Gender violence: marketplace violence and symbolic violence in social movements

Abstract

Drawing on a retrospective case study involving LGBTQ populations and the tobacco industry, we demonstrate how a duplicitous stance by Big Tobacco illuminates the ways that symbolic violence is perpetrated on consumers. We define marketplace violence as the actions and narratives of powerful market actors that perpetuate inequalities that less powerful market actors experience. This research delineates how marketplace relationships perpetuate gender and sexual orientation discrimination, and how powerful market actors engage in invidious action under the guise of community support, thereby undermining community-based social movements.