SA: Just existing as a woman is hard, and even harder when a stranger can reach out to you through social media. Haven’t all women experienced it in one way or the other? A hate comment here, a creepy DM from some stranger there.

In 2015, I left my home country, Pakistan, and moved to the Middle East to work as a journalist. I had a lot to say. I’ve always been a strong feminist and decided to extend my journalism to online spaces. I’d become active on Twitter to fight the misogyny that was so rife around me. Little did I know that the online misogyny would become my routine. I found that there were just as many people online who wanted to harass me because of my gender as they were people in real life. However, I knew I wasn’t alone. My fellow Pakistani women journalists and public figures were also being targeted for speaking out in a big way. We were all suffering. This got me thinking: why are Pakistani women so horrifically harassed in the digital sphere? And is this problem only unique to us?

To find the answers, I interviewed eight Pakistani women public figures from journalism, politics, activism and entertainment for my doctoral research to explore their lived experiences on social media. Since this topic was of personal significance for me, I also decided to include a detailed account of my own experience. These conversations revealed we had all shared online experiences, including slut shaming, body shaming, ageism, leaking of personal information and harassment of women, other female family relations, and even harassment and control from institutions. The same rhetoric we heard in real life was being shared online. These women, just like me, were being punished for not fitting the societal standards of “good girls”. They required them to stay away from the public realm, be quiet, invisible, powerless, and compliant.

Through my interviews, I found that while online gendered harassment affects women globally, the misogyny effect of affecting us is rooted in Pakistan’s colonial past. Pakistan came into being in 1947, after the end of British colonial rule in India. The newly founded state developed a narrative of national identity that pleased the owners of national and family honour on the women, requiring them to be demure and family-oriented. It licensed men to morally police women, a reflection of which can also be seen online. It is important to note that too often, the harassment of Pakistani women is seen through a patronizing Western lens that sees us only as oppressed Muslim subjects. We need to acknowledge the uniqueness of post-colonial Pakistani experience, the agency of Pakistani women, and the dire connection between online and offline misogyny. I imagine a safe, democratised internet where people are treated equally online. And to achieve that, we need to find the root causes of misogyny all over [the world]. Thank you.