Socio-economic characteristics of the participants
Among the informants, three quarters (79%) were female and one quarter (21%) were male. The mean age of the informants was 40 years with a standard deviation of 6.8 years. About half of the participants were academicians and the rest were researchers, journalists, NGO workers, and mass-media experts. The respondents had a similar level of education: most of them had masters and above degrees. The median monthly family income of the informants was BDT 43,263.
Sexual And Reproductive Health Related Misuse Of Digital Media
Misusing digital media in terms of sexual and reproductive health was found at a level of grave concern. The informants revealed their sagacious remarks based on the fact on the ground. This domain of misuse was described in different approaches. Based on the interviews, the following schematic diagram was depicted (Fig. 1). It can be materialized into two distinct ways based on how it occurs, i.e., online to online and offline to online. The first category implies that the entire process of harassment happens online where both of them (miscreants and victim) may be known personally outside of online where both intentional and unintentional nexus can prevail from the corner of the relationship. Intentional relationship in online-to-online category refers to that the victim is interested to strengthen her relationship with the offender though she never meets him in person. Once, the offender apprehends his desired photos and videos, he starts blackmailing for showing more nude photos and videos and in some cases monetary demand. Unless she fulfills his demand, those photos and videos will be uploaded through social media, or porn sites, or any possible sites.
Unintentional Relationship in online-to-online category encompasses that both the victims and the offender do not know each other in person but strategically, the victim has fallen into a trap created by the offender, and indeed, the victim is no longer interested to conduct such obscene acts what the offender threatens. From offline to online, tells us that both the victim and miscreant know each other outside of online, i.e. friends, family members, known individuals,etc. An intentional relationship begins with the mutual consent of both the victim and offender. They may eager to enhance the depth of their relationships through sharing indecent photos of their own by using social media applications. Afterward, they can come closer to make an intimate relationship which can be filmed by their will or secretly by the offender. After that, two things could happen. Firstly; after breaking the relation up, the offender can expose those intimate materials through digital media for jeopardizing the victim’s life. Secondly; the offender (especially men) can start blackmailing to continue sexual relations with him which is termed as “sex slave” whenever he desires, women should be there for saving her social respect. In terms of unintentional relationship, the victim may know the offender in person or not but the victim is no longer interested to a have sexual relation with the offender. By any means, the offender manages to capture the video of an intimate moment and the later step is as like the intentional relationship. These identified steps behind the curtain of misuse can be presented in the following schematic diagram.
The victims attempt to keep them aloof from filing any case what ultimately becomes a matter of discomfort and transforms their social life from dignity into debasement. Ultimately, no hope remains to lead a respectful life in the society that triggers out either to commit suicide or to subsist with a chronic mental disorder.
Influencing Factors That Provoke Misusing Digital Media
The study results addressed four major influencing factors of misusing and those are as follows:
1. Unwise provision of devices without decent direction
It was figured out from the KIIs that the provision of digital devices is boosting up through transforming the norm of offering gifts. Without having a proper knowledge regarding do’s and don’ts, digital devices are reaching towards the hands of users. As the parents, as well as elders, are not concerned regarding the misuse, the prevalence of misuse is escalating.
“Most of the cases, the parents provide smartphones or any other digital devices to their children, especially, during a special occasion from the point of love but they don’t pay heed to ensure the issue of decent use” (KII, Academician).
“….. this is due to a lack of knowledge and awareness of the parents and their guardians. Those who know are more- cautious in delivering digital devices among the teen-ager university students” (KII, Academician).
“…….to hold up the social status in the community, the guardians deliver smart devices without decent direction and watching their activities” (KII, Researcher).
“Digital devices are at our hands without having a proper knowledge regarding safe use of devices and internet” (KII, NGO Worker).
2. Culture of injustice and the power of muscle-men
Unanimously, all the informants were deeply concerned regarding the culture of injustice and how it provokes them to commit further offences. They opined that the offenders are attached with powerful elites and muscle-men in terms of most of the cases. As a result, cases related to rape and sexual violence are not sued in comparison with the actual number of incidents. Even though those cases were filed, a lengthy process, fear or mediating with the offenders by monetary benefit is halted to get the offenders punished. So, the end line of most of the cases is not satisfactory.
“the wide-spread existence of the culture of injustice inspires the offenders to act upon this type of heinous crime which escalates the heights of misuse over years…” (KII, Researcher).
One of the informants opined as like the following;
“..muscle-men are the key to infringe the rules and regulation that leads to a higher risk of vulnerability..” (KII, Activist)
3. Low self-awareness of the victims
Significantly, those girls were not aware of building a relationship. exposed that the truth of possessing a somewhat level of knowledge of the ways of misuse of digital media can affect them horrendously.
“women and girls are mostly the victims of this domain. Majority of them are not aware enough to handle digital devices. That’s why they often become victimized in several ways” (KII, Researcher).
“Women and girls who easily trust other people and share their private issues are more vulnerable than others” (KII, Academician).
“This is very unexpected that the women and girls are falling into a trap sketched by the offender due to lack of awareness” (KII, Journalist).
Due to the paucity of awareness, women and girls are becoming the victims in the form of cyber-bullying, sexting, sextortion, and revenge porn. In multi-dimensional ways, the perpetrators were targeting the victims.
“..the victims, particularly, the women and girls are attacked by the offenders through applying complex and complicated strategies. In order to save them, knowledge dissemination can play an instrumental role…”(KII, Researcher).
Mostly, the victims were targeted in a more disguised way. In terms of operating social networking sites including sharing photos on Facebook, videos in youtube and other sites, etc. The victims needed to have a rigid stand on privacy in terms of messaging, sharing images, and posts27.
4. Easy access to porn sites
It had been becoming so worrying matter to prevail the easy access towards pornographic related sites. Evidence showed that the school-going children in Dhaka city watch erotic porn videos. individuals who consume pornography more frequently are more likely to hold attitudes conducive to sexual aggression and engage in actual acts of sexual aggression25. This misuse keeps a pivotal role to bolster the obscene across society which is perceived by most of the respondents of this study.
“From the curiosity and the addiction, youth watch indecent pornographic contents frequently just a single click. This easy way of access accelerates this misuse as a grave concern” (KII, Academician).
“A complete blockade must be imposed on pornographic contents and a stricter form of implementation of the pornographic control act needs to be enforced” (KII, Researcher).
…amending the ‘pornography control law-2012’ with firm crackdown needs to be materialized.