Significance of social media in the lives of women

  • Social media is easily accessible and it’s also the meeting point of today’s internet savvy audience.
  • Women’s rights
    • A concrete relationship definitely exists between social media and women’s rights
    • Social media has opened doors  and made  everything available  for  everybody everywhere,  thus  eliminating gates and gatekeeping of  any sort.
    • Intrinsically, women’s rights  violations  and women’s rights movements  have  been  quickly  capitalized  on  social  media’s  unparalleled  awareness-raising potential.
    • social media has become a tool for women to campaign against issues like gender stereotyping, gender suppression etc.
  • Curbing violence against women
    • Internet and social media can enable activists and others to challenge myths and stereotypes as well as create new forums for the perpetuation of violence against women.
    • Hashtag movements  to  end  violence  and discrimination   against
    • Social media   is   a   strong platform   to   discuss   and   share   views,   experiences   to channelize  hashtag  movements  to  stop  sexual  violence  and discrimination  against
    • It is  a  new  frontier  to  organise campaign or rally by women‘s rights activists to come forward and  fight  for  gender
    • Through  social  media,  women across  the  globe  are  connected  and  supporting  each  other such  as  lawmakers,  politicians,  business  owners  for  gender equality.
    • Twitter’s hashtag function in particular allows women to easily follow issues that matter to them and forge coalitions based upon shared concerns, from immediate personal needs to calls for large-scale social change. E.g: #MeToo movement, #SelfieWithDaughter etc.
  • Women Entrepreneurs
    • Social media  is  becoming  one  of  the  most  powerful  tools where women can start new companies, venture or start-up as they can contact and converse with customers and consumers directly.
    • Female entrepreneurs   can   do   marketing   through social  media  which  is  very  cost  effective  and  can  be  easily channelized.
    • Social media with the help of new technology pave the ground for millions of people to find online jobs for themselves or create businesses for others globally.
    • For instance, Shradha Sharma is   the   Founder   and   Chief   Editor   at Yourstory.com,   which   is   an   online media  platform  for  start-ups  and    It  is  India‘s leading  online  media  technology  which  has  narrated  more than  20,000  stories  in  12  Indian  languages  of  entrepreneurs which  reaches  to  more  than  10  million  readers  very  month.
  • Making the voices heard
    • In digital platforms, the cost of participating for a cause or in a protest is cheaper. This encourages more people to participate and force governments to pay heed.
    • While women still remain underrepresented, social media provides a level playing field by allowing individual voices from a wider range of backgrounds to be heard, with or without the traditional power.
    • It fills up the lacunae presented by the traditional media, where women receive only 38% of bylines.
  • Global Communities
    • Female-based communities are evolving in a way that cuts through particular companies and physical limitations and connects female players throughout industries and geographies.
    • Because the internet bypasses so many barriers that separate us, women who were formerly isolated can now access high-profile players in their field and, conversely, build an accessible, highly visible platform for self-promotion.
    • Women have historically had a more difficult time capitalizing concepts and proposals, but the interplay of social media and crowdfunding is turning that paradigm on its head.
    • For instance, In July of 2020, women took to instagram to post black-and-white pictures of themselves with the caption “#challengeaccepted”. Women who participated in the challenge would nominate another woman and tag them in the post of their selfie, challenging them to post a black-and-white picture of themselves and nominate someone else.
  • Breaking barriers
    • Social media breaks cultural barriers, legal restrictions, economic barriers and more, enabling the better representation of women from across the globe, even from countries following misogynistic systems.
    • It has played a critical role during the pandemic in enabling the continuation of activism even amid the lockdown and social distancing.