There exists a growing body of mainstream journalistic and scholarly work about disinformation which attempts to capture and expose the bounds of a “disinformation industry”, or “disinformation for hire”. In addition, there is a large body of data-based work which looks at disinformation as “computational propaganda” wielded by nation-states. Much of this work uncovers the involvement of “foreign powers”, and the use of bots and trolls.
The public conversation about disinformation tends, therefore, to be framed using a “macro” lens, with concern for its “serious” impact on political and democratic processes. On the other hand, the impact of disinformation campaigns which weaponise sexuality and target communities who are excluded due to gender, sex and sexuality norms, are seen as having a “less serious” effect on politics and democracy, even though the evidence says otherwise.
Despite these conditions, there is an increasing focus on “gendered disinformation”, including from international human rights experts, like the UN Special Rapporteur on freedom of expression (UNSR FoE). Gendered disinformation as a conceptual framework includes examining the gendered dimensions of who is targeted and by whom, and the content and impact of such disinformation.
Our aim with this paper is to explore the specific location of sexuality in disinformation campaigns targeting those standing up to patriarchal and authoritarian regimes of social and political power, going beyond “gender”.
Ideas about women’s and gender-diverse persons’ sexuality have long been weaponised against those fighting for gender justice and human rights, particularly sexual rights. Indeed, “lesbian-baiting” and “sexuality-baiting” were tools historically used against feminist organising at the international level.
When the women’s rights agenda gained momentum through major multilateral conferences such as the World Conferences on Women, disinformation campaigns against feminist activists and the feminist agenda intensified.
At the Fourth World Conference on Women in Beijing in 1995, flyers distributed at the conference claimed that the Beijing Platform for Action “seeks to promote abortion, depraved sexual behaviour, homosexuality, lesbianism, sexual promiscuity and sex for children.” Another asked, “do sexual rights and sexual orientation include: pedophilia, and prostitution?”
Conservative state actors who opposed the feminist agenda, and their civil society allies such as religious fundamentalist groups, warned of “Gender Feminists”. The label signals many feminists’ efforts to include “gender” as a category in law and policy, as a way to understand inequality and promote equality.
Challenges to the inclusion of the term “gender” continue today. Some member states – supported by right-wing organisations – contest the inclusion of “gender” in legal and policy documents, and challenge its inclusion in a variety of instruments, including those meant to combat gender-based violence. Its inclusion has come to be used as a bargaining tool.
Supportive of this agenda are self-proclaimed “gender-critical feminists”, or trans- exclusionary radical feminists (TERFs). They take issue with all aspects of what they describe as “gender theory”, on the basis that it sets out to create a world beyond binary sex and gender categorisation, and push for “sex-based rights”.
These disinformation campaigns continue the legacy of a patriarchal practice: rumour and gossip – forms of “casual disinformation” – which historically weaponised sexuality to discredit women, gender non-conforming persons, or those who fought against patriarchal and exclusionary social hierarchies.
The UNSR FoE points out in her 2023 report that while gendered disinformation is not a new phenomenon, it is fuelled by new technologies and social media. Today’s disinformation campaigns that weaponise sexuality are intricately shaped by the explosive potential of digital technologies and the decision makers behind them – importantly, in many unseen and unknown ways.
Disinformation campaigns such as those seen in Beijing in 1995 deliberately conflated distinct issues like prostitution, paedophilia, lesbianism (or homosexuality more generally) and sexual promiscuity, and were designed to invoke moral outrage and panic. As we will explore, similar themes and strategies persist in today’s disinformation campaigns.
There is agreement among many feminists that gendered disinformation is a strategy used to silence those criticising the powerful, particularly women and gender-diverse persons. This is in alignment with the opinion of the UNSR FoE. Structural exclusion and social and state violence exacerbate the impact of disinformation “because [gendered disinformation] reinforces prejudices, bias and structural and systemic barriers that stand in the way of gender equality and gender justice.”
In this paper, we explore three specific types of disinformation campaigns which weaponise sexuality: 1) the use of deepfake “pornography” to silence women engaged in the critique of powerful actors, and to attack the gender justice agenda; 2) transferences of anti-trans narratives and strategies through disinformation campaigns across borders; and 3) disinformation campaigns about comprehensive sexuality education.
Table of contents
- Author's note on timeline, methodology and positionality
- Introduction
- Chapter 1: Deepfake "porn" as a tool to silence and delegitimise critiques of anti-gender and anti-democracy actors
- Chapter 2: Sexuality weaponised in disinformation campaigns targeting sexually and gender-diverse communities
- Chapter 3: Attacks on comprehensive sexuality education as a tool in the anti-gender and anti-democracy toolkit
- Chapter 4: The role of disinformation weaponising sexuality in the broader anti-democracy agenda
- Conclusions