Online gender-based violence
Online gender-based violence is targeted harassment and prejudice through technology against people, disproportionately women, based on their gender.
It also includes cyber-sexism played off as humorous and harmless when in reality it reinforces harmful stereotypes, violence, and gender-based power structures that dominant both the offline and online world.
These are images created to present sexist jokes, sexual violence, and gender stereotypes while playing it off as simply something humorous.
One type is online domestic violence, where perpetrators use the internet to exploit the intimate and private knowledge that they have of their partner in order to hurt them.
[4] Research by Sameer Hinduja and Justin Patchin have studied this phenomenon, which they term "digital dating abuse," finding that 28% of students in a romantic relationship the previous year had been victimized in this manner.
[4] A recent systematic literature review by Puneet Kaur et al., identified that the prevalence of cyberstalking is unclear, with empirical studies identifying rates as low as 6.5% and as high as 46%; this wide variation is likely due to divergent sampling methodologies, conceptualization and operationalization of the term, reticence in reporting, and even differences across demographic groups.
Cultural norms and beliefs are carried from physical communities into online spaces by actors who engage in this behavior in person or who already agree with misogynist ideas.
[7] Through cultural causes, scholars claim that rather than technology creating violence online, it simply provides a new platform which users adapt to suit their desired action, some of which may include acts such as doxing, threatening, or stalking women.
For instance, acts of gender-based violence may be more common in fields such as politics where strong ideologies about women's roles and misogyny are already present.
[10] These threads of gendered trolling can be inflated by algorithm behaviors; in many cases online systems "boost" negative posts leading them to reach a larger audience and gain more violent responses.
Systems which provide online formats such as Reddit or Tor can often become popular among groups with violent ideas or who would like to remain anonymous.
Trends of women and individuals of low socio-economic status producing less content online poses a threat to the democratization of the internet.
[15] Despite its status as the most participatory site on the internet, Wikipedia perpetrates these inequalities and does not serve as a safe knowledge outlet for women.
[16] Reports of women claiming that editing Wikipedia articles is something that they fear is a critical component of gender-based violence online.
[17] Issues of safety are relevant in this conversation as the small proportion of women who do participate in these edits feel pressured to reside within the “quiet corners” of Wikipedia as a personal precaution.
Participation in Wikipedia article editing requires heavy emotional labor for women due to its hostile and judgmental environment posed by existing gender inequalities.
That is, anonymity and efficiency that coincide with the essence of the technological media allow for past prejudices to pervade participatory publishing sites.
Unlike those physically attacked, online formats make it much possible for victims to receive hundreds or thousands of threats and violent comments in a short span of time.
Proliferated through the hashtag #Gamergate, this controversy shows how at risk female identifying internet users and content creators are to harassment, death threats, and sexually derogatory attacks among other things.
These online threats translated into the personal lives of the women being attacked; many were forced to relocate, stay in close contact with the police, and cancel scheduled in-person events.
The perpeterators of online gender-based violence target the vulnerable members of a particular gender, including the women of color and the LGBTQ.
It also noted the role of organizations such as the Women's Rights Programme of the Association of Progressive Communication in pushing for an increase in substantive policies regarding online gender-based violence.
