Women This Week: Online Abuse Against Women Surges After U.S. Election

Welcome to “Women Around the World: This Week,” a series that highlights noteworthy news related to women and U.S. foreign policy. This week’s post covers November 9 to November 15.

Blog Post by Noël James and Uma Fox

November 15, 2024 3:30 pm (EST)

Harassment Moves Offline into Schools and Campuses 

A new report from the Institute for Strategic Dialogue (ISD) has found that digital hate and harassment against women rose rapidly after the U.S. presidential election. Sexist phrases like “repeal the 19th [Amendment]” and “get back to the kitchen” surged on platforms like X, TikTok, Facebook, and Reddit following President Donald Trump’s victory over Vice President Kamala Harris. Many of the most frequent comments involve calls for a decrease in women’s rights, while others have explicitly threatened women with sexual assault and harassment. Mentions of the statement “Your body, my choice”—a direct response to the reproductive justice movement’s slogan, “my body, my choice”—grew by over 4600 percent on X. The phrase also appears to have grown in popularity offline, with parents and students reporting groups of boys chanting it to girls in schools. One parent commented online, “Today my daughter was told three separate times on campus ‘your body, MY choice.’ The third group of boys told her to ‘sleep with one eye open tonight.’” 

Colombia Enacts Law to Ban Child Marriage 

This week, Colombia passed a law called “They are Girls, Not Wives,” effectively banning all marriage for children under the age of eighteen. The victory came after seventeen years of hard work by advocacy groups and eight failed attempts to pass the legislation through the House and Senate. The new law will close a gap in the country’s civil code, which allowed children under eighteen to marry with parental consent. According to the UN Children’s Fund, one in four—or 4.5 million girls and women in Colombia—were married before the age of eighteen, and one million were married before the age of fifteen. The bill will also address structural issues that often contribute to child marriage with a specific focus on policies that address education. Sandra Ramirez, a Latin America advisor for the advocacy group Equality Now, said that efforts must turn to effective implementation of the law: “Public policy now will be crucial, as a change in legislation means little without effective implementation and ensuring that the voices of girls and adolescents are at the centre.” Colombia joins twelve of thirty-three other countries in Latin America and the Caribbean to have banned child marriage. 

Libya Announces Plans to Crack Down on Women’s Personal Freedom 

Last week, the acting interior minister for Libya’s Government of National Unity (GNU), Emad Trabelsi, announced that several restrictions targeting women’s personal freedoms would be implemented across the country. Libya currently has two competing governments—the GNU and the Government of National Stability. The GNU, which announced these restrictions, is recognized by the United Nations and much of the international community. The GNU’s plan includes reviving the “morality police” to enforce a requirement that women and girls wear a hijab from the age of nine and monitor public interactions between unrelated couples. Male guardianship laws would prevent women from traveling without permission from their father, brother, or husband, and women would be banned from public spaces with men. Advocacy groups, including Human Rights Watch, said that such draconian initiatives would violate the country’s interim constitution, as well as human rights treaties to which it is a party, including the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights and its Maputo Protocol on Women’s Rights. “It’s already a highly patriarchal society, and women have no rights in Libya,” said Naro, a makeup artist in Tripoli, to More to Her Story. “This decision will negatively affect all women and make society move backward instead of progressing. They’ve ignored all the major problems like political conflict, inflation, and civil wars and focused on women’s hijab instead.”  

Myanmar Floods Uniquely Affect Women and Girls, New UN Women Report Finds 

This week, the United Nations released a new report highlighting the disproportionate impact of recent flooding in Myanmar on women and girls. Since September, flooding and mudslides caused by an intense monsoon season and the effects of Typhoon Yagi have affected over a million people across more than 20 percent of Myanmar’s townships. Women and girls have borne the brunt of this climate disaster. Ensuring access to adequate hygiene supplies, maternal and reproductive care, and medical services remains a concern. In the long term, experts fear the floods may lead to a higher number of girls out of school and that displaced women may find fewer economic opportunities. The threat of gender-based violence is also prevalent. Currently, over 67 percent of displacement camps and shelters are reporting safety concerns for women and girls.   “Extreme weather events like Typhoon Yagi are increasing in frequency and severity,” said Ramesh Singh, the Asia Regional Director of CARE International. “In Southeast Asia, where climate-related disasters are intensifying, prioritizing gender equality in disaster planning and response is crucial for building resilient community.” 

This article was originally posted by the Council on Foreign Relations.