Bill Cosby: New York mag cover sparks #TheEmptyChair debate

New York magazine has featured photographs of 35 women who have accused Bill Cosby of rape or sexual assault on its cover this week, along with interviews of the women. The remarkable cover story, which also includes an image of an empty chair, has sparked a global conversation on rape and rape reporting.

The story in New York magazine features women aged up to 80, including supermodels Beverly Johnson and Janice Dickinson, as well as waitresses and journalists who have spoken about their alleged ordeals. Many said that they felt invisible, that nobody would listen to them and they had struggled for years to overcome the trauma.

The magazine's website, which temporarily crashed shortly after the story appeared, also featured six video interviews and portraits by Amanda Demme.

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The response from commentators was immediate.

"For years Bill Cosby, America's favourite father figure, headed off allegations of sexual assaults with lawyers, cash and a wall of silence," says Rob Crilly in the Daily Telegraph. For years no one believed the accusers, until now.

The NY magazine cover of the 35 women who describe their frustration and anger as they sought justice is "the latest sign that the world is listening", adds Crilly. Cosby, whose role as Cliff Huxtable in the 1980s Cosby Show earned him the nickname America's Dad, "has seen his reputation shredded".

It was the empty chair on the magazine cover that really got people talking, says Jessica Glenza in The Guardian. The absent women, embodied by a lone seat in the corner of the powerful photo, spawned the #TheEmptyChair hashtag.

The tag launched a public discussion of who reports rape, who does not, who is believed and who isn't. "#TheEmptyChair isn't big enough to fit all the people who have been raped, unheard and shamed," tweeted activist Charlene Carruther. Another activist and writer, Janet Mock, wrote that the chair "signals the women who couldn't come forward mostly [because] we, as a culture, wouldn't believe them".

The "powerful image [of the empty chair] is galvanising discussions about sexual assault" across social media, says USA Today. The hashtag #TheEmptyChair represents survivors of sexual violence unwilling or unable to come forward about their experiences, it says.

Some of the most heartbreaking accounts of life in #TheEmptyChair appeared on the Twitter feed of journalist and activist Elon White, who helped launch the hashtag, adds USA Today. Survivors started sending him direct messages with accounts of their assaults, which he then tweeted while keeping their identities private.

The New York magazine story comes at the end of a particularly bad month for Cosby, says the Washington Post. The comedian has continued to deny all sexual assault allegations and has not been charged with a crime, but acknowledged in a 2005 court deposition, made public three weeks ago, that he intended to give Quaaludes (a powerful sedative) to young women with whom he wanted to have sex.