Violence is not our Culture

A Toolkit

Strategising Online Activism

This toolkit is informed by the feminist standpoint on Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) and draws its inspiration from gender-sensitive practices and approaches introduced by women's groups at the forefront of this critique. Essentially, these approaches involve:
• An analysis of women's and men's different roles in society, specifically the multiple “burdens” of women’s experience in society and their access (or non-access) to resources to support their multiple roles and “burdens.”
• An understanding of these gender-based roles and their impact on how women and men experience technologies -their access to information and communication technology and how this access translates into how much “voice” and therefore “power” they have in society.
• Taking a clear stand to address the gender inequality in society, including the field of ICT through women’s empowerment.
The initial idea for developing this approach came from the Feminist Tech Exchange, a feminist training initiative from the Association for Progressive Communications Women's Networking Support Programme (APC WNSP). In 2008, the APC WNSP held the first global FTX in Cape Town, South Africa. There, feminist technology trainers and activists working on women's rights and gender equality were brought together to exchange technological skills and women's and gender rights issues. The initial ideas for this approach were outlined in that event...