Saturday, January 08, 2022
Sexist campaigns
Scathing rumors target powerful women
Brigitte Macron is said to have been born a man – just one of numerous false reports that go viral in online networks. Women advocates of equality are particularly hard hit. The sexist disinformation campaigns can completely destroy careers.
The youngest victim is Brigitte Macron. The French President’s wife is actually a man, according to false reports on the Internet. Similar claims had previously been made about former US First Lady Michelle Obama and New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern. These are just a few examples of “increasing sexist online disinformation campaigns” as denounced in a report by the United Nations.
According to the UN report, “journalists, politicians and advocates of gender equality” are particularly affected. For months, news has been circulating in online networks that Brigitte Macron was a transgender woman and was born as Jean-Michel Trogneux. Trogneux is Brigitte Macron’s maiden name. At the end of December – a few months before the presidential elections in France – the rumor went viral again.
The hoaxes spread like wildfire. Even if hardly anyone takes them seriously – they open the door to insults, slurs and cyberbullying. These gender-specific conspiracy campaigns not only harmed those directly affected, says Lucina Di Meco, feminist activist and co-founder of #ShePersisted, a global initiative to combat disinformation. They aimed to “silence women and minorities and push them out of the political sphere”.
Harassment in real life too
Such rumors “have an impact on real life,” says Marylie Breuil, a member of the French feminist collective Nous Toutes, which campaigns against sexist and sexual violence. Often harassment both online and offline is the result, says Breuil. “They can completely destroy the careers of publicly exposed people.”
In 2013, Laura Boldrini, then President of the Italian Parliament, was alleged to have danced in underwear on television. The result was thousands of sexist insults, rape threats and pornographic montages. Intidhar Ahmed Jassim, a candidate in Iraq’s parliamentary election in early 2018, was forced to step down after internet users spread rumors that she was in a sex tape. Gender-specific disinformation contributes to the “erosion of democratic institutions”, says Di Meco of #ShePersisted.
Claims of alleged trans identity or homosexuality also add to the stigma of trans people and homosexuals. The false reports about Brigitte Macron revive the rumor from the 2017 presidential election campaign that Macron himself was homosexual. Such disinformation campaigns are most likely contributing to “the increase in reported hate crimes against LGBTI + people in Europe in recent years,” warned the European Parliament in the summer. Brigitte Macron now wants to take legal action against the false reports.
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