“Digital Suffragists: Women, the Web, and the Future of Democracy.” Marie Tessier, MIT Press, 2021.

Abstract

Drawing on many years of experience in journalism and in women’s organisations, and most crucially on her two decades moderating the thousands of comments posted to the New York Times comment section, Tessier’s Digital Suffragists presents an important and incredibly relevant case study in epistemic injustice. Her personal experience is supported throughout the text by a rigorous assay of empirical research in this growing area of study. The suppression of women’s voices, and their conditioning towards silence, is not a newly discovered phenomenon, and has been a focal point for sociological, philosophical, and psychological research (as well as political activism) for many years. However, Tessier’s book places the digital word under the microscope and provides the reader with a detailed exposé of the many factors contributing to women’s online silence and its political ramifications, making the case for considering this a failure of democracy.