Gendered attack, disinformation prevalent in Bangladesh’s social media: Study

In Global Majority regions, including in Bangladesh, the digital sphere has evolved into a critical arena for political discourse, where gendered attacks are weaponised to harass and target political opponents, journalists and activists, deterring, and even restricting, the political participation of women and gender-diverse communities.

The research: The Techglobal Institute’s InfoLab devised a method to take into nuances of the Global South.  Here’s what was revealed.

Research Scope: The study analysed nearly 25,000 Facebook posts to understand the coordination and dissemination of gendered disinformation during Bangladesh’s recent general election.

Prevalence of Abuse: 1,400 out of 12,287 unique posts contained gendered attacks.

• Targets: Women and gender-diverse individuals were the primary targets, with significant attacks on female politicians, journalists, and activists.
• Forms of abuse: Included sexual insinuations, derogatory comments on physical appearance, and attacks based on gender, religion, and sexual orientation.
• Impact: Gendered disinformation significantly hampers women’s political participation and broader civic engagement.

Why it matters: Technology-facilitated gender-based violence (TFGBV) is a global issue, affecting a significant percentage of women and girls worldwide.

• Bangladesh Specifics: High incidence of cyber harassment, with 66% of women and girls experiencing cybercrimes was found.

Methodology: Traditional disinformation methodologies from the Global North were found to be inadequate for the context of Bangladesh.

• New Approach: The InfoLab developed a context-specific methodology, including a Bengali corpus of derogatory terms and a human-in-the-loop approach to identify gendered abuse.
• Data Collection: It used CrowdTangle to gather data from Facebook Pages and Groups, focusing on coordinated campaigns.

More challenges

• Information Ecosystem: The political and social media landscape in Bangladesh is highly fragmented and complex, making it difficult to trace sources of disinformation.
• Terminology: Lack of consistent definitions and context-specific abusive terms posed challenges in categorising and analysing the data.

The Gender Dynamics: Despite measures like reserved parliamentary seats for women, political participation remains low due to societal norms and targeted online abuse.

• Binary Gender Definitions: Established binary gender notions further complicate the political participation of gender-diverse individuals.

Are campaigns coordinated? Evidence of coordinated efforts to disseminate gendered disinformation, often involving repetitive posting across multiple platforms was found.

• Male and Female Targets: While female politicians faced the brunt of gendered abuse, male figures were also targeted with emasculating slurs.

What has been recommended: There is a need for a nuanced, context-responsive framework to study and address TFGBV in Global Majority contexts.

• Policy Implications: The study highlights the necessity for platform policies to reflect the experiences and challenges faced by women and gender-diverse communities in Bangladesh.

The Wider View:  Gendered disinformation affects the democratic process by deterring women’s participation and promoting a male-dominated political environment.

• Social Impact: Online gendered abuse exacerbates existing societal norms and violence, further marginalizing vulnerable communities.
• Approaches: The study underscores the critical need for tailored approaches to understanding and combating gendered disinformation in specific sociopolitical contexts, highlighting the intersection of technology, gender, and politics.