Sarah Jeong, newly hired at the New York Times, is a racist who stripped a rape victim of her anonymity. Picture CC-3.0 via Wikimedia Commons.
Recently, newly hired New York Times editorial board member Sarah Jeong has come under hire for racist tweets. The racism however is by no means her only Twitter faux pas. In January 2016 Jeong doxed a rape victim by identifying her. In the United Kingdom, naming a victim of sexual assault is illegal unless they waive their right to anonymity. In the United States it is not usually a crime to name a rape victim, but it is one of journalism’s stronger moral taboos and most ethical journalists will not. Of particular note, Jeong republished the identity of the victim in a blog post knowing she and her husband objected and knowing that Newsweek had taken it down. The Times did not deny the allegations, but did appear to distance Executive Editor from the hire, claiming he had nothing to do with it.
In the United Kingdom and many other states rape victims are entitled to anonymity. In the UK, naming a victim of rape is a crime under s1 and s5 of the Sexual Offences (Amendment) Act 1992 unless they waive the anonymity. In the United States it is merely unethical but although the Supreme Court has upheld a First Amendment right to deviate from the norm, it is generally considered serious ethical wrongdoing.
Sarah Jeong had been involved in an argument over the content of an online article, which had contained a link that Jeong felt trivialised a rape threat. The dispute was covered in Newsweek’s “Today in Tabs” section. A woman (I have deliberately anonymised) wrote a letter to Tabs complaining about the article and revealing her status as a rape victim. The author of the piece, Rusty Foster, published the letter claiming it was “in the interests of fairness”. After complaints the letter was taken down on ethical grounds just leaving the woman’s legal concerns.
The rape victim’s anonymity was restored. Until in January 2016 the woman’s identity was republished on Jeong’s blog. At the time, I contacted the victim via her husband and respectfully requested permission to write about it, which was granted. In my article I also wrote about Jeong’s friendly online interactions (archive) with Sarah Nyberg, who claimed to be a white nationalist paedophile (archive). I linked to her Jeong’s express opposition to revenge pornography laws (archive).
As my earlier article noted, quoting her, Jeong realised her blog post would lead to the victim being harassed all over again and in that knowledge posted her name. She also despicably accused the husband of using the woman’s victim status as a “weapon”.
