Gharidah Farooqi undeterred by vicious trolls

Defamatory campaign against anchor ensued after she posted Zubair Umar’s response to his alleged inappropriate video

By
Saniya Rashid
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Journalist Gharidah Farooqi is being lauded for her fearlessness after she became the subject of vicious trolls on social media in connection to politician Zubair Umar’s alleged inappropriate videos that went viral this week.

Farooqi responded to the social media campaign that has been trying to malign the journalist. Farooqi said that she was undeterred by the ‘dirty trends’ against her on Twitter and would continue to expose the ‘minions and stooges of you know who’.

Several women noticed Farooqi’s tweet and applauded her strength. Veteran journalist Munizae Jehangir encouraged Farooqi and condemned the Twitter trend against her. Jehangir said that people afraid of the truth resorted to senseless attacks like the ones launched on Farooqi.

Anchor Meher Bokhari was distressed by the trend on Twitter and said that people were involved in ‘moral policing, character assassination, trolling’ just because it was easier to target a woman. Bokhari questioned whether Farooqi was being subjected to the disgusting commentary simply because she was a public figure. She added that people were free to disagree with Farooqi professionally but attacking her this way was shameful.

Sociologist Nida Kirmani also noticed the maliciousness against Gharidah and said that women made up only 11.8 percent of Twitter users, yet they received close to 99 percent of the hate on the platform.

Human rights expert Zoya Shabir reminded users that Pakistan had claimed to be most respectful of women but the smear campaign against Farooqi proved otherwise. She appreciated Farooqi for her work and encouraged her to continue the fight against misogyny.

It wasn’t just women, but some men also called out the filthy tweets being shared against Farooqi. Journalist Ajmal Jami asked the perpetrators if they would ever show the ‘embarrassing’ remarks they made to their own family members. Jami said that the right to dissent should not be misused to advance immoral campaigns.

The campaign against Farooqi started when she posted an update regarding Umar’s reaction to his alleged video last week. She tweeted that Umar had categorically denied he was in the video and that he had sought forensic analysis of the ‘doctored’ video as well.

Saniya Rashid
Saniya Rashid is the research editor at Minute Mirror. She holds a Master's in Journalism degree from Ryerson University, Canada and a BA (Hons) in History, South Asian and Contemporary Asian Studies from the University of Toronto. She has a keen interest in connecting the past to the present by conceptualizing current affairs through a theoretical lens from a variety of socio-cultural disciplines. To that end, she is most interested in unearthing subaltern narratives and is committed to shifting the way minorities and marginalized communities are covered and given a voice in the media. She can be reached at rashidsaniya@gmail.com.

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