Sisterhood at a Distance: Doing Feminist Support Work Online

Abstract

The aim of this study is to analyze the characteristics of feminist peer support in the context of online chat counseling. Based on 15 interviews with female lay supporters associated with a branch of the Swedish women's shelter movement targeting young women, we explore how the digital setting—characterized by distance and anonymity—affects the meaning and doing of feminist support. Our results show that core principles of feminist support—striving for equality and trust, the crafting of safe spaces, and sharing experiences—are all renegotiated and/or accentuated by the digital setting. The chat is experienced as enabling a more equal relationship and a high level of safety. The meaning of safety has largely shifted, however, from being associated with a feminist community to safety associated with solitude and distance. We further show a tension in the respondents’ understanding of shared experiences, stressing both the importance of situated knowledges and the value of not knowing who is seeking or offering support. By combining research and material on feminist support and online youth counseling, the article offers novel perspectives on feminist counseling and social work, the power dimensions of online counseling, and the virtual space as an arena for feminist activism.

Ideals of egalitarianism, power-sharing, and empowerment are central components of the feminist peer support provided by women's shelters (Helmersson, 2017; Nichols, 2013; see also Roche & Wood, 2005). In Sweden, these ideals also imbue a growing part of the feminist movement, namely chat-based peer counseling for young women and girls, in some cases including transgender youth, offered by nonprofit young women's support centers (YWSCs, in Swedish, tjejjourer). Most of these centers have organizational ties to the Swedish women's shelter movement and their ambition is, in short, to offer lay support to young women and girls based on a feminist principle of sisterhood. The main channel for support is text-based, one-to-one online chats, during which the user may be completely anonymous in her meeting with a, usually, equally anonymous female volunteer. Some organizations also offer support over the telephone, via email, and/or physical meetings, but the vast majority of contacts take place in the chat rooms. The topics discussed may include experiences of violence and sexual abuse, but also issues such as bullying, stress, family situation, and friendship.

The anonymous online chat encounter entails somewhat new challenges and new possibilities for feminist support and social work, and these preconditions stand at the center of the current study. Understanding the virtual meeting as both an embodied and a liminal encounter (Brophy, 2010), anchored and experienced in multiple sites simultaneously and sensitive to disconnection and distraction (cf. Sundén, 2018), we are interested in how the digital setting affects the support encounter and the particularities of feminist support practices. The aim of this paper is therefore to analyze the characteristics, challenges, and possibilities for feminist peer support during online chat counseling, as experienced by female supporters associated with YWSCs in Sweden. The following research questions have guided our analysis: What qualities are stressed by the participants as important (feminist) principles and values for the support they offer? How is the meaning of feminist support shaped and restrained by the digital setting? How is the chat format experienced and utilized by the participants in relation to those feminist support ideals?

Contextualizing the Young Women's Support Centers

The work of the YWSCs is part of a longstanding tradition of feminist peer support, organizationally and ideologically rooted in the women's shelter movement. Since the 1970s, the feminist movement in Sweden has organized shelters and given personal support on a voluntary basis to women exposed to men's violence (Helmersson, 2017). In 1996, the first organization primarily targeting young women and girls was founded in Stockholm (Stockholms tjejjour, n.d.). Today, there are approximately 60 YWSCs in Sweden; all nonprofit, nongovernmental organizations that aim to offer personal support to young women and girls, sometimes including transgender youth, rooted in a feminist analysis of social power relations. Typically, only women/girls and, in some instances, transgender individuals can become members or volunteers. Unlike the feminist shelter movement from which the YWSCs stem, the YWSCs rarely offer housing. Instead, their most important form of support is one-to-one anonymous chat counseling, provided by a lay person. The chats are commonly run by volunteers, but some centers have one or a few employed staff, financed primarily through the local municipality or county council. The age span of the support-seekers may vary but is generally between 12 and 25 years. A common phrasing, also illustrating the YWSCs’ inclusion of trans women, is that if you identify as a tjej—a Swedish slang-word for adolescent girls and young women—you are welcome to contact the center. In lieu of an English equivalent for tjej, we here use the terms “girls” and “young women” in combination and interchangeably, referring to adolescents as well as young adults.

Recent research on women's shelters in Sweden has found that a feminist-informed emancipatory support ideal, a “doxa of emancipation,” is still highly prevalent in the nonprofit shelter organizations, despite increased professionalization (Helmersson, 2017). The emancipatory support is characterized by an ambition to listen, to trust the woman's story, and to support and strengthen her self-confidence and decision-making (Helmersson, 2017). A woman-only organization can also be described as characteristic of the support (Lauri et al., forthcoming). While shifting the focus somewhat toward another type of support and broadening the scope of social problems addressed, the YWSCs share many of the same core principles, as will be demonstrated in this article.

Feminist Support and Youth Counseling Online

The YWSCs’ support practices are not only part of a feminist tradition of (peer) support, but they also connect to the increasing use of the digital arena for youth counseling. Offering online chat support is a recognized method for reaching young people and has become a common practice in the mental health services (Mortimer et al., 2022; Navarro et al., 2019), increasingly popular also in social work (Cwikel & Friedmann, 2020). Important motivations for young people to seek support online are the possibility to remain anonymous, the alleviation of stigma, increased accessibility, and a heightened sense of control (Hanley, 2009; Navarro et al., 2019).

Research on internet communication has found that an “online disinhibition effect” (Suler, 2004) tends to make it easier to tell others in a digital setting about things that one has never articulated before, which may be beneficial for the counseling situation (Lapidot-Lefler & Barak, 2015). The preconditions for establishing trust in a chat are different than those that apply in face-to-face meetings, but studies indicate that it is possible, sometimes even easier, to build rapport online (Timm, 2018). In a text-based support context, in particular, when meeting young people, this often requires a more informal approach, including the use of humor and self-disclosure (Hanley, 2009), emphasizing the supporter's own subjectivity (Mortimer et al., 2022; Timm, 2018). The temporal delay has also been identified as a positive factor, enabling both parties to reflect upon and develop their respective accounts and responses (Löfberg & Aspán, 2011). In a study of online youth counseling in Sweden, including one YWSC, Löfberg and Aspán (2011) found that a majority of the support-seekers found it easier to speak about difficult things online, largely thanks to the possibility of communicating without needing to think about bodily performance or appearance.

There is little previous research on the use of online peer counseling as a feminist counseling or social work practice. A recent study (Moulding et al., 2022) among young women with mental health problems has indicated the need for feminist-informed online peer support, but there are, to the best of our knowledge, no previous empirical studies of the characteristics of this type of support. Previous research on the YWSCs in Sweden have either focused on the motivation of volunteers to enter mentorship programs (e.g., Larsson et al., 2016), or, when analyzing the chat support, have not addressed its feminist dimensions (cf. Löfberg & Aspán, 2011). Studies of online feminist communities and digital feminist support, on the other hand, tend to focus on social media interaction, forum discussions, or digital activism, which all lack the affinity to counseling and the division of roles that is characteristic of the YWSCs (cf. Baer, 2016; Mendes et al., 2018; Perez Aronsson, 2020). Bringing together research insights on feminist peer support and online youth counseling, thus allows us to scrutinize the practical implications of feminist support principles, the intersectional power dimensions of online counseling, and the virtual space as an arena for feminist practice and activism, in novel ways.

Theorizing Support in a Virtual Space

The “virtual” space offered by the internet has been celebrated for the possibilities that its “disembodiedness” seems to offer; making it possible to temporarily transcend one's body and its limitations (see e.g., Turkle, 1995). This stance has been much criticized by various researchers, however, who stress that the virtual and the physical worlds are co-constitutive, rather than mutually exclusive (Dickel & Schrape 2017; Hine, 2015; McGerty, 2000).

In this regard, we follow Jessica Brophy's (2010) argument for a corporeal cyberfeminism, and the need to avoid idealizing virtual space as free from oppression and material limitations. As Brophy comments, such an understanding reproduces a Cartesian split between mind and body. From a feminist perspective, presenting the disembodied individual as preferable or even possible builds upon an abstract understanding of “Man” that tends to universalize human experience, obscuring differences in interests and capabilities. When a user is separated from her “site-specific socioeconomic location,” all users are silently assumed to represent the dominant form (Brophy, 2010, p. 931). In the context of the girls-only support chat, such an approach would risk making a certain type of young woman, for example, a Swedish-born, able-bodied, white girl, the unrecognized norm for a support-seeker. As an alternative, Brophy argues that “feminist scholars interested in the internet” should explore both the agency of users and “the power of the internet and its associated technologies to shape, encourage and restrain those experiences” (2010, p. 942). Such an approach centers on the question of the entanglement of the online and offline “worlds,” rather than idealizing either one. Virtual or not, the support relation itself, as it manifests in the (peer) counseling context, is a non-reciprocal relationship, defined by the two parties’ different roles. In line with the theorizations of feminist therapy, we understand this relation as characterized by a structural inequality that can be mitigated, but never fully abolished (cf. Brown, 1994).

Based on these theoretical outlooks, we direct our attention towards the participants’ descriptions of how the practice and ideas of feminist support are shaped, restrained, and renegotiated in and by the digital setting, but also how the virtual space, its possibilities and limitations, are utilized strategically by the participants and their organizations.

While not fully disembodied, a virtual encounter has somewhat different characteristics from a physical meeting, given the physical distance, temporal delays, and technical mediation of the meeting, including the possibility for disconnection. Formative of digital connectivity is indeed, as Sundén (2018) has pointed out, interruptions, distance, and waiting for a response. Brophy suggests the term “liminality” to describe the user's experience of “entering the internet,” acknowledging the inevitability of embodiment as well as the crossings and entanglements of different spaces and temporalities: “Users consistently cross between the online world and offline world, and in this liminal state participate in many interactions which involve a complex interplay of self-technology and self-other” (Brophy, 2010, p. 941). We take these statements as important cues for understanding the interviewed supporters’ experiences of the online support encounter, as they put questions regarding proximity, authenticity, and (dis)identification and connection with the other at the center. How does the online setting, characterized as it is by invisibility, delay, and distance, affect the meaning and doing of “sisterhood” and feminist support?

Method

This study is based on 15 semi-structured interviews with six employees and nine volunteers from seven YWSCs, located in different cities in Sweden. Two of the national networks for women's shelters and YWSC (Roks and Förenade Jourer) disseminated the call for participants among their member organizations, who in turn shared the invitation with their supporters. Those interested in participating in the announced interview on feminist support practices and the YWSC movement then contacted the researchers directly. The centers to which the participants belonged all described themselves as feminist organizations and text-based chat support as their main activity. The age range of the participants was between 25 and 55 years, and most participants were in their early thirties. All participants except one had at least one year's experience of sitting in the chat support. No one had the experience of contacting a YWSC for support themselves. Three participants were active in trans-inclusive organizations; however, no one expressed a trans or nonbinary identity.

The interviews were conducted by the first author between February and April 2021 and were finalized when a broad range of experiences had been collected and themes began to be repeated. All the interviews took place in Swedish. Due to the Covid-19 pandemic, they were conducted digitally, using the video conference client Zoom Meeting. Using digital methods for interviewing has, like online counseling, both positive and negative effects, it is for example easier to miss out on nonverbal cues. However, meeting across a distance through digital methods may also encourage self-disclosure and make the participant more comfortable, leading to richer material (cf. Thunberg & Arnell, 2022). In this case, interviewing across distance had an added value in relation to the research aims, offering the researchers first-hand experience of establishing rapport in a “virtual” space.

The interviews were recorded and transcribed verbatim. To ensure anonymity, information regarding organizations and geographical locations, as well as the participants’ personal details, were removed from the transcripts. All participants were informed about their participation being voluntary, and how their personal data would be treated. The study was approved by the Swedish Ethical Review Authority (2020-06371) before it was initiated.

Analytical Procedure

Aiming to explore how the digital setting shapes and restrains the doing and experience of feminist support, we have employed a reflexive thematic analysis (Braun & Clarke, 2022). The first author made an initial thematization, which was thereafter discussed and reworked by the researchers together, returning multiple times to the interviews, each time with new questions based on the emerging analysis. While the themes were developed based on the material, our analysis of why these matter and how they can be connected are informed by our pre-understandings of feminist peer-support as well as our theoretical conceptualization of the virtual encounter. Notably, our results concern the supporters’ perspectives on being a supporter, and the supporters’ perceptions of how the support-seekers experience the chat. More studies are needed to understand the first-hand experiences of support-seekers.

Results

In the following, we present four themes that describe the most important qualities of feminist peer support as understood and expressed by the interview participants, and what happens to these qualities and ideas when they are to be practiced in a digital setting.

Feminist Support as Horizontal and Power-Sharing

The respondents described a strong ideal of egalitarian support and referred to the well-established principles of the women's shelter movement that Helmersson calls a “doxa of women's emancipation” (2017, p. 123). The ideal kind of support can be described as horizontal, illustrated by the participants with metaphors like “holding her hand” and “walking beside her.” As such, this feminist support is contrasted with institutional, “vertical” support for youth, represented by the participants by examples such as therapy, school, or social services. In the next section, we discuss how the YWSCs’ ambition to mitigate the structural inequality of the support encounter plays out in the digital setting.

Being a Listening (Big) Sister

While striving to provide horizontal support, the interviewees acknowledged that the support is not reciprocal, and stressed that it should not be. The supporter and support-seeker are understood as having very different tasks in the conversation; one is telling her story and the other is listening. To avoid reinforcing the structural inequality of this encounter, the supporters stressed important principles of listening without judging or giving unwanted advice, aiming to “hand over” power from the supporter to the support-seeker. “We are not the experts of her situation, but she is,” explained one of the participants. “Our task is to be a fellow sister through it all, supporting her own ability. […] [But] it's up to her to make the decisions” (P4). The supporters motivated this with reference to a feminist analysis of power and girls’ and young women's need for someone who takes their side if they are exposed to violence, but also to the specific need among children and young people for a place where they can speak out and ask questions without being evaluated by an adult. The age difference between supporters and support-seekers may vary but, given the anonymity of the chat, it is seldom known to either party. However, knowing that there can be a significant difference in age, the supporters described elaborate strategies to avoid a patronizing support position. They mentioned the need to use language that is easy to understand, to avoid giving unwanted advice, and to never question the support-seeker's perspective. “Our idea is that you should be equal with the one you’re talking to, and not make yourself superior, to never take the role of a parent or a top-down perspective, but always strive to be at the same level,” as one supporter (P14) put it. Staging this horizontality is seemingly facilitated by the digital setting, which allows the supporters to be either a nonjudging adult, or to down-play or even hide any assumed age difference, taking the position as simply “another girl.”

Always Trust Her Story

Standing beside and empowering the support-seeker also includes not questioning her story. This is seldom a problem, although several participants noted that they may sometimes have doubts about the truthfulness of a narrative. As representatives of non-governmental organizations, the supporters are not there to evaluate or further influence the support-seekers’ situations, but to listen and confirm. In any case, the anonymity of both parties makes it difficult to verify whether something is true or not. Even though claiming a false identity may be easier online, the level of authenticity of a conversation was stressed by many interviewees as less important than adhering to the principle of trust. As one of the interviewed supporters put it: “It [assuming that she's telling the truth] has to be our point of departure. We can’t check facts or question, that would be a really weird activity” (P1).

Many respondents bore witness to a problem with so-called “trolling” in the chats, such as recurring visitors who tell the same story again and again, often with sexual content. Being exposed to this type of user is perceived as a potential risk of sitting in the chat. Despite this, the level of acceptance of seemingly “strange” or “non-serious” conversations is high. As one participant stated: “Even if what they’re saying isn’t completely true, they have some kind of need to get it out anyway” (P5).

The (Lack of) Power of the Supporter

An important effect of the anonymity and physical distance between the supporter and support-seeker that is characteristic of the online encounter is the supporter's small amount of control over the chat situation, as well as her inability to intervene in the support-seeker's offline world. This seems to further destabilize the power imbalance of the support encounter. For the support-seeker, the distance means a heightened level of control, in the supporters’ experience: “They’re not entering someone's office and I’m not sitting behind some desk […]. If they think I’m an idiot and want to stop talking, they don’t even have to tell me that” (P9). The supporters’ impression of this dynamic corresponds to previous research on users’ experience of online counseling for youth (Löfberg & Aspán, 2011).

For the supporters, on the other hand, coming to terms with their passive role can be a challenge, in particular when chatting with support-seekers in difficult situations. A recurring example was support contact with individuals having suicidal thoughts. In such situations, the participants described feeling frustrated and insufficient. The inability to act is something that you must accept if sitting in the chat, however. You “have to stand the feeling of powerlessness,” as one participant put it. The short-term nature of most chat encounters further strengthens the passive role of the supporters; the conversation is restricted to an hour or two, and, in all likelihood, you will never have any further contact with that person. All these aspects of the digital setting thus set practical limits on the supporter's ability to act.

We argue that the supporters’ lack of control, and the conditions for trust and authenticity inherent in the digital format, provide a foundation for the feminist support practice that is somewhat different from that of a physical encounter. The principle of trust seems to become accentuated in the anonymous encounter, due to the very possibility to, relatively easily, avoid telling the truth. Likewise, the supporter is forced by the digital setting to accept a passive role. Trusting and sharing power with the support-seeker is not only important in the digital setting, but also impossible to avoid to some extent. A cautionary note on the risk of downplaying the supporter's role and possible influence in online counseling situations is necessary, however. While the digital setting may facilitate the removal of some barriers to equality (cf. Brown, 1994, p. 104), it cannot abrogate the inequality of the support situation itself. Seeking support necessarily puts the support-seeker in a vulnerable position, as she lays her situation out in the open and waits for a response. Neither can the setting undo the material and social circumstances that have led supporter and support-seeker to end up with their respective roles in the first place.

Providing a Safe (Online) Space

The participants described offering a “safe space” to support-seekers as paramount for good support, and many referred to the girl-/girl and transgender-only organization as key for building this “safety,” for supporters as well as support-seekers. But the concept of safety, as we will discuss in the following, is also brought to the fore in other ways.

The Girls-Only Safe Space

Creating “safe spaces” through women-only organizing has long been a core element of feminism (Roestone Collective, 2014), offering “a space to bond and share experiences with an imagined community of like-minded people” (Perez Aronsson, 2020, p. 13). Typically, the perceived safety of these spaces builds on the absence of (cis) men as the oppressing group and the presence of like-minded “sisters”: they provide women with both safety from harassment, abuse, and misogyny and safety to be intellectually and emotionally expressive (Lewis et al., 2015). The feminist safe space furthermore builds on a relational understanding of safety, which needs to be continuously recreated and sustained through practices such as active listening and affirming exchanges (Roestone Collective, 2014). A similar understanding of safety imbues a large part of the interviewees’ descriptions of their support.

It's an important fact that we’re a women-only organization, because part of what we offer is precisely that girls support girls. […] There is a need for a free zone where you can be a girl and a girl talking, and that we’re two people talking to each other. (P9)

This quote illustrates how the safety achieved by separatist organizing is perceived as allowing the support-seekers to open up with their problems, connecting the absence of men with the principles of “sisterhood” to which the supporters adhere: not judging, sharing power, just being “two girls talking” to each other. Likewise, the girls-only organization is described as safe and enabling for the supporters and the atmosphere of the support community: “I think that many of our volunteers choose to get organized [with us] because you have certain experiences that you may share with others in the association, which leads to very good conversations” said P6. “You can find enormous support and pep in each other.”

Anonymity, Invisibility, and Control

The participants unanimously stressed that the anonymity offered by the online setting allows support-seekers to feel safer. Anonymity is considered to facilitate support-seekers in daring to open up about difficult experiences and is also perceived as allowing them to have greater control over the situation. As the supporters have neither the opportunity nor the obligation to contact parents or the authorities, the young support-seekers can tell them things they would not risk mentioning in other contexts, as P5 points out: “They don’t have to worry that we’ll call a parent or contact the police or social services, because we can’t do that. So, I think we get a lot of information that they’re afraid to share with others.”

The invisibility and “disembodied” character of the chat encounter was also perceived as enabling for both supporter and support-seeker, corresponding to previous research on how the online setting itself can facilitate self-disclosure (cf. Lapidot-Lefler & Barak, 2015).

I think [the anonymity] is really, really good. Partly because of this distance and the fact that you can take your time when answering, so you can read and read again […]. And it's a bit of the same thing that's good for the support-seeker, that they don’t have to open their mouth. They don’t need to look at anyone directly, but they use the written word. […] It's a much less vulnerable position than sitting in a room with someone. That's really threatening when you’re young. (P6)

In a text-based digital encounter, young people can “become invisible to become visible,” as Löfberg and Aspán (2011, p. 59) put it, suggesting that the digital setting is particularly beneficial for young people seeking support. This is confirmed by the interviewed supporters’ experiences. The relative anonymity of the chat gives the young users a sense of enhanced control and space for action (Löfberg & Aspán, 2011).

The invisibility inherent in the chat format was experienced as creating a “safe space” for the supporters as well. They do not have to keep up a professional face but can react with both tears and laughter to the support-seekers’ narratives. The physical distance was also described as making it easier to avoid becoming too negatively affected by difficult conversations.

In addition, the chat format was perceived as allowing supporters time to phrase their response, and to relieve the pressure attached to providing support. The supporters we interviewed often sat together with others while chatting, or used a separate channel for communication with each other:

[W]e always sat together. And I thought that was very good, because it also happened that you would just turn to your chat buddy and just: “God, this is terrible.” And so, vomit a little and then continue chatting. Then you can also just throw out “Does anyone have any good tips on…?” (P2)

For the supporters, the distance and invisibility characterizing the online chat thus seems to work in synergy with the safety provided by the feminist organizing and the community of supporters in creating a safe setting for giving support. Working together in a girls-only space allows for consulting and venting when the problems shared by the support-seekers are overwhelming. However, the safe space offered to the support-seekers is partly renegotiated, with less emphasis put on the relational safety characterizing a girls-only safe space (cf. Roestone Collective, 2014), and focusing instead on the benefits of anonymity and invisibility.

Personal Support I: Presence and Proximity

The support offered by the YWSCs was described by the participants as non-professional, and their role as being a “sister,” and an equal. This could imply an understanding of the ideal support as being personal and close, with the supporter sitting there on the basis of being an “ordinary girl.” In this section, we address two dimensions of personal support in the chat: firstly, the possible disadvantages of the “safe” distance discussed above, related to the (lack of) proximity of the support encounter, and, secondly, the opportunities for rapport between supporter and support-seeker.

On (Not) Being Present

The interviews indicate that the text-based format for support has clear effects on both the temporality and the experienced closeness of the conversations. There is not the same directness as in a physical meeting or phone call, but rather a readiness for slowness and ruptures (Sundén, 2018). The tempo of a chat can vary hugely; sometimes you do not receive an answer for ten minutes, and at other times the tempo is intense. As discussed above, the physical distance and invisibility characterizing the meeting make it possible for the supporters to also support each other during the conversation. This multiple presence adds to the supporters’ feelings of safety, but can also be related to a possible disadvantage of the chat situation; because you are simultaneously inhabiting both a virtual and a physical room, you are, perhaps inevitably, less present in both spaces. The liminal (Brophy, 2010) character of “being online” becomes evident here. Multiple “places” and temporalities shade into one another, creating a setting for personal support that is very different from a physical meeting. One of the interviewed supporters had previous experience of giving support over the telephone. Comparing the two, she thought that the phone tended to make you more empathetic, as you were forced to be more present.

Because, with the chat, I mean when you’re sitting at the computer, you might even get a bit bored. You might even think: “God, not this again,” I don’t know. You can sit there and just, I’m going in, I’m not getting any answers here for a while, I’ll go and check Facebook. Like that. I think most do that. And that's more difficult when you’re on the phone, just leaving. You can’t really do that. So, I think the support gets better the more personal it is. (P13)

Another participant acknowledged that there is a risk of “dehumanizing” the support-seeker, forgetting that there is a real person at the other end. For this reason, she explained, the supporters continuously remind themselves that the support-seekers are actual people, whose life circumstances the supporters know very little about.

Notably, the digital setting enables supporters to have multiple conversations at the same time, often conducting between two and five chat conversations simultaneously. The main reason for this is to be able to offer support to more girls. Most of the interviewees thought that this generally works well. But if a conversation turns into a very difficult one, for example, concerning suicidal thoughts, many supporters will close the other channels as quickly as possible, to be able to focus on one person only. This strategy indicates that different conversations demand different levels of “presence” from the supporters.

Establishing—and Maintaining—Rapport

All the interviewees agreed that the chat format generally works well for the purpose of supporting young people. However, many highlighted the online setting as being a challenge to establishing rapport. “We don’t have a voice, no body language,” said P4. “Therefore, it can be really difficult sometimes to sense where you are, what tone it is.” Since you cannot use body language or tone of voice, you must use your typing to show that you are listening and that you understand. The fact that the support-seeker can easily leave at any time places high demands on the supporter's ability to keep the support-seeker's trust. In written communication, the words that you choose may become more important. As one supporter put it: “You really have to think about what you’re writing, so that the person doesn’t hang up, because she doesn’t feel listened to” (P10). While expressing themselves through text may be preferred by many youths, it should also be acknowledged that language skills differ and that some may prefer oral communication. However, some participants thought that the chat format makes it easier to establish trust and get a good flow in the conversation. “It takes away a lot of pressure, like social pressure,” said P6. “But maybe it's my generation. […] You use smileys and exclamation marks and caps lock, like ‘HAHAHA’ […] There's something very free in it.” The participants further described how a more personal contact can be established through the use of humor, by imitating the support-seeker's style of writing, and by using emojis.

The strategies described are similar to the ones that have been found to be effective for establishing rapport in online counseling (Hanley, 2009). Previous research has also noted the need for the supporter to emerge as a real person, by not appearing too strict, or as simply following a protocol (Löfberg & Aspán, 2011; Timm, 2018). This was also stressed by many participants. It is important to not seem like a chatbot, as that would (presumably) compromise both the support-seeker's trust and the principles of feminist support.

When we open a chat-box, it automatically pops up a message, but after ten seconds I usually send an emoji or question […]. So that it doesn’t become like [imitating a computerized voice] “you are suffering from deliberate self-harm,” like that, “it can be difficult to speak with one's parents.” I still want them to know that someone [a real person] is sitting on the other side. (P8)

But one participant brought up a different perspective. She argued that it can be experienced as safer for the support-seekers “to feel that you’re just telling some computer how you really are,” and that “it's a higher threshold to dare to tell how you really are and feel, if the supporter becomes like a real person” (P11). In her experience, if the supporter becomes too much of an individual, this can have a negative effect on the support offering.

This perspective seems to be at odds with the principle of listening that is described as central to feminist support, implicitly questioning whether there really is a need for someone human who listens to and validates the support-seeker's story. Is it rather the very opportunity to tell the story that is central? This interpretation is confirmed by the YWSC The Girl Zone in a report describing the characteristics of chat support. As an online chat offers the possibility to control the level of proximity of a conversation, chatting makes it possible to “‘borrow someone's ear’ without feeling emotionally forced to socialize with the other” (Munkesjö, 2011, p. 12). Chatting about how you feel with a stranger may be an “intra-personal conversation approaching an inter-personal” (Munkesjö, 2011, p. 12).

These conflicting perspectives on the (im)personal encounter illustrate a tension in the material between the meaning of trust and safety, as discussed above, and the supporting function of “someone who listens.” We read this tension as being, again, an effect of the physical distance and the characteristics of digital connectivity (Sundén, 2018). When meeting in the chatroom, both supporter and support-seeker are simultaneously present and elsewhere, and the degree of their emotional and temporal commitment to the conversation may vary. A certain level of detachment and invisibility, which emerges as the default mode of the virtual meeting, seems enabling for both support-seeker and supporter and their opportunity to establish a relationship. However, too much detachment is presented as a risk, possibly leading to a dehumanizing attitude, at odds with the ideals of feminist support.

Personal Support II: Sharing Experiences

A recurring and important question for feminist theory and activism, following longstanding debates on intersectionality and the category “women,” is the question of sameness and difference among women's and girls’ experiences and life situations (for an overview, see e.g., Alcoff, 2006). Recent studies of feminist organizing in Sweden suggest that an intersectional analysis of power and a problematizing approach to the category “women,” highlighting differences in women's positions and interests, dominates among young feminist activists’ understandings of feminism (Johansson Wilén, 2019). Likewise, the question of sharing—or not sharing—the experience of being a girl, and what this entails, stands at the center of the YWSCs’ organizing and the interviewees’ reflections on good feminist support. We turn to this in the final theme.

Defining “The Girl Experience”

There is an assumption underlying the YWSCs’ organizing that the supporters’ identities and social positions affect their ability to provide support, and contribute to the centers and chat being (or not being) safe feminist spaces. Sharing a gender identity is not the only important factor in good support, but most participants agreed that it has a positive effect on the chat conversations and atmosphere of the organizations. “It can be good knowing that you’re talking to someone who maybe has gone through similar stuff, or at least has some kind of understanding of it,” as P6 put it, also illustrating the movement's attachment to feminist epistemology and an understanding of knowledge as situated (cf. Haraway, 1988). From this perspective, your social location and identity, such as being a girl, is perceived as affecting (while not necessarily determining) your outlook on the (virtual) social world (cf. Brophy, 2010, p. 931). Because many participants referred to the benefits of sharing the experience of “being a girl” with the support-seeker, they were asked to specify, if possible, what types of experience they meant. Many had difficulties, however, in naming specific features of “the girl experience,” or were reluctant do so, referring to the differences among girls’ social locations, as exemplified by this quote: “I think that, even though girlhood can look very different, we have all still been, or are, young girls. You’ve ended up in certain situations, felt certain feelings, and that's something you can share” (P1).

Among those who did mention specific experiences, recurring themes were: being subjected to gender norms, having been exposed to sexual harassment, and a general fear or caution in relation to men or boys, knowing that, you need to take the risk of violence into account. Throughout the interviews, however, it became clear that the participants and their organizations, in wanting to be inclusive and recognizing differences while still adhering to a separatist form of organizing, had to draw a tentative and loose picture of the possible meanings and implications of being a girl or young woman. For the trans-inclusive centers, the question of what different individuals may share seemed to become less important, as the common characteristic among members and support-seekers was implicitly drawn in negative terms: their target group and members are those who are not cis men.

Sharing, But Not Sharing

Recognizing that supporters’ experiences matter for the support they can offer, many participants referred to the homogeneity of the organization, in terms of aspects such as ethnic background and educational level, as a problem. It was argued that the lack of diversity among supporters might affect their ability to provide good support to certain young people. One volunteer said, for example:

The vast majority of members come from a very similar background. I mean, it's mostly white, middle-class girls who are academics. (…) That also affects how you encounter people. If you have a certain experience, it's super important for someone who is maybe seeking support specifically […]. You have a certain knowledge that maybe no one else has. (P11)

However, the same participant also stressed that the chat conversation should not be about the supporter, and that who is sitting at the other end should not be important.

This person who logs in or seeks contact does so for a reason, not because they want to speak with me, but because they want to share something with someone. I think you end up with the wrong focus if [the support-seeker] gets too much information about who is sitting at the other end. (…) If you become like a real person. (P11)

Many of the supporters use pseudonyms instead of their real names, they normally will not say how old they are if someone asks, most will not disclose their occupation or cultural background, and they rarely refer to their own experiences of similar matters during a conversation with a support-seeker. In general, the supporters in the trans-inclusive centers do not disclose their gender identity. The volunteers’ reluctance to share details about themselves is generally explained with reference to the fact that it is the support-seeker who should be at the center; the supporters should not redirect attention towards themselves. Rather than making comparisons with their own experience, many will instead refer to the support-seeker's problem as “common,” using more general language to put the girl's situation into a wider context.

The two standpoints on “sharing experiences” put forward by the same participant above illustrate a tension found throughout the interview material. Sharing experiences and social locations are considered important on one level, while the supporters simultaneously refrain from telling support-seekers even the smallest details about themselves. This conflict is accentuated by the online format, which seems to make disclosing your first name, age, and sometimes even gender, too “private,” at least for some participants. While this could be related to the risk of “trolling,” the strict ambition not to “overshare” is notable in light of the simultaneous emphasis on personal experience as a merit for good support. This tension begs the question: to what extent does sharing experiences and social locations really matter, when the level of similarities and differences in a particular chat encounter are not known to either support-seeker or supporter?

The Power of Imagined Similarities

The participants’ emphasis on personal experience and implicit references to feminist theories on situated knowledge appear furthermore to be in conflict with their reasoning regarding authenticity. “It might be that, if it wasn’t a chat, it wouldn’t work out at all. That they saw me,” said one participant (P5), who was slightly older than many other supporters. She acknowledged that she does not disclose her age in order not to compromise the support-seekers’ trust. This is something that several participants mentioned. The participant quoted above finds being older an advantage, but she recognizes that the support-seekers might expect a younger person to be sitting at the other end. “Calling it ‘girl chat’ signals something, and in all the pictures there are just young girls. They don’t think they’ll meet someone who is a mother or a grandmother,” she said. But since the support-seekers do not know what the age difference is, it does not really matter, many of the supporters concluded. In a similar vein, a participant from one of the trans-inclusive centers noted that the support-seekers can “assume anything they like” about the supporter, for example, regarding their gender identity, and does not see this as a problem.

We see the participants’ line of reasoning on this subject as indicative of how the idea of shared experiences and identification is made to matter in the chat support. The sense of solidarity and sisterhood that the support takes as its starting point largely builds on both parties’ loosely drawn image of their chat partner as a peer, a “sister.” The “truth,” in terms of particularity and difference, is generally perceived as less important than establishing and keeping the support-seekers’ trust. In a sense, by posing only as “another girl” and not sharing too much about themselves, the supporters can be anyone the support-seekers want them to be. In that way, they can more easily “meet” the support-seeker's expectations.

A tentative answer to the question raised above—about how sharing experiences and social locations can be understood as important in an anonymous setting—is hence that it matters primarily at the level of “imagination.” Both supporters and support-seekers inevitably create a picture for themselves about the person they are chatting with. Sometimes they have clues to assist with this image, like a name, but often the meeting takes place, or so it seems, “outside the social structures,” as P6 phrased it.

Simultaneously recognizing that a “body is necessary for participation online” (Brophy, 2010, p. 933), the participants also highlighted potential risks of meeting the other at the level of imagination. On the one hand, “[the fact that we can’t see or hear the support-seeker] makes us very free of prejudice, but on the other hand, it also makes it more difficult to see certain power structures that might affect them,” said P6. Neither is imagination itself free of prejudice, of course. Accordingly, many respondents stressed the importance of not making assumptions about the support-seekers based on societal norms or their own experiences; one should be “norm-critical” (cf. Johansson Wilén, 2019), use inclusive formulations, and not impose one's own situation or perspectives on the other. Supporters and support-seekers know very little about each other and will be in contact for only a short time, but it seems that a point of common understanding and trust can still be reached. This could suggest that the feminist support offered is ultimately defined, not by sharing actual experiences or social positioning, but rather by an underlying assumption of mutual care and good will.

Concluding Discussion

In this article, we have set out to analyze how the digital setting can shape, restrain, and contribute to a renegotiation of the meaning of feminist peer support, which traditionally is based on principles of horizontality, trust, and the sharing of experiences. The interplay between feminist notions of sisterhood and the anonymity and distance characterizing the online chat has several implications. It seems to facilitate more (although not fully) egalitarian support relations, making the young support-seeker less dependent on the supporter or social norms, granting her the power to leave at any time, and not having to worry about possible interventions in her life by the supporter. This too implies a partial renegotiation of the meaning of trust and the safe space provided by the feminist support organizations.

If the traditional feminist understanding of safe space is built on a logic of togetherness and a community of girls/women who share something in common, the safety enabled by the digital format itself is based on an idea of safety as dependent on borders and isolation (cf. Lewis et al., 2015). Here, the safe space invoked is free not only from the particular danger and inhibition associated with the presence of men or boys, but also from the potential threat that the evaluating gaze of any other person may constitute. Hence, by providing feminist support in a digital setting, the YWSC brings together two different logics of safety, which together constitute a particular form of environment for opening up, giving support, and establishing rapport.

The relationship that is established in the chat situation is complex, characterized by distance, anonymity, its temporary nature and division of roles, and varying assumptions about both similarities and differences between supporter and support-seeker. Influenced by feminist critiques of a disembodied and universal knowing subject, the supporters acknowledge that their understanding of the support-seeker's particular situation is limited, and even more so due to the digital setting. They, therefore, stress the importance of remembering that there is a unique individual sitting at the other end of the connection. However, to what extent the supporters themselves should emerge as real, “situated” individuals in the encounter in order to provide good support is less clear. The interplay between feminist perceptions of situated knowledge and virtual encounters between two anonymous individuals appears to destabilize, or redefine, the assumed relevance of the supporters’ social locations. Our findings indicate that a specific form of rapport and trust can be achieved, not by sharing authentic experiences, but by the supporters posing as an “imaginary sister”; as someone the support-seeker knows nothing about, but whose solidarity she can count on. While this strategy may raise ethical questions (is it, for example, appropriate to let a support-seeker think that you are almost as young as she when you are in fact much older?) and may be questioned from the perspectives of support-seekers (for which we have no first-hand evidence), it nevertheless suggests a way of practicing feminist solidarity and identifying common ground, while both dodging and overcoming the much-debated question of difference among girls (or women). The extent to which the supporters and support-seekers share interests and experiences, or fully understand each other's viewpoints seems—based on the supporters’ narratives—to be less important than their temporary ambition to chat, listen, and trust each other in the given situation.

Our results show that text-based, anonymous chat support have a large potential as a feminist-informed support practice, in particular for young people, but also bring ethical issues concerning rapport building and detachment to the fore. By destabilizing the meaning and relevance of authenticity, identity, and shared experiences, practices, and experiences of feminist support in a digital setting can furthermore contribute to strategic and conceptual feminist discussions about sameness and difference. A challenge for feminist online peer support is recognizing the possibilities for rapport and solidarity across distance, while simultaneously acknowledging that the virtual encounter is never disembodied nor free from power relations. This will be important for any use of digital communication in the broader field of feminist social work.