As the representative of Take Back the Tech! Bangladesh I took the opportunity to give a presentation on the topic- ‘Consent, autonomy and agency: Online violence’ from a Bangladeshi perspective. Case studies of online violence in Bangladesh, government initiatives, campaigns of Take Back the Tech! Bangladesh have been discussed in the presentation.
Gender and Internet Governance Exchange (gigX):
If the question is ‘who governs the internet?’ you can’t name any specific person, company, organisation or government. A multistakeholder network is involved in the process, which includes governments, civil society, academics, researchers, private sector, national and international organisations. This network develops and makes decisions regarding the rules, principles, norms and programmes that shape the use of the internet. For years women, girls and sections of civil society have been marginalised in these decision making processes. The Gender and Internet Governance eXchange (gigX) is a platform which enables equal and meaningful participation of women and girls in the decision making. These exchanges create scope for women’s rights, internet rights activists from different parts of the world to discuss the relationship between gender, women’s rights and internet governance. As the coordinator of Take Back the Tech! Bangladesh chapter (supported by Bytes for All Bangladesh and Bangladesh Open Source Network), I had the privilege to participate in the Gender and Internet Governance Exchange (gigX) in June 2015 in Macau, China.
This year’s gigX took place at the Macau Productivity and Technology Transfer Center (CPTTM). Here I met with people who are working as women’s rights and internet rights activists from different parts of the world. It was a great space for all of us to discuss and understand the concepts related to internet governance such as internet rights and human rights, privacy and security, technology-based violence against women, freedom of expression, Feminist Principles of the Internet etc.
The gigX provided a space for me to understand the parts of the Feminist Principles of the Internet: access, economy, expression, consent- autonomy- agency, movement and public participation. As the representative of Take Back the Tech! Bangladesh I took the opportunity to give a presentation on the topic- ‘Consent, autonomy and agency: Online violence’ from a Bangladeshi perspective. Case studies of online violence in Bangladesh, government initiatives, campaigns of Take Back the Tech! Bangladesh have been discussed in the presentation.
Read the full Feminist Talk in GenderIT.org .