Disinformation with a Gender

As anti-democratic agendas continue to rise – in Europe and abroad – so does the amount of online attacks, fake news, conspiracy theories, or deep fakes targeting women in politics. Luana Souto is a legal researcher and was a Research Fellow at the Weizenbaum Institute in April 2024. She spoke to us about what enables these attacks against female politicians, how they are used to weaken democracies, and what can be done to fight them.

 

What is gendered disinformation? How does it manifest, what does it look like? 

Gendered disinformation is a broad concept assuming different approaches, such as fake news, conspiracy theories, online attacks, memes, or deep fakes created to disqualify a female politician based on her gender. It is a political strategy to undermine women's political rights, built on what society historically considered to be a "man's job." My research focuses on how gendered disinformation is used to spread gender backlash policies, and how online attacks against female politicians weaken democracies and overturn women's rights.  

How widespread is the problem?  

Gendered disinformation is part of a larger complex of gender-political violence that can also be psychological, physical, and sexual attacks, or patrimonial and symbolic strategies used to constrain their political activities. So far, my work is dedicated to analyzing the Brazilian and Latin American contexts. In recent years, the number of online attacks against female politicians has increased in the region. In Brazil, we’re dealing with a backlash to the increase of women in politics.

A few decades ago, attacks against female politicians were assumed to be the problem of non-developed countries. However, recent years have demonstrated that even the most established democracies can face it. In 2019, for example, in the aftermath of Brexit and in reaction to an increase of female politicians, the UK faced a large number of resignations resulting from misogynistic attacks. At least 6 women resigned from the British parliament that year.

How are you researching this? What methods do you use?

I am a legal researcher, so my work is based on a theoretical approach that involves critical analyses of a problem or a legal issue. I focus on understanding these phenomena and creating more effective legal solutions to protect women’s rights by “translating” potential solutions into legal or regulatory languages.

I also work with a feminist perspective that challenges our traditional legal system. This means facilitating an interdisciplinary dialog with disciplines such as Gender Studies, Sociology, Political Sciences, and sometimes Literature to develop a more effective regulatory framework for women's rights protection. It is qualitative work based on a scoping literature review and legal-dogmatic research methods, which means researching current positive law as laid down in written and unwritten rules, principally statutes and decided cases.
 

What enables or promotes these types of online attacks?

Each country has what the literature calls an "enabling environment." Sometimes, it could be religious beliefs, cultural elements that shape a society, or a political event that somehow divides people, creating the notion of "us" and "them." It is interesting to note that times of crisis – a democratic crisis or a health crisis, such as the COVID-19 pandemic – result in political polarization, which is a powerful trigger against women’s rights. They become a target because they represent a progressive agenda that is considered a threat to anti-democratic groups. So, hate, fear, and misogyny are used to unite the group's members to attack female politicians. 

Nowadays, any country can face anti-democratic agendas, especially due to the rise of far-right political parties, and in this context, female politicians will become a target.
 

What role do digital media play here?

Digital media provide an online and technology-facilitated environment to disseminate gender backlashes and disinformation. Anti-democratic groups benefit from the borderless and biased design of technology to create artificial anti-gender debates, manipulate public opinion about candidates, and attract new followers. The (false) idea of being anonymous on social media encourages people to act and express their views in this place more openly, in a way they wouldn’t in real life. The digitalization process assists in widespread and increasing gendered disinformation, also using the tech-neutrality discourse from which people believe that anything from the internet is true. Meanwhile, political parties use bots, trolls and fake news to disqualify their opponents in the electoral arena.
 

Are there differences between countries, cultures or political systems?

Yes, they usually lie in these enabling environments or the strategies of the attackers. In New Zealand, for example, during the pandemic, the number of attacks against the Prime Minister, Jacinda Ardern increased due to conspiracy theories related to vaccination. In Brazil, our patriarchal history, allied with our social-colonial inequalities, could be identified as our enabling environment. For example, one of the most famous fake news about Manuela D’Ávila, who ran for vice president in 2018, was how her patrimony increased during her campaign. Somehow, this was connected with claims of corruption rising in the country during the so- called “Car Wash Operation” scandal – similar to what happened with Dilma Rousseff's impeachment process. In the end, their goal is to weaken democracies, and gendered disinformation is just a tool.

What about the number of attacks?

Developed countries with more consolidated democracies will report fewer cases when we compare them with developing countries. But while attacks in both cases discourage female politicians in their own country, an attack against a female politician in a “more politically stable” country will have an impact on women in other countries, too – for example my own. If a female politician is not even safe there, why should an aspiring woman in Brazil feel safe?

Here in Europe, we’ve recently witnessed the political success of women from the radical right. Do female politicians, who stand for anti-democratic, anti-feminist values, also face such attacks based on their gender? 

These are very interesting cases. Anti-democratic female politicians usually represent a traditional male politician, inheriting the political capital from their father, husband, or other political figure – sometimes acting as placeholders. And still, they suffer attacks based on their gender. But – in the case of Brazil – progressive politicians face twice as many attacks as those on the right.

What are the social and political effects of gendered disinformation and online attacks? What does this mean for our democratic institutions? 

The main objective of gendered disinformation is to discourage women from occupying public or political spaces. The attacks against them are addressed to their gender and not related to their work qualifications. The political effect will be less diversity in public offices, parliaments, and governments. Therefore, the social effects will be a lack of diverse and gender-sensitive interests and claims in our governments, legislations, and public policies. As a result, our democratic institutions will become less democratic because one of the elements of democracy is equality. So, how should we be equal if just one part of society's interest is considered? 

What can and should be done about this, who plays a key role in fighting this problem?

In my opinion, a holistic approach is essential to solve problems related to gender issues. Of course, we can establish some legal or governmental measures. The UN as well as the EU have been active here through the UN Report on Freedom of Expression and the gender dimensions of Disinformation, and the European Commission Strengthened Code of Practice on Disinformation. They will play a crucial role in dealing with it in a legal space and perhaps criminalize gendered disinformation.

However, as a legal researcher and a critic of our legal order, I believe these measures will not be enough in the long term. In my doctoral thesis, I highlighted how social measures are essential in gender issues, especially through the educational system. Our children, at very young ages, are already assuming binary gender stereotypes and an idea of what is a “man's job." This impacts society's perspective of who should run for public office and who shouldn't. So, I believe in a non-gender-binary educational curriculum as a strategy to overturn centuries of misogynic beliefs regarding which gender should occupy political spaces. 

Thank you for the interview.

 

Care to learn more?

• Book: Women in Power: A Manifesto, by Mary Beard (2017)
  • Video: Lecture by Mary Beard on Women in Power (2017)
• Book: The Authority Gap, by May Ann Sieghart (2022)
  • Video: TED Talk. How to Close the Authority Gap, Mary Ann Sieghart (2024)
• Article: Global Disinformation Index: Gendered Disinformation in the European Parliamentary Elections (June 2024)

 

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Dr. Luana Mathias Souto holds a doctoral degree in Law from Pontifícia Universidade Católica de Minas Gerais - PUC Minas (Brazil). She is a theoretical researcher focused on Gender Studies and Law. In April 2024 she was a Fellow at the Weizenbaum Institute in the Research Group “Platform Algorithms and Digital Propaganda.”

She was interviewed by Leonie Dorn

 

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This interview is part of a special focus "Solidarity in the Networked Society." Scientists from the Weizenbaum Institute provide insights into their research on various aspects of digital democracy and digital participation through interviews, reports, and dossiers. Find our more