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What happens to Amy Chaturvedi in Fieldwork as a Sex Object is every woman’s worst nightmare realised – a sextape gone viral. Worse still, a deepfake sextape. Unlike real sextapes that could once be monetised and become a shortcut to celebrityhood, a sextape today can be made and circulated so easily that they are only good enough for faceless social media trolling. A sextape is no longer a novelty and millions float around on pornography websites as “homemade movies”, so when one does go viral, best believe that it was made to go viral. The intentions are nefarious – to disgrace an outspoken woman, get the manosphere all charged up, and, in a country like India, to reinforce beliefs that nothing good can come from women’s liberation.

So when Amy’s deepfake sextape goes viral and quite literally breaks the Indian internet, she knows she is done for – this is unlike any crisis she’s handled before. She is well aware of the treacherous landscape of reposts, shares, likes, and comments but until now, only her words have been attacked. The scrutiny of her face and (morphed) body is entirely new, and there’s no one else she knows who has faced anything remotely similar. Her vociferous online Communist activism has earned...

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