Event funded by Prince Harry focuses in part on reproductive rights
The Center for Intimacy Justice showcased research on censorship and social media demotion regarding women’s healthcare information at the event.
Researchers who study women’s rights met last week at a conference funded by Prince Harry to push for a healthier tech ecosystem.
The Responsible Tech Youth Power Fund (RTYPF), a grant initiative to support youth organizations working to shape the future of technology, hosted yesterday's event. The duke’s foundation, Archewell, which he co-founded with his wife, Meghan, Duchess of Sussex, funded the second cohort of RTYPF grantees, alongside names like Pinterest and Melinda French Gates’ Pivotal Ventures.
Prince Harry spoke about tech companies amassing more power than the government. He said these digital spaces had been built to create communities, but no one had attempted to make them safe. He criticized the profit motive that he felt most tech companies were driven by, rather than a concern for the well-being of society.
The Center for Intimacy Justice (CIJ), a woman-led advocacy organization committed to combating gender-based digital suppression, attended the event. CIJ works to change discriminatory technological practices that deny women, girls, and people of diverse genders access to information about health.
CIJ’s RTYPF project focuses on addressing the digital suppression of sexual and reproductive health information, which disproportionately impacts girls, women, and people of diverse genders.
I spoke with Jackie Rotman, its Founder and CEO. We discussed the censorship of women's reproductive health information on major tech platforms like Meta, TikTok, and Amazon.
“People already can't get access to reliable information about sexual health topics from their doctor,” Rotman said. “And when it's further stigmatized online, it's a lot harder for people to search for topics like pain that they're facing or other vaginal health and other issues in reproductive and sexual health.
It also has a significant impact on entrepreneurship. Her organization found that 85 percent of executives in women’s healthcare said that censorship made it harder to raise funds and be successful.
Rotman explained that content is often misclassified as adult or sexual, leading to suppression of health information and hindering innovation in the women's health sector. Rotman highlighted the disparity in policy enforcement, with male-focused products like erectile dysfunction ads allowed while those related to female pleasure are often censored.
A 2022 report compiled by her organization found 100% of businesses had ad rejections, and 50% had entire accounts taken down.
Shadow banning is also prevalent, particularly on Meta and TikTok. This is when something can be posted but not shown to followers. Many people who write about abortion have complained that they have been demoted or lost access to key features to promote their work, as there has been a push to limit the information shared about reproductive care.
“A lot of content creators describe that they have a lot of engagement and a lot of activities, and then they might post something about sexual health and find that they are just suddenly having major dips in their followings, or that no one's actually seeing their content,” Rotman said. “So that can be indicative of shadow banning.”