Zuckerberg has long been fascinated by Augustus Caesar, the emperor who transformed a republic into an empire and justified harsh means through the promise of order. That is one version of Rome: the ruler’s version, the story of conquest and extraction. But the classical tradition also gives us Philomela, Lavinia, Cassandra, and Penelope: women whose speech had to be contained because it threatened male power.
Women whose tongues were cut out, who were locked away, in an effort to silence their claims against powerful men. Later in Scotland and England, women were similarly punished with the branks, an iron cage locked over the head with a flat bit that pressed down the tongue, sometimes spiked.
Last week, Sarah Wynn-Williams sat in silence for an hour at the Hay Festival alongside Tim Wu and Carole Cadwalladr. Not silenced by iron, but by paper.
This article explores the tactics used as modern day paper branks: forced arbitration, non disclosure agreements, expensive legal proceedings to make an example out of truth tellers.
Please read and share, and more importantly, buy Sarah's book. While she might be muzzled with paper branks, like Philomena and her loom, Careless People is Sarah's cloth.
Women whose tongues were cut out, who were locked away, in an effort to silence their claims against powerful men. Later in Scotland and England, women were similarly punished with the branks, an iron cage locked over the head with a flat bit that pressed down the tongue, sometimes spiked.
Last week, Sarah Wynn-Williams sat in silence for an hour at the Hay Festival alongside Tim Wu and Carole Cadwalladr. Not silenced by iron, but by paper.
This article explores the tactics used as modern day paper branks: forced arbitration, non disclosure agreements, expensive legal proceedings to make an example out of truth tellers.
Please read and share, and more importantly, buy Sarah's book. While she might be muzzled with paper branks, like Philomena and her loom, Careless People is Sarah's cloth.