MILAN — The Facebook group “Mia Moglie” (My Wife), with three emoji hearts, has finally been shut down. This public group created in 2019, that until Wednesday counted more than 30,000 members, the vast majority of whom are men. The intent and ultimate goal of this virtual gathering is to share photographs of women’s bodies and body parts, and then comment however one pleases.
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At least in theory, the photographs are meant to be those of the commentators’ wives, thus the name. It’s impossible to know whether the women portrayed are actually their unfortunate better halves, or unfortunate strangers. But it appeared obvious from the nature of the images that the women hadn’t consented to being exposed, nor to be on the receiving end of dozens and dozens of comments that to call obscene is an understatement, and which we’ll spare you.
Stolen images
Feminist author and activist Carolina Capria received and shared on her Instagram profile several screenshots of the puerile exchange of opinions about what they would do to this or that woman. Some say the wives had agreed, but no female comments are in sight.
Understandably, outrage quickly mounted; the case hit the media, and many Italians mobilized to report the group to both Facebook and the Postal Police. Sharing a stolen intimate photo, even if it’s from a wife, is a crime.
More than six years and 30,000 people later the end of a social media group that was neither encrypted under Telegram nor hidden in some corner of the so-called Dark Web. Rather it was public and visible, speaking volumes about a creeping rise in online violence, unrecognized by those who perpetrate it.
It’s a game in which women are merely a commodity
“Women have always been the arena on which men challenge each other and measure their virility,” Capria writes. “Showing to another man ‘my’ woman as a commodity that can be given away but is still possessed establishes a hierarchy, creating a relationship with that man that would otherwise be impossible to forge. It’s a game in which women are merely a commodity, a commodity that adds value to the man who possesses them. An intermediary body between two bodies that otherwise don’t know how to establish a relationship. Because the only relationship is one that has virility at its core.”
This emblematic case of misogyny, in its sloppy pettiness, recalls the same dynamics as the case of Gisèle Pelicot, the French woman raped by dozens of men with the complicity of her husband.
Small victory
Late Wednesday morning, the group was deleted. A victory, if a small (and late) one. “We removed the Facebook Group “Mia Moglie” for violating our policies against the sexual exploitation of adults,” Meta announced in a statement to news agencies. “We do not allow content that threatens or promotes sexual violence, sexual abuse, or sexual exploitation on our platforms. If we become aware of content that incites or advocates rape, we may disable the groups and accounts that publish it and share this information with law enforcement.”
They are bodies, not people.
Meanwhile, another Italian group with the same name and the same goals already exists. The creator, who has no qualms about using his full name and place of work — an IT professional from Turin — specifies that this time it will be private, but with the usual trick: comments go directly into the photos to circumvent security.
Eighty people already signed up in the first 20 minutes. There remain dozens and dozens of other groups, with varying degrees of participation, dedicated to exchanging and commenting on photographs of women, both known and unknown. In any case, they are bodies, not people.
