In case you hadn’t heard, the viral video of the girl pretending to be drunk and being picked up by sleazy men has been reported to be a hoax. ?According to Huffington Post and Smoking Gun,?the men in the video were told they were acting for a comedy sketch, not a ?social experiment? as the video presented. ?Jennifo Box, sometimes listed as Jennifer Box in some news reports, also released a video claiming the men pictured ?were perfect gentlemen.??She went on to say:
?Had I known the damaging outcome of this video, I never would have participated.?
Watch her entire videotaped statement below:
So, at first this appears to be the end of the story.? What more is there to say?? Stephen Zhang, the creator of the video project, apparently attempted to cash in on a trend after the Girl catcalled over 100 times video went viral. ?Zhang has yet to comment on the video hoax so we are left with conjecture about his motives at this point.
When you compare the two videos, the differences are apparent.? I know when I saw the drunk girl video I wondered how the creators managed to convince the guys to give permission to show their faces (notice in the Catcall video, most of the faces are blurred out).? Honestly, I kind of felt stupid for not being more vocal on that fact from the beginning. ?Of course, I also did not want to undermine the video’s message.
For comparison, here is the original catcall video:
Here is Stephen Zhang’s hoax:
However, go back and look at the reaction to the original catcall video from Hollaback, an organization dedicated to stopping street harassment, especially the comments section on social media. ?Several times, men accuse the video of being staged for no other reason than they want to say it is staged.? Many men had a less than good response to the video.? Who can forget this CNN debate that set men back to the stone age? ?As a man, this kind of language really upsets me to begin with. ?I keep wondering what happened to respect.
Still, the last thing any issue about equality?needs is a hoax, and Zhang, regardless of his motives, has given the world just that.
With the next viral video that shows men being sexist towards women, I almost guarantee you the Drunk Girl video will be brought up in the debate.? It is the kind of hoax that sexists latch onto as proof such behaviors are not as bad as people say.? They will try to say someone is ?cashing in? on the trend just like Zhang did.? That, or they will say it was faked to try to sway opinion.
Hoaxes set honest issues back and this one was a huge hoax. ?It gives those who want to keep equality at bay enough ammunition to stall any sort of progress.
