| Misogyny | Prejudice, hatred and hostility towards women. It is especially directed towards girls and women who challenge male dominance. Misogyny aims to control women into reinforcing sexist ideas and patriarchy. Source: UNGEI |
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| Collective Care | Refers to a feminist ethic that views communities being responsible for each other’s well-being. It recognizes the toll that systems of oppression take on mental, emotional, and physical health. Feminists emphasize the radical potential of collective care to navigate oppressive systems that threaten survival and to imagine alternative futures. Source: UNGEI |
| Patriarchy | A social structure or system of community, society and government in which (usually straight) men’s and boys’ power is upheld as superior to and often exclusive of the power of women and girls and queer persons. Patriarchy refers to the authoritative control of the male-figure over the family and kin groups, as well as the nation-state, military, and organized religion. Patriarchy can be supported and reinforced by persons of all genders. Source: UNGEI |
| Incels | Heterosexual men who blame women and society for their lack of romantic success. They are known for their deep-seated pessimism and profound sense of grievance against women. The incel ideology is rooted in the belief that women have too much power in the sexual/romantic sphere and ruin incels' lives by rejecting them. Source: ADL |
| #MeToo | A social movement and awareness campaign against sexual abuse, sexual harassment and rape culture, in which survivors share their experiences. The phrase was initially used in 2006 by activist Tarana Burke. The hashtag went viral in 2017 after actress Alyssa Milano posted it on Twitter in solidarity of women abuse survivors of film producer Harvey Weinstein. Source: Wikipedia |
| Tradwife | A recent phenomenon in western culture in which women use social media to romanticize traditional gender roles and encourage the patriarchal structure. Source: PAVE |
| Rape Culture | Behaviour, values and beliefs that normalise, trivialise, or make light of sexual violence and undermine consent. It is rooted in patriarchal power structures that fuel gender inequity. Source: Surviors' Network |
| Toxic Masculinity | A narrow and repressive description of manhood, designating manhood as defined by violence, sex, status and aggression. It’s the cultural ideal of manliness, where strength is everything while emotions are a weakness; where sex and brutality are yardsticks by which men are measured, while supposedly “feminine” traits—which can range from emotional vulnerability to simply not being hypersexual—are the means by which your status as “man” can be taken away. Source: Learning for Justice |
| Manosphere | An umbrella term for online communities that have increasingly promoted narrow and aggressive definitions of what it means to be a man – and the false narrative that feminism and gender equality have come at the cost of men’s rights. These communities promote the idea that emotional control, material wealth, physical appearance and dominance, especially over women, are markers of male worth. Source: UN Women |
| Toxic Beauty Culture | Advice normalizes unrealistic and narrowly defined beauty standards, promotes potentially harmful beauty practices (like cosmetic surgery), and suggests that the key to building self-esteem is physical ‘perfection’. Source: Dove Self-Esteem Project |
| Bro Culture | Refers not just to macho behaviors in general, but also to darker things like binge drinking, sexism, rape culture and other elements associated with hyper masculinity. Source: USA Today |
| Diet Culture | A societal norm that ranks thin bodies as superior to other body types and has been associated with negative outcomes, such as eating disorders. Wellness has evolved into a term that is often used to promote diet culture messages. Source: NIH |
| Clean Girl Aesthetic | An aesthetic arose in 2020. In theory, this aesthetic is supposed to be minimalistic, as the goal is to look as natural as possible; but, as it turns out, it takes a lot of makeup and skincare to look as natural as possible. Source: John Hopkins News |
| Clean Eating | Widely promoted on social media sites, this loosely defined trend consists of choosing foods that are natural and wholesome—particularly foods that are free of chemicals, additives and preservatives, and refined, processed ingredients. Source: NIH |
| Beauty Filters | Filters are essentially automated photo editing tools that use artificial intelligence and computer vision to detect facial features and change them. These real-time video filters are a recent advance, but beauty filters more broadly are an extension of the decades-old selfie phenomenon. Source: MIT Technology Review |
| Social Media Influencer | A social media influencer is an individual who has a large following on social media platforms. These individuals use their influence to promote products or services. Many social media influencers are paid by companies to promote their products. Some of the most popular social media platforms used by influencers are Instagram, YouTube, and Snapchat. Source: SMRI |
| Mansplaining | The combination of “man” and “explaining” — is a colloquial expression used to describe situations in which a man provides a condescending explanation of something to someone who already understands it. And a new study reveals that its negative impact on women is very real. Source: MSU |
| Pickup Artists (PUAs) & Alpha Males | A male supremacist community of heterosexual men who share predatory and coercive strategies aimed at manipulating women into sex. PUAs and alpha males endorse engaging in sexual harassment, stalking and even sexual violence. This community contains influencers who, in some cases, profit enormously from selling their misogynistic worldview and “techniques.” Source: Southern Poverty Law Center |
| #RedPill | An online community, based on a scene in the Matrix, that pushes a narrative that women run the world without taking responsibility for it and that their male victims are not permitted to complain. Source: The Guardian |
| Glow Up Culture | The idea that devoting your time to bettering your physical appearance or transforming your self in the guise of self-improvement will lead to happier and better life. Source: Cosmopolitan |
| #thatgirl | Social media content that promotes a lifestyle which revolves around perfectionism and hustle culture. Often it features an aesthetic that is "thin, pretty, and predominantly white." Source: Medium |