I applaud what Gio has done, and I have seen what sort of reaction it can get.

A few years ago, I was with a Facebook group called The Watchers who were working on taking down rape-enabling pages. After many complaints to Facebook, we were getting nowhere.

I started targeting advertisers whose ads appeared on these pages. In one memorable case, I googled the company and found an email address for their CEO and senior Comms advisor. I sent them an email with a screencap of images of rape juxtaposed with their brand name. I didn’t really expect much.

I got an email back very quickly saying they were horrified and were immediately pulling all their Facebook advertising and re-evaluating their entire advertising strategy.

My email wasn’t a threatening one. It was one that expressed concern about their product and brand – one I liked – being associated with such horrors. The idea took off.

I was thrilled to see that recently Laura Bates of the wonderful The Everyday Sexism Project started doing the same thing. And that got international media attention.

Not detracting from the awesome work Gio has done, it is now a recognised method of activism. In fact it invalidates the comments of his detractors because it is a recognised method.