Carolina Gomez Mena
La Jornada Newspaper
Sunday, January 25, 2026, p. 8
Gender misinformation perpetuates and deepens discriminatory stereotypes, weakens the agenda of equality and women’s rights and discourages public and political participation in the sector, warns the Inter-American Commission of Women (CIM); It also emphasizes that this is not an isolated problem that has intensified in recent years.
In the practical guide to address this issue, prepared by the CIM – of the Organization of American States – examples of gender misinformation are cited, such as stating that “80 percent of complaints about gender violence are false, when in reality all the official statistics in Latin America show that these are exceptional, since they are barely between 0.1 and 7 percent” or disseminating that “a new feminist law allows any man to be imprisoned only with the word of a woman, when the truth is that no country has a law of this type.”
Falsehoods like these are spread on social networks, and the more they are shared, the more real they are perceived, he adds.
Gender misinformation consists of intentionally spreading false information about people or groups, based on their sex, gender identity or expression. The purpose is to harm, discredit or silence, the analysis specifies, adding that fake news (fake news) They are not synonymous with misinformation. “Although they are sometimes used as such, they are just a form of misinformation,” he points out.
Likewise, it states that there is a close link between misinformation and gender violence or hate speech, and many times the three problems occur together or overlap.
Concomitant phenomena
“While disinformation intentionally spreads false information about people or groups based on their gender identity, online violence involves actions or content that seeks to intimidate, harass, shame or harm a person based on their gender, identity or sexual orientation in digital environments.”
They often manifest themselves as “concomitant phenomena, that is, disinformation campaigns include violence and disinformation strategies are used within violent attacks.”
Meanwhile, hate speech is “expressions that advocate inciting harm, especially discrimination, hostility or violence, based on the identification of the target with a certain social or demographic group.”
