Digital Threat Digest - 29 September 2022
PGI’s Digital Investigations Team brings you the Digital Threat Digest, SOCMINT and OSINT insights into disinformation, influence operations, and online harms.
Do Muslim women need to be saved? No, we all do!
Over the last week or so I have been amazed at the courage Iranian women have shown, protesting against the strict law requiring women to cover their hair with a hijab or headscarf. The protests which started after Mahsa Amini was killed have been the biggest challenge Iran’s Shia Muslim clerical establishment has faced in years.
Online, people were quick to call out Amini’s death and support the protests with #MahsaAmini #مهسا_امینی trending on Twitter. In solidarity, women across the world have cut their hair, as a symbol of shedding oppression. Researchers, journalists, influencers, and notably, US politicians have all come out to support the movement.
I of course support the movement and I am inspired by the courage these women have when facing such an oppressive authority BUT I have been disappointed but unfortunately not surprised at how online this has been framed as an attack on Islam. Many a scrolls on Twitter have highlighted that people are taking this as an opportunity to highlight the oppression of Islam, how women are now celebrating the burning of their hijabs and the cutting of their hair because Islam was oppressing them. No, it was not Islam, it was the men enforcing these rules not too dissimilar from the men who overturned Roe v Wade in the US and not too dissimilar from the laws that will soon ban women from wearing the hijab in several European countries.
The common denominator here is that women’s bodies are being controlled – told they have to wear something, told they can’t wear something, told their bodies have to be used in a certain way. That is the narrative – not this attack on Islam that has dominated social media for decades. The narratives targeting Islam reminded me of Lila Abu-Lughod’s book, Do Muslim Women Need Saving? Which also inspired my title for today’s digest. Abu-Lughod deconstructs the Western desire to save women from Islam, having vilified it – in turn making Muslim women the victims themselves. This disturbing paradox has seeped through almost every discussion of Muslim women – particularly on social media.
The point is that social media is very quick in forming and picking sides, it constructs the narrative that can lead to the most clicks, likes, retweets – even when that means perpetuating Islamophobia, why? Because it sells. So, this is a slight piece of advice, you can support the women in Iran, they should have the option to do wear the hijab but if you support women in Iran, you should support women everywhere and you should see that the battle for choice is worldwide. So, look at those hashtags, look at who is posting, their previous stances on similar situations and understand that social media is curating certain realties for you, don’t fall into that trap. It is our responsibility as members of this digital world to give agency to women everywhere, to make their own choices - regardless of what those might be.
More about Protection Group International's Digital Investigations
PGI’s Social Media Intelligence Analysts combine modern exploitative technology with deep human analytical expertise that covers the social media platforms themselves and the behaviours and the intents of those who use them. Our experienced analyst team have a deep understanding of how various threat groups use social media and follow a three-pronged approach focused on content, behaviour and infrastructure to assess and substantiate threat landscapes.
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