Effects on gender inequality

• Kleeman 


  • Men have more power to set the information agenda, leading to a male bias
  • 13% of Wikipedia contributors are women
  • List of female porn stars has over 1000 editors and 2,500 edits but list of female poets has less than 100 editors
  • Women under-represented in science and lack decent biographies, which users assume means she is unimportant - marginalisation becomes circular
  • Only one page for all 6 seasons of Sex and the City, but 43 separate articles on Top Gear
• Atkinson 


  • Online beauty industry is detrimental to young women due to internalising cultural beauty ideals and appearance comparison
  • Leads to obsession with face filters and body dysmorphia
  • Dramatic rise in women asking plastic surgeons to make them look like their online face
  • Instagram has filters like 'Fix Me'
• Sarkeesian 


  • Misogyny in gaming - women oversexualised or portrayed as the damsel in distress
• Walter


  • Hypersexual culture where women are seen as objects due to pornography
  • Online world reinforces this - women on Instagram learn that the less clothes they wear, the more likes they get
• Cieslik & Pollack 


  • Young women with eating disorders form deviant subcultures on the dark net that promotes anorexia and bulimia
• Haraway


  • Women should try occupy every digital space they can as a solution to patriarchal oppression.  
  • Agricultural and industrial revolutions did not benefit women - if they don’t embrace technology then they will be sidelined again 
  • Women need to be at the decision table in tech offices to stop it developing in a ‘masculine’ way 
  • New technology can free us from traditional thinking - Cyborgs are non-binary so could be liberating.  
• Curran & Seaton


  • We should not be using digital media to escape inequality or as a solution, instead we should be questioning what pressures there must be in face to face life that makes people want to retreat into the virtual world to escape inequality
  • Role-playing doesn't provide a solution to inequality
• Haenfler


  • Alternative versions of masculinity are available in the virtual world, and this provides respite from the need to excel at sports or sex
  • Nerd masculinity - young boys can use gaming to get status and rewards, therefore rejecting hegemonic masculinity
  • Often play alongside women, reducing inequality