Whatever happened to the girl in #MeToo?

Abstract

Through #MeToo social media feminist digital grassroot activism, in tweets, threads, and groups, in petitions and in the intermedial debates following the hashtag, a girl took shape. This girl was constructed as vulnerable, ambitious, naïve, or duped and was central for bringing on feminist social change in policy and practice in the 2010’s. The figure faced intra-feminist critical questions about whiteness, heteronormativity, cis femininity, class, ability, and Western-ness. A few years later, this girl has magically disappeared from public debate. This article poses the question; Who was she, and what does her disappearance mean for future feminist activist struggles against sexism, sexual harassment, sexual violence, and rape, other discrimination and bullying in the workplace? The girl is analysed by considering the Swedish #MeToo petition #NärMusikenTystnar (#WhenThe MusicStops), a petition and hashtag that gathered narratives of sexism, sexual harassment, sexual violence, and rape on social media and presented them in the daily press in 2017. The article draws out both strengths and weaknesses of the girl as a figure for feminist digital activism. In the conclusion the case of the missing girl in 2023, and the possible impacts her disappearance may have on feminist digital activism, is discussed.