What role can humor play in battling online harassment, shame, and misogyny and in building a different kind of world, especially in our post-#MeToo moment? This question is at the heart of Who’s Laughing Now? Feminist Tactics in Social Media. As Jenny Sundén and Susanna Paasonen explain, online hate and harassment toward subjects “coded as female or feminine” thrive on affective mechanisms like shame and fear (1). Paying particular attention to the dynamics of shame and the “potentialities of shamelessness,” the authors examine humorous online responses to misogyny, some well known (having gone viral) and some more fleeting (1). Ultimately, they argue that online humor, specifically shameless or absurd humor, can disrupt and reshape affective circuits of shame and misogyny.
In the first two chapters, the authors provide groundwork and framing, beginning with the barriers to productive, world-(re)building feminist humor. Starting with a set of linked, if shaky, premises,...
