Yvette Cooper calls for on Government to tackle online misogyny as she launches Labour campaign to champion women

Yvette Cooper will  today call on the government to tackle online misogyny, as she launches a campaign to champion women’s voices online.

The former Home Secretary will today speak to Labour Women’s Conference in Brighton where she will outline plans to set up a new Commission on Women and Technology, which includes a campaign to champion women’s voices.

One of the issues she will highlight is online misogyny.  Cooper will warn that bullying and misogyny online risks creating a new oppression and silencing women who want to speak out. To combat this she is calling for the government to campaign against online abuse and properly collect data on the extent of abuse.
“The scale of misogynistic abuse online is truly shocking. This is not just a case of trading insults, women like Caroline Criado-Perez, Mary Beard, Charlotte Proudman, Brianna Wu and Zoe Quinn, are being threatened – told they will be raped or killed for speaking out. This is completely unacceptable and it’s time women from across politics, media and business came together to challenge, and confront this behaviour. 

“Sexist abuse is also increasingly masquerading as political activism. There was evidence of this in the Scottish Referendum, the General Election campaign and even in the Labour leadership contest too.

“In the end this isn’t about experienced politicians like me, Liz, Stella, Angela, Caroline or Harriet – we’re never going to be silenced by the high tech equivalent of angry letters written in green ink that politicians have received for centuries. But the scale of abuse directed at those who retweeted us or supported us will put women off joining the Labour Party in the first place and getting involved. We mustn’t let that happen”, she will say.

Cooper will say that while some progress has been made on tackling online abuse, misogyny and bullying online risks silencing women who want to speak out.

Among Cooper’s plans are introducing  compulsory Sex & Relationship Education and expanding programmes to empower young women through mentoring programmes.