Emma Watson Laughs In the Face of Sexism

Everyone's favorite person is at it again. On Thursday, Emma Watson earned international favor with a political tweet. The recently named Goodwill Ambassador for UN Women joined a Twitter protest aimed at Turkish deputy prime minister Bülent Arinç. The PM recently said in a speech that women should be chaste and avoid laughing in public. The Independent reports: "[Women] will not laugh in public. She will not be inviting in her attitudes and will protect her chasteness... Where are our girls, who slightly blush, lower their heads and turn their eyes away when we look at their face, becoming the symbol of chastity?”

In response, women have been posting pictures of themselves laughing with the tag #direnkahkaha, which is Turkish for the suppression of laughter.

Watson joined the protest by tweeting a photo of herself bent over in the street laughing. Her post received thousands of favorites and retweets, but on Friday afternoon, the tweet was no where to be found. Thankfully, Watson's empowering tweet has been undeleted and is back in her feed.

The fact that the tweet was deleted, even for a short while, seems like a strange move, as the tweet was not particularly polarizing. Arinç's remarks have been widely regarded as sexist and offensive, and Watson's show of solidarity with the women of Turkey makes sense in light of her capacity as Goodwill Ambassador.

Celebrities have often taken down tweets that reveal too strong of a position, but this is one that Watson should be standing behind. I would speculate that some member of her team or someone at the UN thought that it took too extreme of a position, but I think the choice to remove it was misguided, and I'm glad it's back up.

Watson's tweet and the Twitter protest are still going strong.