Swallowing the Pink Pill: How Problematic Information Misrepresents Women

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SWALLOWING THE PINK PILL

HOW PROBLEMATIC INFORMATION

MISREPRESENTS WOMEN

Master’s Thesis Supervisor:

23 June 2020 Guillén Torres Sepulveda

Sanne Kalf

New Media & Digital Culture Second reader:

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Acknowledgements

I want to express my appreciation for everyone that has supported me with and/or has gone through the endeavor of writing a thesis during the current pandemic. The space and time offered by a situation so peculiar have made me embrace this work in a strange manner. Partly, probably, because of its constancy, but also because the amount of problematic information that arose from the outbreak of the novel coronavirus was inspiringly motivating.

Thank you, Guillén, for your guidance and supervision.

And of course, my sincerest thanks to Thomas and my parents, for unconditionally supporting me and loving me through my seclusion, I couldn’t have done it without you.

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Abstract

This thesis researches how problematic information contributes to the misrepresentation of women, and subsequently, what types of problematic information play into female stereotyping. As in the current paradigm the notion of truth is contested, the appeal to emotion and personal belief has intensified. The re-assemblance of power often means that visibility and representation then are asserted to those of dominant social groups. As problematic information stories are often considered problematic as these are capable of impacting electoral outcomes, general cynicism and apathy, and instigating extremism, discourses that evolve from these circumstances are often misogynistic, confirming gender roles or enacting harmful stereotypes, and thus are in need of scrutiny from a feminist perspective. This study emphasizes a medium-specific approach in order to analyze different types of problematic information, researched through various networked spheres on the web, from social media platforms like Twitter to subcultural online spaces such as Reddit. Moreover, this study differentiates itself as it adds deepfakes to an existing framework of problematic information practices.

Keywords

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Introduction

A younger-looking skin can be achieved in 5 days, the gender pay gap doesn’t exist and every woman in the world has starred in a porn video. These conceptions might all have a ring of truth in a continuum where anything can be comprised and transformed, in a time that often is referred to as the ‘post-truth era’. It is this time in which a decline of trust in traditional media is perceived, and its condition “is discussed as both first-order ‘fact fights’ as well as second-order competitions between ‘sectarian knowledge’ regimes and competing media ecologies” (Rogers & Niederer 168). Furthermore, with the rise of populism, it is no longer truth, but the appeal of emotion and personal belief that is the endeavor of power. This consequently “suggests an emerging formation of power concerned with the undoing of hard-won gains in relation to gender and other intersecting forms of inequality and difference” (Burke & Carolissen 543), in which visibility and representation then are asserted to those of dominant social groups. Discourses that evolve from these circumstances are often misogynistic, confirming gender roles or enacting harmful stereotypes, and thus are in need of scrutiny from a feminist perspective. These discourses are perpetuated through ‘fake news’, or problematic information, and found in all networked spheres on the web, from social media platforms to subcultural online spaces such as Reddit or 4chan. While certain types of problematic information might be explicit, others are subtle, and investigating these types and the way that these construct representations therefore is significant. This study will thus aim at answering the following question: how does problematic information contribute to the misrepresentation of women? And subsequently, what types of problematic information play into female stereotyping?

The first section of this thesis will elaborate on understanding problematic information and the representation of women, by situating these in current literature and reviewing these. This section will provide the most significant theories for this

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study, and thus will emphasize its major concepts. This section will thus ensure a framework in which the urgency of researching problematic information through the lens of female representation will be outlined. This section will, then, be followed by the methodological approach of this study. The pillars for the methodological approach are the three main categories of problematic information as outlined by Caroline Jack: publicity and propaganda, confusion and distraction, and cultural commentary. Moreover, this framework will be expanded by adding deepfakes. Deepfakes are added to this framework as these are a relatively new phenomenon, but pose new challenges to the approach to problematic information as it merely takes the form of manipulated audio-visual material. Where imagery once was held as proof, this idea seems to shift. These categories, with respective sub-categories, will provide a structure for the following chapters.

These chapters contain analyses and subsequent discussions, of which the greater share is supported by empirical case studies. Accordingly, the first chapter focuses on publicity and propaganda, with its respective sub-categories of propaganda and advertising. This chapter will provide an analysis of anti-abortion propaganda and the way this represents women, alongside an analysis of influencer culture and the #KylieJennerLipChallenge, and how the problematic information deriving from this challenge affects the representation of women.

The second chapter emphasizes confusion and distraction, with its respective sub-category of gaslighting. In this section, the rumors and gaslighting practices constructed around U.S. Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez are analyzed, in order to accumulate the most common stereotypical ways in which she is represented, and what this means for the portrayal of women.

The third chapter focuses on cultural commentary, with its respective sub-categories of hoaxes and conspiracies, alongside satire. The first section stresses hoaxes and conspiracies, and therefore introduces Gamergate, the networked harassment campaign that on its surface, dedicates itself to preserving ethics in video

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game journalism, but reveals itself as a highly anti-feminist virtual community. The second section, focused on satire, argues in extension of the former section, but centers around the difficulty of trailing a writer’s intent, and explores the ambiguity of cultural meanings.

The fourth and final chapter ultimately emphasizes deepfakes, and therefore analyzes the deepfake-generating application DeepNude, alongside the subreddit where DeepNude-comprised photos are posted, r/Fake_Nudes. This chapter will discuss the ramifications of deepfakes, and explore the power and control that is exercised through the continuum of image-based sexual abuse.

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Theoretical framework

The concept and practice of ‘fake news’ often stir up the assumption of renowned conspiracy theories, hoaxes, and rumors that plague algorithm-based newsfeeds. These types of stories have been around for decades, albeit non-digital – it was only recently that the fiftieth anniversary of conspiracy theories was blithesomely celebrated by New York Magazine, featuring the most pervasive stories commenced in the United States, from the assassination of John F. Kennedy and communists poisoning the U.S. water supply, to the possible existence of lizard people (McCormick 2013). Fake news has long existed before new media technologies were introduced according to sociocultural historian Sharon McQueen, one might argue that fake news arose with the dawn of human speech, and that false documents can be traced back to the ancient times (15). Early forms of fake news, similar to how we contemporarily know it, emerged in 1890, as the then U.S. news media ecosystem was predominantly made up of prevalent tabloids that were entwined in a sensationalist war to take each other down, reporting untrue rumors in order to polarize and eventually sell more newspapers. This practice is referred to as yellow journalism, which eventually pervaded into propaganda in World War I, after which journalists assigned high priority to journalistic norms of objectivity and integrity (Rogers & Niederer 15; Lazer et al. 1094). These journalistic ethical norms are currently fading as the threshold to publishing content on the internet is low, and gatekeepers are removed, so everyone can express themselves. As the early web was inhabited by self-publishers (Rogers & Niederer 16), and in the realm of Web 2.0 the distinction between the user and producer increasingly dissolves (Jenkins et al. 183), traditional news sources in the current media ecosystem are often undermined, causing general trust in mass media to collapse (Lazer et al. 1094).

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It was in 2016, in the course of the U.S. presidential elections (with the Cambridge Analytica scandal1 often marked as the outset for the spread of online misleading

information) that Craig Silverman introduced the term ‘fake news’. Silverman’s research mostly focused on political clickbait sites masquerading as actual news sites, as well as hoax-publishing sites in favor of partisan sensationalism, which overpowered Facebook engagements of legitimate news sites during the elections (Benkler et al. 3; Silverman 2016). The term has since expanded as an umbrella term in order to include hyper-partisan websites that do not necessarily cover incorrect stories, but are strongly in favor of right-wing ideologies (Marwick “Why Do People” 476), as well as including a broader perspective on problematic information through encompassing audiovisual content, such as deepfakes (Chesney & Citron 1785). Thus, fake news encloses a wider range of misinformation and disinformation practices. Due to “its value as a scientific construct, and because its political salience draws attention to an important subject” (Lazer et al. 1094), ‘fake news’ remains a common term, but as the definition advances and the term often is weaponized, it has been regarded as in need for renewal. Therefore, fake news is alternatively referred to as ‘false information’ (Benkler et al. 24; Cerase & Santoro 345; Zannettou et al. 1; Wardle 2017) or ‘problematic information’ (Jack 13; Marwick “Why Do People” 476; Gillespie 77; Chadwick et al. 4259).

There is no short-hand answer for the question where problematic information usually emerges, as the internet consists of many virtual communities and online spaces that have their own vernaculars and affordances, and the nature of problematic information stories vary substantially: their form and type usually merge and overlap, and seemingly harmless white lies are often the tip of the iceberg for

1 The Cambridge Analytica scandal refers to the illegitimate use of data of millions of Facebook users for

micro-targeted political advertising in order to gain behavioral insights and attempt at manipulating the outcomes of the 2016 U.S. elections (Rogers & Niederer 14; Cadwalladr & Graham-Harrison; Benkler et al. 11).

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toxic and systematic discourses. Problematic information stories abundantly circulate on social media platforms such as Twitter and Facebook, and through algorithmic ranking create echo chambers (Sunstein 44), or filter bubbles (Pariser 16), which isolate users in their personalized space that allegedly fits their own interests, viewpoints and beliefs, imposing them to tunnel vision (Benkler et al. 4). According to computational social scientist David M. Lazer and colleagues, research demonstrates that people single out and search for information that confirms their pre-existing beliefs (also referred to as selective exposure), view this information as more persuasive than conflicting information (also referred to confirmation bias) and are more likely to accept information that pleases them (also referred to as desirability bias) (1095). As a result, social media manage to be key conveyors of problematic information stories.

However, problematic information additionally often emerges within net-native subcultures on Reddit, 4chan, 8chan, and similar sociotechnical networks (Benkler et al. 12; Massanari 333; Marwick & Lewis 18). New media researchers Daniel de Zeeuw and Marc Tuters define these emerging communities as the deep vernacular web (1), which, as opposed to social media’s dominant face culture, accumulate a unique mask culture that is rather anti- and impersonal, than personal, and is based on cyber-separationist notions of anonymous infrastructures, as seen in the early web era (2). The authors argue that the deep vernacular web offers a counter-hegemonic space with a tradition of dissimulative identity play, in which users are able to escape real life (that is signified by the tie of online behavior to personal profiles on dominant, Silicon Valley-led social media platforms) (8). These subcultures accordingly often foster an environment of counter-mainstream ideologies, as these are characterized by ambivalence, ephemerality, and anonymity (and therefore, no stable identity cues) (ibid.). By means of this, it is difficult to derive the intention or authenticity of users or their online speech, which is referred to as ‘Poe’s Law’: through irony, it is impossible to tell when an extremist expression is satirical, or when it’s serious, it can be meant in both ways but simultaneously also

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be interpreted in both ways (De Zeeuw & Tuters 3; Phillips & Milner 194; Grey Ellis 2017).

Problematic information stories are often considered problematic as these are capable of impacting electoral outcomes, general cynicism, and apathy, and instigate extremism (Lazer et al. 1095). Racial hoaxes, for example, are a prevailing discursive strategy to disguise discrimination and exclusion. Andrea Cerase and Claudia Santoro, media and communication scholars who conducted a qualitative study on media hype and exclusionary discourse within problematic information, found racial hoaxes to be

[…] a powerful means for triggering waves of fake news and outraged comments both on mainstream and social media. Built on grounds of plausibility and consistency with existing narratives, racial hoaxes may remain latent for a long time, and periodically emerge when negative stereotypes can be framed as actual news stories. (333)

Racial hoaxes, as culmination of social outrage and hate speech, thrive on a principle of ‘Othering’: the process of defining who is a member of the in-group of society. This ‘Othering’, the binary course of in- or exclusion, is the fundament of discrimination (de Beauvoir 26). Social outrage is a key element in discriminatory practices, as the Other, the minority, whether immigrant, refugee, Muslim, Jew, person of color, LGBT or woman, usually is responsible for worsening all that raises the most concerns, such as division of wealth, morality, security, safety, the public space, and the social environment. Ideological motivations for spreading these hoaxes usually derive from likeminded individuals who believe that “white, male identities and conservative belief systems are under attack from a range of outside forces” (Marwick & Lewis 18), that is, the Other. This projection of the Other reinforces the sense of a group identity, which enables a context of

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representation that is crucial to understand why (racial) hoaxes are spread (Marwick “Why Do People” 477; Benkler et al. 306).

Moreover, social outrage is found to be a key element in media hype (Cerase & Santoro 335). Media hype theory, as composed by media sociologist Peter Vasterman, suggests that news coverage usually follows an event, after which journalists offer their opinions and facilitate a debate. This provokes positive feedback loops, that continuously regenerate the story: incidents that deemed insignificant become relevant, and accordingly a central theme develops. This causes a temporal lowering of thresholds to events or statements concerning the central subject, which leads to a flow of interrelated news stories (513-514). As media bear “the role of guardians of public interests” (Cerase & Santoro 335), social outrage is an imperative component in articulating public discontent. Consequently, waves of social outrage in mainstream and social media can reinforce negative stereotypes, that in association with existing narratives can be framed as actual news stories (ibid. 333). By means of this, racial hoaxes are able to foster polarized and segregated discourse, which have serious social complications for the excluded targeted groups. The practice of Othering, or scapegoating certain social groups, often intertwines with redpilling, a gradual process of ‘getting to see the world as it really is’, or ‘waking up to reality’, referring to a scene from the 1999 film The Matrix (Marwick & Lewis 19; Van Valkenburgh 4). In this particular scene, Neo, the protagonist, is given the choice of taking a red pill, that reveals the unpleasant truth about reality; or the blue pill, that would make him stay in ignorance, albeit blissful, returning to his everyday life. Neo takes the red pill and accordingly is awakened. Inherent to redpilling is distrust in traditional media and conspiratorial thinking, for traditional media are indicted to be dominated by liberal ideology and political correctness. In the case of far-right circles, for example, an individual is redpilled if one believes in a truth that

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counters mainstream beliefs, such as the Holocaust denial2 or the oppression of men

by feminists, the foundation for the Men’s Rights Movement and the manosphere (Marwick & Caplan 543; Marwick & Lewis 18; Gotell & Dutton 66; Jane 662). In media sociologist Shawn P. Van Valkenburgh’s extensive content analysis of subreddit r/TheRedPill (r/TRP), the home to red pill philosophy, he delineates the connection that r/TRP community members draw between seduction, evolutionary psychology, and economics (2). These are principal subject matters in beliefs as to why participants claim sexual strategy must be discussed in “a culture increasingly lacking a positive identity for men” (r/TheRedPill 2020). Van Valkenburgh found that its main belief answers to ‘The Myth of Female Oppression’, where community members argue that feminism and female oppression are fabricated narratives, and that women supposedly are empowered, liberated and independent due to the economical infrastructures that are paid for by men (6). Furthermore, feminism is said to be a sexual strategy that puts women in the best position to find mates in order to pursue genetical goals (ibid.). Finally, scientific truth and empirical evidence are said to be valued over idealist liberalism, which is comically referred to as a ‘religion’. The sidebar, r/TRP’s manifesto, is imbued by dichotomous reasoning of “the conservative, scientific, pragmatic, objective, and masculine on the one hand; counterposed against the liberal, religious, idealist, subjective, and feminine on the other” (7; r/TheRedPill 2020). Among the subreddit it is well-established that women are unable to think rationally (8). Accordingly, community members are ordered to familiarize themselves with a framework that consists of social and biological theories, in order to adapt their behavior to interact with women (‘passing the shit-test’), commodifying women and having as many sexual relations as possible (16).

2 The negation of the Nazi genocide of European Jews, a distinct form of antisemitism (Shermer &

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The ramifications of redpilling are exemplified in Gamergate, a decentralized misogynist harassment controversy that emerged from a cultural war in the gaming community. The harassment was primarily targeted at (feminist) game developers Zoë Quinn and Brianna Wu, as well as feminist media critic Anita Sarkeesian, and consisted of coordinated conspiracies and committed, targeted abuse, including:

[…] detailed discussions and investigations into [their] sexual history, the leaking of nude photographs, ‘doxxing’ to find out [their] real life details, death and rape threats, and attempts to bully [them] and [their] supporters out of the industry. (Heron et al. 23)

At the beginning of August 2014, a former boyfriend of Quinn shared a blogpost in which he claimed that Quinn’s success was due to unethical, intimate relationships with a gaming journalist, as well as sharing Quinn’s personal information and screenshots of conversations (Massanari 334). Quinn thereupon became a key figure in a hateful campaign based on resistance against the increasing influence of feminism in the gaming industry, as well as the premise of questionable ethics in game journalism, as sponsorship, advertising, and branding influence impartiality (Heron et al. 23; Massanari 334). Supporters of Gamergate argued that progressives and feminists were unfairly favored in the press, which validates belief systems held by Men’s Rights activists, as well as provoking larger arrays of conspiracies. This, in turn, unleashed a wave of harassment by a networked, leader-less cybermob, crucifying everyone involved or speaking up against the harassment, who were regarded as ‘social justice warriors’ (SJW), a disparaging term for progressives that would supposedly be engaging in a discussion for their own personal validation (Heron et al. 22). While a more in-depth analysis of Gamergate is demonstrated in the third chapter of this research, the general emphasis affirms that

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Gamergate participants adhered to a normatively white masculine subject position that viewed itself as being under attack from SJWs and feminists, and thus justified harassing behavior through a mantle of victimhood and appropriation of the language of identity politics. […] This allowed Gamergaters to adopt a position of ethical superiority, in which, as Mortensen writes, 'aggressive, sexualized attacks against women are seen as reasonable, even moral modes of argumentation’ (2016, 7). (Marwick & Caplan 547) In other words, in the gendered violence of Gamergate, femininity is weaponized and used to harass, delegitimize and denigrate women and their associates, policing their online behavior as well as discouraging the participation of women in the public sphere, both online and offline (Marwick & Caplan 545). This is what feminist media scholars Sarah Banet-Weiser and Kate M. Miltner refer to as ‘networked misogyny’, which is based on technological affordances and structures such as anonymity (171). The discourse on gendered violence and networked harassment is part of what digital cultures researcher Adrienne Massanari refers to as ‘toxic technocultures’ that are “enabled by and propagated through sociotechnical networks such as Reddit, 4chan, Twitter, and online gaming”, exhibit “retrograde ideas of gender, sexual identity, sexuality, and race and push against issues of diversity, multiculturalism, and progressivism” and often rely on “Othering of those perceived as outside the culture” (333). These cultures are generally dominated by ‘geek masculinity’, a gender identity that is characterized by a notable enchantment and accomplishment of technology and games, that are used as social indicators for in- and exclusion. Furthermore, geek masculinity incorporates “some elements of hegemonic masculinity (such as judgment and mastery) while often renouncing others (such as sporting or athletic cultures)” (Braithwaite 1). While not restricted to or limited by these values, toxic technocultures in particular maintain the axiom of patriarchy and male dominance. This is particularly harmful as women are already unequally

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represented in a wide array of digital spaces, such as online news (D’Heer et al. 1; Vandenberghe 5), the political sphere (Di Meco 10), data science (D’Ignazio & Klein 27-28), artificial intelligence (Richardson 291; Nascimento et al. 237; Gibson 244) or contemporary media culture (Gill 150; Snyder-Hall 256; Harvey & Gill 61; Attwood 86).

Since the 1960s and 1970s, studies of female representation in news outlets have exposed dominant patterns of underrepresentation of women as well as representation of women in stereotypical ways, displaying traditional gender roles, usually as spouses, mothers and only seldom as politician or professional (D’Heer et al. 1; Vandenberghe 6). In online news, for example, women are often portrayed with great emphasis on their appearance, by mentioning age, displaying in stages of undress, and sexualization, whereas men are often presented as authoritative figures (D’Heer et al. 6; Di Meco 10). Thus, female spokespersons are regularly portrayed in private environments, whereas male spokespersons are portrayed in business environments (ibid.; Vandenberghe 6). Similar dispositions are common in video games, where women are often portrayed as victims, sex objects or “simply set-dressing” (Heron et al. 20). Sociologist Gaye Tuchman refers to this stereotypical representation as ‘symbolic annihilation’: the trivialization and marginalization of women in (mass) media (529; D’Heer et al. 1). Symbolic annihilation cuts like a double-edged sword as it diminishes the position of women in society and distorts an accurate representation of reality.

The representation of women and femininity, and accordingly the demands of femininity, are constructed through gender and how gender is perceived in society. Gender theorist and philosopher Judith Butler, known for Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity and her ground-breaking work on gender performativity, argues that gender is not an attribute of identity, but rather a repetitive enactment: she argues that gender is performative, not performed in a staged sense, but repetitive of practices that project onto certain gender roles (xii). Specific traits and properties are assigned to a gender because of the norms that are

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in power, that are embodied and internalized. By means of this, gender identity is shaped through a set of acts, “constituting the identity it is purported to be” (33). Butler in like manner questions the distinction of gender and sex, as sex often is referred to as a stable biological characteristic, and gender is ought to be the exhibit hereof. Butler does however reject the idea that gender is entirely equal to behavior, rather, she argues that behaviors are decided by gender (12). By means of this, Butler delivers a critique on hegemonic discourse and the binary view of gender, which brings her work about as a great influence on feminist and queer studies.

In the era of the early web, the internet was reclaimed as a technology that could generate possibilities for transgressing the binary notion of male and female, in order to construct a disembodied, transgender or even genderless identity (Van Zoonen 6). This aligns with ecofeminist scholar Donna Haraway’s 1985 A Cyborg Manifesto, in which she proposes to reject dichotomous thinking through the concept of the cyborg, in order to move away from traditional gender notions (178). Haraway proposes the cyborg as intersectional hybrid, in order to argue for collective consciousness with respect to new technologies that enable the creation of new realities in which patriarchy, colonialism, and capitalism are left behind (156).

Technology, in this sense, has always had a transgressive and subversive dimension, as well as a means to “create and sustain narratives that demand attention and redress for gendered violence” (Jackson et al. 1; Sobieraj “Bitch, Slut” 1700). Nowadays, this is exemplified through the digital labor put in various examples of hashtag activism and digital resistance, such as #YesAllWomen and #MeToo for instance. The internet is eminently a space for critique and data-extraction, as like-minded individuals are able to gather in networks of solidarity that respond to and provoke offline endeavors, such as policy interventions, the formation of activist organizations, and events, contributing to contemporary political and cultural debates about patriarchal hegemony, sexism, rape culture and misogyny (Jackson et al. 2-3). The stimulation of these debates as well as collective vocalization do not

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only raise awareness to aforementioned issues, but also force a transformation in attitudes on these issues, as narratives are changed from justifying that men commit violence to the acknowledgment of the experiences of women. Furthermore, it reveals a continuum of abuse in which the connection between everyday sexism and violence is emphasized and the concept of rape culture is legitimized (ibid. 5). This ultimately challenges social norms and structures of inequality, by making the private visible and the personal political (Clark-Parsons 3).

Historically, feminists have always drawn on tactics of visibility in order to overcome suppression. Gender historians Annette F. Timm and Joshua A. Sandborn argue that in the Sexual Revolution of the 1960s, sex was often used as a means of delivering messages, by provoking extreme expressions to change social attitudes towards sex out of marriage (240). These were a manifestation of greater changes, such as the normalization of access to birth control (also for unmarried women) by the introduction of the contraceptive pill (242), private sexual freedom (244), and ultimately the halt on government interference in people’s private lives (250). The lack of representation and the misrepresentation of women ultimately is an undemocratizing jurisdiction, as these reinforce and sustain harmful stereotypes. Political gender journalist Nicola Pardy argues that imagery of women in problematic information stories are often another form of gender-based degradation, as stolen images of attractive women are used by Russian Twitter bots to target men. An example hereof is the “phony image” of gun-law activist Emma González, of whom a picture circulated on Twitter in which she was portrayed ripping up the Constitution, as she was campaigning for gun law reformations following the Parkland shooting (Pardy 2018). Another important example of a contemporary key female figure that is demonized through problematic information strategies is Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the youngest woman ever to be elected in Congress (Watkins 2018), of whom many fake tweets, fake citations and untruthful memes are

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spread. Digital sociologist Sarah Sobieraj reminds us of the complications of such gender-based character assassination and aggressions:

When digital sexism succeeds in pressing women out of digital spaces, constrains the topics they address publicly, or limits the ways they address them, we must consider the democratic costs of gender-based harassment, in addition to the personal ones. (1700)

As online environments function as discursive arenas, the way women are represented in texts, conversations, imagery, and various other types of media are exceptionally significant fields of research. The representation of women ultimately reflects in the way women present themselves and make choices for themselves, as these are influenced by their sex or gender. This is often depicted in the feminist debate on ‘choice’, as the question is asked whether women make decisions as these are influenced by compulsory standards or because these decisions are made consciously (Ringrose 107). This paradox of choice and self-representation play an important role in what is referred to by feminist cultural theorists Rosalind Gill and Laura Harvey as the ‘sexualization of culture’, where the depiction of female sexuality often is in contradiction, in the sense that it can be either “a real and positive change in depictions of female sexuality” or “a way that renders them depoliticized and presses them into the service of patriarchal consumer capitalism” (54). Gill furthermore argues that the sexualization of culture inherently puts the female body in a position of corporeal surveillance, an “obsessive preoccupation with the body”, where the body “is presented simultaneously as women’s source of power and as always unruly, requiring constant monitoring, surveillance, discipline and re-modelling (and consumer spending) in order to conform to ever-narrower judgments of female attractiveness” (149). Women and their bodies are, then, always something that must be open for discussion, debate, and evaluation, by which it ultimately is in favor of others more than of themselves, “always at risk of ‘failing’”

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(ibid.). The representation of women, femininity, and their sexuality then ultimately become passive, responsive, and objectified. This passivity is what feminist scholar Claire Snyder-Hall, too, claims as a contradictory principle in gender equality and sexual liberation. She argues that fundamental for the bolstering of gender norms are the ways women ordain the “demands of femininity”, a term that she adopted from historical feminist scholar Lori Marso, that imply “women’s socially constructed desires, which include both sexual desire and internalized beliefs about gender identity and roles” (256). These demands are powerful in the symbolic and the imaginary in culture and mass media, as feminist cultural theorist Angela McRobbie aptly summarizes:

the power of representation, the seduction of received rhetoric, the ease with which the self dissolves into the image on the screen, the appeal of easy pleasures and the occasional desire to relinquish responsibility, gives to the ever-ready radical right a clear advantage over and above the political and material advantages they already have at their disposal. (54)

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Methodology

This thesis aims at laying bare the complexity of fake news phenomena and the significance of the representation of women, which has proved in the past to often be either unequal or misogynist. Thus, this research aspires to provide more insight and knowledge within the debate of fake news and its effects on marginalized social groups, by highlighting dominant and toxic technocultures. The general emphasis of this research focuses on unequal gender representation, sexism, hate speech, the politicization of the female body, and the emergence of having diverse representations in media.

As mentioned earlier in the theoretical framework, the terminology for fake news has been under scrutiny, which is why this research will be continued using ‘problematic information’ instead. The term problematic information was brought to attention in 2017 by media historian Caroline Jack, who in collaboration with Data & Society published the Lexicon of Lies, in which she addresses various definitions, terms, and types for problematic information. As many types of problematic information overlap or have ambiguous meanings, this thesis will follow the three main types that Jack addresses, divided by respective subcategories, each with their own nuances. Firstly, Jack distinguishes misinformation and disinformation as meta-definitions, which, according to the author, differ in intent (2). Misinformation refers to “information whose inaccuracy is unintentional” (2), whereas disinformation represents “information that is deliberately false or misleading” (3). Nevertheless, she argues that the original intentions of problematic information are usually difficult to trace back, and that this is rarely clear (4).

Furthermore, Jack differentiates three main categories of problematic information, of which the first is problematic information in the sphere of publicity and propaganda, which are persuasive information campaigns, “organized communicative activities that aim to reach large groups of people” (ibid.). This category entails a myriad of subcategories, among which “deliberate, systematic

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information campaigns” that persuade the public into buying certain goods or adopting certain ideas or attitudes, or “advertising” and “publicity”, deployed by companies and advocacy groups, amongst others (5). In lines with this subcategory is “propaganda”, or “manipulation or ideological indoctrination” (6-7). These types of problematic information will be analyzed in the first chapter of this research.

Moreover, Jack establishes the category of problematic information that sows confusion or distraction, by which she refers to “gaslighting” (9). Gaslighting, she argues, is re-appropriated from the field of psychology to politics, and entails the “use of misdirection, denial, and demonstrably false public statements”, as well as tactics of confusion and distraction (ibid.). Gaslighting goes hand in hand with what is often referred to as “fabricated news”, that are completely fictional stories that are generated to sow discord, usually demonizing specific individuals or social groups (Zannettou et al. 4).

Finally, Jack characterizes the category of misinformation as cultural commentary, which derives from an urgency to convey critique or cultural commentary (11). These include various categories, among which satire, that “uses exaggeration, irony, and absurdity to amuse the audience, while calling attention to, and critiquing, perceived wrongdoing”, additionally an umbrella term that entails other satirical forms such as parody and culture jamming (ibid.). Last, but not least, Jack addresses hoaxes, which are fairly similar to conspiracy theories. A hoax, she argues, is a “deliberate deception that plays on people’s willingness to believe”, and “are a means of challenging authority, custom, or the status quo” (ibid.). This research will address various case studies related to the corresponding categories mentioned above, which are introduced in each chapter with their respective methodological steps in detail.

Additionally, this research will address deepfakes. The urgency of adding deepfakes to the prior existing framework corresponds to it being a relatively new phenomenon with particular egregious potential. As our information technologies already suffer

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from what Robert Chesney and Danielle K. Citron refer to as “truth decay”, “our networked information environment interact[ing] in toxic ways with our cognitive biases” (1753), deepfakes pose many new challenges, such as the re-evaluation of the documentation of (audio-visual) content, as well as the blurring boundaries of the real and the fake, which call for new methods of evaluation, interpretation, and moderation.

In order to cultivate an analysis of these types of dis- and misinformation and the representation of women, various case studies related to these types will be studied by using feminist critical discourse analysis (FCDA), as constructed by gender scholar Michelle M. Lazar. FCDA is an advancement of critical discourse analysis, an analytical practice, as well as a critical perspective that suggests researching “with an attitude” (van Dijk 466), aiming at laying bare social problems and political issues, “focus[ing] on the ways discourse structures enact, confirm, legitimate, reproduce, or challenge relations of power abuse (dominance) in society” (ibid. 467). The objective of FCDA is to “advance a rich and nuanced understanding of the complex workings of power and ideology in discourse in sustaining (hierarchically) gendered social arrangements” (Lazar 141). As FCDA offers an open approach to discourse, providing a “multimodal view”, and by means of that a “holistic feminist critique of discursive constructions of gender” (ibid. 145), it extends from focusing mainly on text to integrating other semiotic modalities, such as “visual images, layouts, gestures, and sounds” (ibid. 144).

As FCDA mainly intends at critiquing discourses that preserve patriarchal structures, in which men are privileged and women, as a result, are disadvantaged, it challenges the gendered nature of many social practices such as laws, rules, norms, habits and a general consensus (van Dijk 469). Lazar distinguishes two levels of gender in these social practices:

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First, gender functions as an interpretive category that enables participants in a community to make sense of and structure their particular social practices. Second, gender is a social relation that enters into and partially constitutes all other social relations and activities. (Lazar 145)

Ultimately, the asymmetrical power relations between men and women are best understood through the Foucauldian sense of power, that is an omnipresent enactment, and works from the idea that the body and sexuality are cultural constructs, rather than being a natural phenomenon. Foucault’s work on power thus has been very significant for feminist theory, precisely because it addresses oppression at the microlevel, speaking to individual wrongdoing such as for example micro-aggressions, hate speech or sexual harassment, as well as the macrolevel, speaking to systematic injustice such as sexism and racism (Allen 268). Of course, these levels are mutually shaping as norms and values, in turn, are internalized. This thesis will deconstruct the gendered power structures and mechanisms in dis- and misinformation practices. This will be done by defining which powerful social groups control the context of this discourse, what tactics these groups deploy as well as what tropes are detectable. By means of this, a power discourse will be laid bare that ultimately demonstrates the ways in which less powerful social groups are controlled, along with its consequences (van Dijk 470). The context of this discourse is thusly embodied by “the participants in various communicative, social, or institutional roles and identities, as well as their goals, knowledge, opinions, attitudes, and ideologies” (van Dijk 470-471), for which close reading is required.

Furthermore, this thesis takes a mixed-methods, multiple medium approach by addressing the types of problematic information as put forward by Jack, and researching the respective medium to where this type of problematic information has been emerging. This medium-specific approach is one of the cornerstones of

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the Digital Methods Initiative (DMI), in which online groundedness plays an important role in order to conceptualize the cultural and societal values of a medium (Rogers 5). Therefore, the methodologies are somewhat different in each section, and thus are further clarified in their respective introductions. Moreover, it is important to note that different types of problematic information often coexist, emanate from and/or descent from each other, as problematic information is by its very nature ambiguous and subject to overlap and transformation. This is not only the case for the veracity, but also for their pervasiveness.

These phenomena are analyzed with the media ecosystem of the United States as focal point, as the 2016 U.S. Presidential Elections often are marked as the period in which problematic information in its current forms started being published and amplified, and seemed to mark the start of an epistemic crisis (Rogers & Niederer 43; Benkler et al. 4). Furthermore, most theories and concepts regarding problematic information are in English, as is the availability of sources, which underline the cultural power of studying problematic information with a U.S. viewpoint.

While the discourse analyzed in this study lays bare the various types of problematic information that shape a certain representation of women, several limitations do remain. This primarily concerns the scope size of the case studies brought forward, and the subjectivity of discourse analysis, as the hypothesis of this thesis is that problematic information obstructs a righteous representation of women. Furthermore, the dataset utilized in this thesis is comprised of algorithms that by very nature are biased, as the inner workings of these algorithms often are unknown.

As this thesis relies on empirical data, such as Tweets and Reddit posts, usernames are scraped as well. These usernames are important to keep in the datasets, as users are regarded as authors of their respective posts. However, much debate has been about informed consent and privacy towards users. The Association of Internet Researchers acknowledge the challenges in this area, and argue that personally identifiable information (PID) should be treated with caution (franzke et

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al. 10). On Reddit, users are able to remain entirely anonymous, so as there is no sensitive personal information collected, the usernames in this research are not pseudonymized. Twitter, however, is slightly more personalized than Reddit, but allows for privacy measures such as ‘locking’ accounts, so that users that are not willing to be found online can remain private. Therefore, in the case of Twitter, only publicly available accounts have been assembled for the datasets.

The point of departure for this analysis is that hegemonic discourse perpetuated through problematic information is detrimental for the representation of women, and therefore, the aim of this paper will be to answer the following research question: how does problematic information contribute to the misrepresentation of women? And subsequently, what types of problematic information play into female stereotyping?

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Analysis

1 Publicity and propaganda

This chapter will discuss the question of what role problematic information in the form of persuasive information campaigns, such as propaganda and advertising, plays in the representation of women. Jack argues that these persuasive information campaigns “present a mixture of facts and interpretations that aim to link brands, people, products, or nations with certain feelings, ideas, and attitudes” (4). Furthermore, she argues that often, facts and interpretations in these campaigns are mixed and hardly distinguishable, which may be intentional, but always aim at distorting the worldviews of their public. Jack’s interpretation of these persuasive information campaigns aligns with what Savvas Zannettou and colleagues refer to as “propaganda” or “biased or one-sided” stories, which they characterize as stories that are a powerful means or communicating ideologies (4). These stories both are hyper-partisan, which means that they are extremely in favor of a certain person, party, or event (ibid.). These narratives often “reinforce narratives about race, class, and gender that help build and reinforce collective identity, especially on the right” (Marwick “Why Do People” 476).

The first section of this chapter will focus on researching the consequences of propaganda for the representation of women, through the means of the anti-abortion movement. In this section, the way women are addressed and framed on the popular pro-life news website LifeNews will be analyzed, as LifeNews is considered one of the largest anti-abortion news websites that are around with an ever-growing audience by the vast spread of problematic information via Facebook (Warren 2017), and is the first Google hit when ‘pro-life news website’ is queried in the respective search engine. Prior to that, in order to gain a better understanding of the abortion debate, the context, history, and online prominence of said debate will be discussed.

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The second section of this chapter will focus on researching the consequences of advertising and publicity for the representation of women, through the means of influencer culture. Influencers play an important role in the spread of problematic information, as these are “significant nodes in these networks, [where] they hold the power to amplify particular messages”, and “play a distinct role in media manipulation efforts” (Marwick & Lewis 20). This analysis will be conducted through a close reading of the Kylie Jenner lip challenge, an online hoax that encouraged girls and women to suck their lips into shot glasses to plump their lips. This will be done by researching its respective hashtag (#KylieJennerLipChallenge) on Twitter on the alleged date from which it was covered by media, 20 April 2015 (Mulshine 2015; Newsbeat 2015). Furthermore, this section will pay attention to influencer culture within the alt-right and its ramifications for the representation of women.

1.1 Propaganda

Propaganda specifically distinguishes itself from conventional stories as, firstly, it is highly political and secondly, it is a historical phenomenon, as it was employed during World War II and the Cold War (Zannettou et al. 4). The utilization of propaganda is especially weighty as it is often used in changing courses of human rights, conditions, and history. An example of a highly propagating organization that is almost as old as the practice of propaganda itself, is the anti-abortion movement. This movement rose to prominence in the US after Roe v. Wade in 1973, a Supreme Court ruling that objected the criminal abortion laws in Texas that only allowed for abortion when the mother’s life was in danger and thus a victory for legal abortion laws nation-wide (Saurette & Gordon 65). Prior to Roe v. Wade, abortion was a crime and as this was the norm for over a century, religious organizations had no interest

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in the subject matter, and neither were there unified anti-abortion movements (Blanchard 22 in Saurette & Gordon 66). This quickly changed after 1973, as

several of the core characteristics captured by the traditional portrait – a focus on legislative means, the wide-spread use of fetal-centric arguments, and a highly judgmental anti-woman tone – began to dominate anti-abortion strategy and discourse. (Saurette & Gordon 67)

Anti-abortion propaganda knows a long history of anti-scientific attitudes that in turn act as pervasive and imminent arguments to convince in order to either talk pregnant women out of their abortions, or to persuade laws and regulations all along (Traister 2017). This type of problematic information is specifically harmful as it concerns women’s reproductive rights, and accordingly, their health, as it finds its way into legal and constitutional spaces. President Donald Trump, for instance, appointed Katy Talento as health care adviser, who stated that “hormonal birth control causes cancer and miscarriage” (Traister 2017), and “Big Pharma is breaking your uterus” (Cohen 2017). Moreover, the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban of 2003 is named after the alleged eponymous medical procedure, however, such procedure doesn’t exist, but is rather a misleading description and political term of a rare form of late-term abortion (Weitz & Yanow 100; Traister 2017; Warren 2017).

In the digital realm, so-called ‘pro-life’ activists propagate their viewpoints and unjust information through many online forms, such as social media pages, blogs, videos, and documentaries. In order to gain an understanding of how anti-abortion propaganda negatively affects the representation of women, the conservative pro-life news site LifeNews is analyzed. The data scope consists of the top five articles that are acquired by querying ‘feminist’ on the LifeNews website, as this term is used by anti-feminists and conservatists with a negative connotation to address women that hold counter-conservatist, or progressivist, views (Schreiber 315; Coste 172;

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Bryson & Heppell 39). Furthermore, the analysis is limited to these five results, as users tend to not scroll or click further than the top half of the first page (Loiz 2014). These news stories will be analyzed in adherence to the ten characteristics of propaganda as mode of discourse as outlined by communication theorist Douglas Walton. A complete overview and analysis of these stories are presented in sheet ‘1.1’ of the appendix.

The first characteristic within this framework is that propaganda is usually comprised of a dialogue structure, which means that there are usually two parties being addressed, the proponent and the respondent, whose relationship is asymmetrical (109). Walton argues that the goal of this asymmetrical relationship is “to alter the convictions or actions of the proponent in a particular direction or toward a particular view different from the one the respondent already has” (ibid.). The common denominator of the LifeNews articles is that they all invoke a dialogue structure that makes the article seem like an interview, with excerpts of key figures that are deemed ‘feminists’, who are critiqued after each citation. As the article merely consists of appraisals, it leaves no room for the featured person to respond. Furthermore, multiple sources are often used disorderly, with no clear direction to what stems from which source. This is, for example, the case in the story “Feminist Claims: “God is All Right With” Killing Babies in Abortions”(Yoder 2020a), where excerpts from different interviews and videos are copied and pasted together as if these are one conversation, or parts are intentionally left out and accompanied by suggestive descriptions, as seen in the title (the original phrase Viva Ruiz, the activist featured in this story, used, was: “God is all right with abortion” (#ShoutYourAbortion 2020), which was turned into the provocative ‘killing babies in abortions’). These ultimately form misleading statements.

The second characteristic mentioned by Walton focuses on the content of the message, which can include verbal or visual discourse, and usually involve props (109). These include “possible implications and insinuations, figures of style such as

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metaphors or symbols, and vocabulary” (Vamanu 202). The LifeNews articles all feature pictures of the targeted ‘feminists’, and ultimately aim at falsifying their claims by disproving them with conservative or Christian thought. In order to do this, citations are isolated and taken out of their context. In the story “Feminist Writer: Children Shouldn’t “Belong” to Those Whose Genetics They Share” (Cook 2019), writer Sophie Lewis is accused of encouraging the “dissolution of the mother-child bond”, which is a negligent reading of Lewis’ theory. In fact, Lewis’ suggested changing the perspective on motherhood by suggesting ‘surrogacy solidarity’, to radically change existing norms and notions on the labor of being a mother and having a family (Lewis 2019).

This plays into the third characteristic, the goal-directed structure of propaganda, in which “proponent’s goal is to get the respondent to carry out a particular action or to support a particular policy for action”, which is often depicted as manipulative (Walton 110). Often, this is done by taking statements out of their context (as shown above), or by a literal understanding of comments that are intended humorously. In the second section of the third chapter of this research, ‘Satire’, the ramifications of misinterpretation will be further elaborated upon. However, as misinterpretation usually takes place unintentionally, an intentional literal understanding of a certain statement can be enforced as a tactic for problematic information (Marwick “Why Do People” 478; Rogers & Niederer 24). This is, for example, the case with the article “Feminist Defends Joe Biden Over Tara Reade: “I Would Vote For Joe Biden If He Boiled Babies and Ate Them” (Ertelt 2020), in which Katha Pollitt, with the intent of dark humor and exaggeration, argues that she “would vote for Joe Biden if he boiled babies and ate them” if that is what is necessary to avoid another four years of Donald Trump (Pollitt 2020). Pollitt made it clear in her article that she uses this extremity in order to underline the importance of taking back the White House (ibid.), and rectified her statement afterward by mentioning her humorous intent and exaggeration on Twitter (@KathaPollitt 2020).

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The fourth characteristic leads to involvement in social groups, in other words, where the message “always represents some broader agency or organized group that has interests or views that binds its members together” (Walton 110). In the LifeNews articles, this ultimately leads to the channeling and clustering of organizations and social groups that hold anti-conservatist viewpoints, that are not always necessarily explicitly pro-abortion, but are considered progressive and in favor of female reproductive rights and choice. This is particularly evident in the article “Pro-Abortion Feminist: Pro-Life People Who Protect Babies From Abortions are “F—— Monsters” (Yoder 2020b), as news platforms such as Slate, the New York Times, Jezebel, Vice, Rewire.News, HuffPost, Teen Vogue, and Refinery29 are assembled and positioned as allies of the anti-abortion industry.

The fifth characteristic aims at laying bare the indifference to logical reasoning. Propaganda is not necessarily “for or against using logical reasoning and relevant evidence”, but

[i]f appeals to emotion, of a kind that would be judged dubious or even fallacious by logical standards of good reasoning, work better than rational evidence to achieve the goal of argumentation used in propaganda, then such appeals are appropriate and should (normatively speaking) be used by good propagandists. (Walton 110)

Accordingly, the article “Feminist Brags About Aborting Her Baby During Pandemic While Others Can’t Get Medical Care” (Bilger 2020), the indifference in logical reasoning in the article stems mostly from arguing that abortions are not deemed as health care, as these would invoke many complications, such as breast cancer (ibid.). These are two separate arguments that not necessarily correspond with each other, as side effects or complications of a procedure are not an indicator of when something must be considered as (essential) health care, but female reproductive rights and health are (Amnesty 2020). Another argument that is utilized

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in the article in order to regard abortion as non-essential is the supposed research in which LifeNews found that the reasons that women were getting abortions were “‘social reasons,’ not mother’s health or rape/incest, as their motivation in approximately 93% of all abortions” (Bilger 2020). LifeNews claimed that thirty-thousand doctors argued in favor of this argument, even though this number is nowhere legitimized or specified (ibid.).

The sixth characteristic refers to one-sided argumentation, or “a kind of advocacy dialogue that uses partisan argumentation to advocate one side of an issue and to present the arguments in favor of that side as strongly as possible” (Walton 110), which “is inherently one-sided as a type of discourse in which argumentation is used” (ibid. 111). This characteristic is not particularly stronger in any story, but it is evident that in all stories the argumentation derives from the idea that ending a pregnancy is equal to murder, that “[a]bortions do not save lives. They destroy them” (Bilger 2020). There is a strong pro-life sentiment in all articles, that essentially places the Christian ideology of the fetal right to live, in which the fetus is presented with personhood as “an independent, autonomous individual with rights to care, love and support” (Hopkins & Reicher 78) before female reproductive rights. By means of this, advocates that are pro-abortion or pro-choice are utterly portrayed as “selfish and uncaring”, as opposed to “principled and caring”, how pro-abortion activists usually position themselves (ibid. 74).

The seventh characteristic relates to this one-sided argumentation in the sense centers around the involvement of persuasion dialogue,

to move the masses to action (to go to war, to buy a product, etc.), to comply with action, or to accept and not oppose a certain line of action. […] the means used to get action, or support for action, is that of persuading the audience to become committed to a particular point of view that the audience did not accept (or did not fully embrace) before. (Walton 111)

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The language and references in the articles are tousled accordingly, by, as is exemplified in “Feminist Brags About Aborting Her Baby During Pandemic While Others Can’t Get Medical Care” (Bilger 2020), using words and definitions to express the alleged impropriety of abortions. While the featured ‘feminist’ in the article, Fae Ehsan, wrote an op-ed on why she had an abortion during the novel coronavirus pandemic and why the right to abortion according to her is essential, she is being accused of “bragging” about her abortion, as well as “celebrating” that she “can continue to abort [her] unborn bab[y] in the midst of the coronavirus restrictions” (Bilger 2020). These terms imply that Ehsan glorifies abortion, and demonize her as the image of “women who fuck freely and without remorse” is being held against her (Penny 2019).

Furthermore, propaganda is justified by results, as it is “generally justified by citing a danger to the group, and then stressing that the adoption of a particular point of view is needed to combat or guard against that danger” (Walton 111). This is particularly striking in the way conservatist and Christian views are vindicated in the articles, as the women that allegedly contest these principles are diminished. This is exemplified in “Feminist Writer: Children Shouldn’t “Belong” to Those Whose Genetics They Share” (Cook 2019), where Sophie Lewis is banished for questioning the traditional perspectives on the family, as well as in “Feminist Claims: “God is All Right With” Killing Babies in Abortions” (Yoder 2020a), where Viva Ruiz is criticized for her alleged abolishing queer activist approach, as in “Pro-Abortion Feminist: Pro-Life People Who Protect Babies From Abortions are ‘F—— Monsters’” (Yoder 2020b), where the author argues that by discontinuing abortions, the 'real' problems that women have to deal with, such as "financial hardship, abusive relationships, and mental health", will be salvaged.

These narratives are furthermore invigorated by what Walton refers to as the ninth characteristic, the use of emotive language and persuasive definitions, which appear to resemble the seventh characteristic of involving persuasion dialogue, but differs in the rather universal manner of using words and maintaining a lexicon from

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a specific ideology. This refers to how, for example, ‘feminists’ are regarded from a Christian-Conservative lens, as mentioned earlier, but also to how abortion is perceived as baby-murdering (Walton 112). In this specific debate, pro-abortion activists usually regard themselves as ‘pro-life’, while anti-abortion activists regard themselves as ‘pro-choice’, which derives from the sense of having bodily autonomy, and corroborates with the third-wave feminist notion of choice. This notion is characterized by “deep respect for pluralism and self-determination”, tolerant towards women’s agency over their bodies and sexuality (Snyder-Hall 255). However, life activists usually frame themselves as more ‘woman’ than pro-choice activists by arguing that “the belief that abortion is a right – and a good thing – is simply the result of consistent brainwashing by “pro-abortion” culture” (Saurette & Gordon 254). This is oftentimes explicitly mentioned throughout the analyzed articles, such as in “Pro-Abortion Feminist: Pro-Life People Who Protect Babies from Abortions are ‘F—— Monsters’” (Yoder 2020b), where the author claims that the abortion industry’s lie is “that women need abortion because they can’t succeed without it” (ibid.).

Ultimately, LifeNews positions pro-life activists as saviors, by claiming “[t]he pro-life movement tells them instead that they aren’t alone – and that, as women, they are empowered with the ability to have children and thrive” (Yoder 2020b). This is what Walton refers to as eristic aspect of propaganda, which implicates “that any means required to fight against the “evil” or danger posed by the “enemy” is justified”, often orchestrated with “misuse of statistics, manipulation of opinion polls, photomontage techniques, and the use of psychological techniques of persuasion”, in which “[o]ften the words “fight” or “struggle” are used” (Walton 113). All the articles at a certain moment include a break in which LifeNews explicitly asks for help in their ‘combat’ (fig. 1).

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Altogether, these characteristics reveal the critical ways in which propaganda aims at controlling and perpetuating certain beliefs, in this case, anti-abortion ideologies. In particular, these ideologies are detrimental as these nullify women’s reproductive rights by prioritizing Christian-Conservative belief systems, that ultimately contribute to a realm of anti-feminist doctrines. These doctrines aim at reasserting male dominance and “espous[ing] patriarchal or misogynistic beliefs, portraying women as irrational, vindictive creatures” (Nicholas & Agius 36). This is particularly evident in the way that feminism is demonized on the website, as public figures with progressive beliefs are regarded as ‘feminists’ and their statements are taken out of context, by taking them literally and framing these in ways that make feminists look like coldblooded baby murderers that are covered up by alleged profane communities, such as the LGBT-community or liberal news media. This stereotyped framing ultimately sets public figures back regardless of their statements, as the anti-feminist implication is that the person responding will be angry, family-hating, unattractive, and atheist. More importantly, feminists are framed as being undeniably pro-abortion, while is a wider range of perception towards abortion and choice. As platforms like LifeNews operate independently and have no gatekeepers for the quality of their content, these highly partisan news stories contribute to the decay of journalistic ethical norms, and perpetuate discourses of social inequality. This polarization is specifically harmful to the representation of women as it contributes to the symbolic annihilation, in other words, erasure of voices of women, that demand equal rights and treatment.

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1.2 Advertising

This section will provide an analysis of problematic information within influencer culture and its ramifications for the representation of women, by scrutinizing the #KylieJennerLipChallenge (#KJLC). According to Caroline Jack, problematic information as advertising refers to the persuasion of an audience to either sell goods or services, or to persuade this audience into adopting certain ideas or attitudes (5). Jack argues that advertising always is a form of marketing (ibid.). Influencers are key figures in social media marketing, as these entail aspirational consumption and a substantial following that “position themselves as fans and reach out to [them] in a well-worn mode of address: the faithful supplicant and adoring audience” (Marwick “Instafame” 156). Because of this, influencers play a substantial role as key figures in how information is transmitted and perceived. One of the most prominent influencers of the 2010s is Kylie Jenner, the youngest member of the famous Kardashian family. #KJLC was an online viral challenge that arose in April 2015 as Jenner had transformed from a young girl into a woman and significant changes to her physical appearance had been noticeable. Her transformation is often described as the “fembot transformation” (Frangos 34; Hess 2018), the “richface” (Maddeaux 2015) or the “Instagram face” (Tolentino 2019) and refer to the popular appearance of “a young face, of course, with poreless skin and plump, high cheekbones. It has catlike eyes and long, cartoonish lashes; it has a small, neat nose and full, lush lips” (ibid.). This homogenous appearance and augmentation are often either the result of plastic surgery or photoshopping of pictures, and represent “the fetishization of the DIY (do-it-yourself) body beautiful that demands, commodifies and celebrates constant modification to an ever-morphing ideal type” (Lazar 2011 qtd. in Renold & Ringrose 1066). This is what feminist cultural theorist Rosalind Gill refers to as the “makeover paradigm”, in which women are required to believe that “they or their life is lacking or flawed in some way, and second that it is amenable to reinvention or transformation by following the advice of relationship, design or

Swallowing the Pink Pill: How Problematic Information Misrepresents Women