, and children. Keywords: Emotions, feminism, men, masculinity, queer phenomenology. Berggren, Kalle: “Ashamed of One’s Sexism, Mourning One’s Friends: Emotions and Relations in Men’s Encounters with Feminism in Sweden”, Culture Unbound, Volume 12, issue 3, 2020: 466–484. Published by Linköping University Electronic Press: http://www.cultureunbound.ep.liu.se Culture Unbound Journal of Current Cultural Research Introduction One of the most important questions for research on men and masculinity concerns how men can change (Segal 2007), i.e.
    [Show full text]
  • Wenn Ki, Dann Feministisch Impulse Aus Wissenschaft Und Aktivismus
    WENN KI, DANN FEMINISTISCH IMPULSE AUS WISSENSCHAFT UND AKTIVISMUS Hrsg. von netzforma* e.V. Berlin 2020 • Wenn KI, dann feministisch — Impulse aus Wissenschaft und Aktivismus Hrsg. von netzforma* e.V. — Berlin 2020 • DIE GESCHICHTE MEINER SCHRIFT Zu Beginn des Jahres entdeckte meine Mutter eine neue Leiden- schaft: Sticken. Sie hatte schon vorher Freude an kreativen Praktiken gehabt (wie Weben und Stricken). In ihrer neuen Aktivität fand sie etwas befriedigendes, was sie sehr er- füllt. Ihre ersten Stickereien waren Buchstaben, vor allem aus dem Sajou-Alphabet. Als ich die sah, kam mir eine Idee. Gemeinsam dachten wir über eine fruchtbare Zusammen- arbeit nach, die unsere beiden jeweiligen Hobbys vereinen könnte. Was wäre, wenn sie meine eigenen Schriften stickte? Um diese Idee umzusetzen, entwickelte ich für meine Schrift Arthemys Display Light eine neue Version, die es meiner Mutter ermöglichte, die Formen auf ein spezielles Gewebe (namens Aïda) zu übertragen. Dieser Prozess erfordert eine binäre Sprache, genau wie Pixel auf einem Computer. Die Buchstaben werden also Punkt für Punkt gedacht und akribisch zusammengesetzt. Das geht weg von dem Ge- danken einer vektorisierten Form, die nur durch ihre Umrisse definiert wird. Vielmehr muss die Form in ihrer gesamten Fläche aufgebaut werden, wie mit Legosteinen! Auf dieser Grundlage konnte meine Mutter die verschiedenen Buch- staben bauen, indem sie einfach dem Raster des Gewebes folgte. Sicherlich war dieser Prozess ziemlich aufwendig und verlangte eine Menge Geduld ab, aber meine Mutter
    [Show full text]
  • Thefeminist Porn Bookintrocha
    Introduction: The Politics of Producing Pleasure CONSTANCE PENLEY, CELINE PARREÑAS SHIMIZU, MIREILLE MILLER-YOUNG, and TRISTAN TAORMINO he Feminist Porn Book is the frst collection to bring together writ- ings by feminist porn producers and feminist porn scholars to Tengage, challenge, and re-imagine pornography. As collaborating editors of this volume, we are three porn professors and one porn direc- tor who have had an energetic dialogue about feminist politics and por- nography for years. In their criticism, feminist opponents of porn cast pornography as a monolithic medium and industry and make sweep- ing generalizations about its production, its workers, its consumers, and its efects on society. Tese antiporn feminists respond to feminist por- nographers and feminist porn professors in several ways. Tey accuse us of deceiving ourselves and others about the nature of pornography; they claim we fail to look critically at any porn and hold up all porn as empowering. More typically, they simply dismiss out of hand our abil- ity or authority to make it or study it. But Te Feminist Porn Book ofers arguments, facts, and histories that cannot be summarily rejected, by providing on-the-ground and well-researched accounts of the politics of producing pleasure. Our agenda is twofold: to explore the emergence and signifcance of a thriving feminist porn movement, and to gather some of the best new feminist scholarship on pornography. By putting our voices into conversation, this book sparks new thinking about the richness and complexity of porn as a genre and an industry in a way that helps us to appreciate the work that feminists in the porn industry are doing, both in the mainstream and on its countercultural edges.
    [Show full text]
  • Turns to Affect in Feminist Film Theory 97 Anu Koivunen Sound and Feminist Modernity in Black Women’S Film Narratives 111 Geetha Ramanathan
    European Film Studies Mutations and Appropriations in THE KEY DEBATES FEMINISMS Laura Mulvey and 5 Anna Backman Rogers (eds.) Amsterdam University Press Feminisms The Key Debates Mutations and Appropriations in European Film Studies Series Editors Ian Christie, Dominique Chateau, Annie van den Oever Feminisms Diversity, Difference, and Multiplicity in Contemporary Film Cultures Edited by Laura Mulvey and Anna Backman Rogers Amsterdam University Press The publication of this book is made possible by grants from the Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research (NWO). Cover design: Neon, design and communications | Sabine Mannel Lay-out: japes, Amsterdam Amsterdam University Press English-language titles are distributed in the US and Canada by the University of Chicago Press. isbn 978 90 8964 676 7 e-isbn 978 90 4852 363 4 doi 10.5117/9789089646767 nur 670 © L. Mulvey, A. Backman Rogers / Amsterdam University Press B.V., Amsterdam 2015 All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this book may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise) without the written permission of both the copyright owner and the author of the book. Contents Editorial 9 Preface 10 Acknowledgments 15 Introduction: 1970s Feminist Film Theory and the Obsolescent Object 17 Laura Mulvey PART I New Perspectives: Images and the Female Body Disconnected Heroines, Icy Intelligence: Reframing Feminism(s)
    [Show full text]
  • Feminisms 1..277
    Feminisms The Key Debates Mutations and Appropriations in European Film Studies Series Editors Ian Christie, Dominique Chateau, Annie van den Oever Feminisms Diversity, Difference, and Multiplicity in Contemporary Film Cultures Edited by Laura Mulvey and Anna Backman Rogers Amsterdam University Press The publication of this book is made possible by grants from the Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research (NWO). Cover design: Neon, design and communications | Sabine Mannel Lay-out: japes, Amsterdam Amsterdam University Press English-language titles are distributed in the US and Canada by the University of Chicago Press. isbn 978 90 8964 676 7 e-isbn 978 90 4852 363 4 doi 10.5117/9789089646767 nur 670 © L. Mulvey, A. Backman Rogers / Amsterdam University Press B.V., Amsterdam 2015 All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this book may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise) without the written permission of both the copyright owner and the author of the book. Contents Editorial 9 Preface 10 Acknowledgments 15 Introduction: 1970s Feminist Film Theory and the Obsolescent Object 17 Laura Mulvey PART I New Perspectives: Images and the Female Body Disconnected Heroines, Icy Intelligence: Reframing Feminism(s) and Feminist Identities at the Borders Involving the Isolated Female TV Detective in Scandinavian-Noir 29 Janet McCabe Lena Dunham’s Girls: Can-Do Girls,
    [Show full text]
  • Othering Processes in Feminist Teaching a Case Study of an Adult Educational Institution Yang, Chia-Ling
    Othering Processes in Feminist Teaching A case study of an adult educational institution Yang, Chia-Ling 2010 Link to publication Citation for published version (APA): Yang, C-L. (2010). Othering Processes in Feminist Teaching: A case study of an adult educational institution. Lund University. Total number of authors: 1 General rights Unless other specific re-use rights are stated the following general rights apply: Copyright and moral rights for the publications made accessible in the public portal are retained by the authors and/or other copyright owners and it is a condition of accessing publications that users recognise and abide by the legal requirements associated with these rights. • Users may download and print one copy of any publication from the public portal for the purpose of private study or research. • You may not further distribute the material or use it for any profit-making activity or commercial gain • You may freely distribute the URL identifying the publication in the public portal Read more about Creative commons licenses: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/ Take down policy If you believe that this document breaches copyright please contact us providing details, and we will remove access to the work immediately and investigate your claim. LUND UNIVERSITY PO Box 117 221 00 Lund +46 46-222 00 00 OTHERING PROCESSES IN FEMINIST TEACHING Othering Processes in Feminist Teaching – A case study of an adult educational institution Chia-Ling Yang Lund Dissertations in Sociology 91 A complete list of publications from the Dept. of Sociology, Lund University, can be found at the end of the book and at www.soc.lu.se/info/publ.
    [Show full text]
  • Sinister Wisdom 70.Pdf
    Sinister Sinister Wisdom 70 Wisdom 70 30th Anniversary Celebration Spring 2007 $6$6 US US Publisher: Sinister Wisdom, Inc. Sinister Wisdom 70 Spring 2007 Submission Guidelines Editor: Fran Day Layout and Design: Kim P. Fusch Submissions: See page 152. Check our website at Production Assistant: Jan Shade www.sinisterwisdom.org for updates on upcoming issues. Please read the Board of Directors: Judith K. Witherow, Rose Provenzano, Joan Nestle, submission guidelines below before sending material. Susan Levinkind, Fran Day, Shaba Barnes. Submissions should be sent to the editor or guest editor of the issue. Every- Coordinator: Susan Levinkind thing else should be sent to Sinister Wisdom, POB 3252, Berkeley, CA 94703. Proofreaders: Fran Day and Sandy Tate. Web Design: Sue Lenaerts Submission Guidelines: Please read carefully. Mailing Crew for #68/69: Linda Bacci, Fran Day, Roxanna Fiamma, Submission may be in any style or form, or combination of forms. Casey Fisher, Susan Levinkind, Moire Martin, Stacee Shade, and Maximum submission: five poems, two short stories or essays, or one Sandy Tate. longer piece of up to 2500 words. We prefer that you send your work by Special thanks to: Roxanna Fiamma, Rose Provenzano, Chris Roerden, email in Word. If sent by mail, submissions must be mailed flat (not folded) Jan Shade and Jean Sirius. with your name and address on each page. We prefer you type your work Front Cover Art: “Sinister Wisdom” Photo by Tee A. Corinne (From but short legible handwritten pieces will be considered; tapes accepted the cover of Sinister Wisdom #3, 1977.) from print-impaired women. All work must be on white paper.
    [Show full text]
  • View Recent MA Theses, Exams, and Projects
    Department of Women’s Studies Masters Thesis Topics Thesis: Politicizing the Woman’s Body: Incentivizing Childbirth to Rebuild Hungarian Kelsey Rosendale Nationalism (Spring 2021) Exam: Feminist Political and Epistemic Engagements with Menstruation and Meat- Rashanna Lee Eating (Spring 2021) Thesis: Patch Privilege: A Queer Feminist Autoethnography of Lifeguarding (Spring Asako Yonan 2021) Thesis: A Feminist Epistemological Evaluation of Comparative Cognition Research Barbara Perez (Spring 2021) Thesis: Redefining Burden: A Mother and Daughter’s Navigation of Alzheimer’s Anna Buckley Dementia (Spring 2021) Project: Feminist Dramaturgy and Analysis of San Diego State’s Fall 2020 Production of Emily Sapp Two Lakes, Two Rivers (Spring 2021) Thesis: Living as Resistance: The Limits of Huanization and (Re)Imagining Life-Making Amanda Brown as Rebellion for Black Trans Women in Pose (Fall 2020) Thesis: More than and Image: A Feminist Analysis of Childhood, Values, and Norms in Ariana Aritelli Children’s Clothing Advertisements at H&M (Spring 2020) Alexandra-Grissell H. Thesis: A Queer of Color Materialista Praxis (Spring 2020) Gomez Thesis: Centers of Inclusion? Trans* and Non-Binary Inclusivity in California State Lori Loftin University Women’s Centers (Spring 2020) Rogelia Y. Mata- Thesis: First-Generation College Latinas’ Self-Reported Reasons for Joining a Latina- Villegas Focused Sorority (Spring 2020) Thesis: The Rise of Genetic Genealogy: A Queer and Feminist Analysis of Finding Your Kerry Scroggie Roots Spring 2020) Yazan Zahzah Thesis:
    [Show full text]
  • Teaching Meets Gender by Manushi Desai
    Teaching Meets Gender An Exploration and Comparison of India and Sweden’s Efforts into Teaching their Teachers about Gender Equality. Manushi Desai Supervisor's name: Edyta Just, Gender Studies, LiU Master’s Programme Gender Studies – Intersectionality and Change Master’s thesis 15 ECTS credits ISRN: LIU-TEMA G/GSIC3-A—20/001-SE Abstract When it comes to gender equality and education, teachers become the influential element of change as their proximity and classroom interactions with students can facilitate more gender sensitive teaching. This thesis aims to investigate the efforts made by India and Sweden to teach their teachers about gender and intersectional practices and sensitivity training and then analyse what one system can borrow from the other, while investigating the role of geo-politics in all of these. The thesis looks at efforts in forms of guidelines, strategies, and manuals that come from each country. The material is read closely, analysed, and then compared to determine what can be borrowed for both. The thesis presents its analysis from the theoretical lens of gender and intersectionality, transnational feminism, and decolonial feminism. The implications of this thesis are tangible as well as intangible, however - the biggest one is building a bridge between two countries to share knowledge and strategies in order to bring about a change in education systems which will ultimately create a ripple effect of gender awareness. Keywords: gender awareness, intersectionality, teacher education, gender education, Sweden, India, Egalia, NCERT, gender equality. 2 Acknowledgements I would like to thank my thesis guide, Prof. Edyta Just, for the continuous effort that she put in helping me be more critical and be more aware of the gaps I left while writing.
    [Show full text]
  • Feminist and Queer Formations in Digital Networks
    A University of Sussex DPhil thesis Available online via Sussex Research Online: http://sro.sussex.ac.uk/ This thesis is protected by copyright which belongs to the author. This thesis cannot be reproduced or quoted extensively from without first obtaining permission in writing from the Author The content must not be changed in any way or sold commercially in any format or medium without the formal permission of the Author When referring to this work, full bibliographic details including the author, title, awarding institution and date of the thesis must be given Please visit Sussex Research Online for more information and further details Remediating politics: feminist and queer formations in digital networks Aristea Fotopoulou University of Sussex Thesis submitted September 2011 in partial fulfilment of the requirements of the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. Acknowledgements Particular thanks go to my supervisors Caroline Bassett and Kate O'Riordan for their unreserved encouragement, support and feedback. I am grateful to Olu Jenzen, Beth Mills, Russell Pearce, Polly Ruiz, Rachel Wood and Lefteris Zenerian for commenting on drafts and to Ruth Charnock and Dan Keith for proof-reading. I'd also like to thank my colleagues in the School of Media, Film and Music and especially Sarah Maddox for being so understanding; my fellows in English, Global Studies, Institute of Development Studies, and Sociology at Sussex for their companionship. I am grateful for discussions that took place in the intellectual environments of the Brighton and Sussex Sexualities Network (BSSN), the Digital Communication and Culture Section of the European Communication Research and Education Association (ECREA), the ECREA Doctoral Summer School 2009 in Estonia, the 2011 Feminist Technoscience Summer School in Lancaster University, the Feminist and Women's Studies Association (FWSA), the 18th Lesbian Lives Conference, the Ngender Doctoral seminars 2009-2011 at the University of Sussex, the Research Centre for Material Digital Culture, and the Sussex Centre for Cultural Studies.
    [Show full text]
  • Into the Labyrinth of Knowledge and Power
    Into the Labyrinth of Knowledge and Power The library as a gendered space in the western imaginary Sanne Koevoets PhD Dissertation Utrecht University Sanne Koevoets, 2013. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License ISBN: 978-90-393-5988-4 Into the Labyrinth of Knowledge and Power The library as a gendered space in the western imaginary In het Labyrint van Kennis en Macht De bibliotheek als gegenderde ruimte in het westerse imaginaire (met een samenvatting in het Nederlands) Proefschrift ter verkrijging van de graad van doctor aan de Universiteit Utrecht op gezag van de rector magnificus, prof.dr. G.J. van der Zwaan, ingevolge het besluit van het college voor promoties in het openbaar te verdedigen op vrijdag 14 juni 2013 des middags te 14.30 uur door Susanna Koevoets geboren op 12 september 1980 te Apeldoorn Promotoren: Prof. Dr. R.L. Buikema Prof. Dr. S. Slapšak Financial support for this research was partially provided by the European Union, Marie Curie Fellowship for Early Stage Training (EU Sixth Framework Programme) Librarians wield unfathomable power. With a flip of the wrist they can hide your dissertation behind piles of old Field and Stream magazines. […] Librarians rule. - The Librarian Avengers Table of contents ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS 3 INTRODUCTION 5 SETTING THE SCENE FOR LIBRARY RESEARCH: RESONANCES OF LIBRARY LOSS 5 SETTING THE SCENE FOR LIBRARY RESEARCH: THE “IMAGE PROBLEM” OF THE FEMALE LIBRARIAN 11 SETTING THE SCENE FOR LIBRARY RESEARCH: INTO THE LABYRINTH 18 1. THEORETICAL FOUNDATIONS OF CULTURAL LIBRARY RESEARCH 22 ARCHIVE THEORY 22 ARCHIVAL EXCLUSION AND BIBLIOGRAPHIC ERASURE 30 EPISTEMOLOGIES OF THE LIBRARY 34 A FEMINIST HETEROTOPOLOGY OF THE LIBRARY 38 METHODOLOGY: TOWARDS A POETICS OF THE LIBRARY 43 2.
    [Show full text]
  • Digital Infringements and the Responsibility of Digital Platforms
    COPENHAGEN BUSINESS SCHOOL Digital Infringements and the Responsibility of Digital Platforms by Christian Skettrup A master’s thesis written for the degree of Master of Business Administration and E-business Student ID: 117547 – Character count: 145.888 Supervisor: Nanna Bonde Thylstrup 15.05.2020 1 Abstract Private companies with digital platforms such as Facebook, are using discursive work and strategical positioning to situate themselves in a favorable position in the eyes of their users, advertisers, legislators and the general public. Despite repeatedly facilitating the distribution of some of the worst content that humanity has to offer, the society fails to hold them responsible for their part in the illegal activities. This is partly because most digital platforms are surrounded by a legal framework that exempt them from legal liability when their users conduct illegal activity, and partly because of secretive and opaque practices that makes it difficult to decipher the dynamics of commercial content moderation. With a grounded theory approach, this paper will show how digital platforms are not just neutral technological intermediaries that exist in a vacuum, but rather socio-technical objects that exist in complex political, economical and technological environments, from where they afford their users certain things. In practice they gain a quasi-legislative role, from which they can shape their users’ ability to exercise their fundamental rights. The Umbrella case provides a rare glimpse into the opaque and secretive regulation and moderation practices conducted by Facebook. Practices that makes it possible for digital platforms to implement their self-defined regulation through technical measures. 2 Contents Abstract ............................................................................................................................................................
    [Show full text]