Why women aren't welcome on the Internet.

In Amanda Hess’s “Why Women Aren’t Welcome on the Internet”, she uses strong language and personal experience to demonstrate that the issue of sexism and harassment against women on the internet is not just a boy having fun but a very serious issue. She attempts to show the men in society, who compose a large majority of the law enforcement and internet companies, that the messages that he and other female internet users receive are not just “juvenile pranksters” but real life people who can possibly be harmful towards them. The author appeals to our ethos and logos through her own personal account with a cyber-stalker.  This lead to her calling the local law enforcement who ended up not even filing a report. Hess was forced to pay a private investigator into order to get a court case, and eventually a one year protection order. Her personally account exemplifies the extreme amount of time, money, and personal effort that women must put forth in order to avoid this harassment. The author also brings this problem to light so that other women may see that they are not the only experiencing this issue. It may be difficult for some women to share their experiences with other women because they are driven away from online chat rooms, which is shown through a drop from “28 percent to 17” from 2000 to 2005. By publishing her own experiences along with the experience of multiple female activists and journalist, along with the use of extremely vulgar examples of comments they receive, she is able to gain the attention of more people. The author does a pretty good job of present her argument from all points of view, but she fails to prevent a solution to the problem. However she does point out that there is no easy solution to this argument because most men do not understand where women are coming from since it only happens to women for the most part. One possible way to help women, but not completely solve the issue, would be to increase law that are already in place. There are only 3 federal laws that apply to cyber stalking and only 34 states with cyber stalking laws, so it is apparent that more needs to be done to get rid of this issue.