Digital reinvention of patriarchy: How AI reinforces power structures

Imagine sitting in class on an ordinary day when you hear your peers snickering about you. Later, you discover that someone has created an Instagram account using images of you — pictures you never took and that never existed in the first place. The account leaves you socially isolated, humiliated, and afraid. For many women, including Fatima*, an A-Level student, this is not a distant fear but a lived reality.

Her experience reflects a wider failure to protect young women from the harms enabled by rapidly advancing technology. It also raises urgent questions about the speed at which AI is developing, whether existing safeguards are keeping pace, and who is most vulnerable when they do not.

Minderoo Foundation, an Australia-based organisation focused on women's rights and gender equality, writes in an article on its website that “AI is developing at a speed and scale that often outpaces the regulatory frameworks guiding its use.” The article further notes that women are more likely than men to agree with this concern, adding that AI can reinforce gender norms and, in some cases, amplify them.

As AI-generated content becomes harder to detect, it may begin to shape how women choose to exist in social spaces. The fear of being targeted, misrepresented, or humiliated could silence their thoughts, restrict their expression, and force them to navigate public life with constant caution.

Social isolation and public scrutiny

According to UN Women, 41% of women who are victims of deepfakes not only confront online scrutiny but also face all sorts of offline harassment. For Fatima*, this harassment was tied to social isolation from the people around her, facing ostracism in school with no support from her guardians.

“I wasn't able to tell my parents because they wouldn't believe I was being bullied in the first place.” Her parents further blamed her for the bullying she was facing, implying it was her fault she was being bullied in the first place.

“As far as my friends go, I only had one or two friends left, but I was helpless, and I couldn't really do anything else about it. The school also knew my image was being portrayed as this tramp or this person who goes around doing this for money or attention."

Karen Hao, an award-winning journalist covering AI's impact on society, in her MIT Technology Review paper, emphasises how AI, since the beginning, has been used to create pornographic representations of women.

"Sensity AI estimates between 90% and 95% of all online deepfake videos are nonconsensual porn, and around 90% of those feature women,” she mentions.

Perpetrators also find it easy to take advantage of women because there's little to no support for them, knowing the fact that society will show disdain for women, making them ashamed, excluded, and unable to ask for help. They think revenge porn is the perfect weapon to be used against women.

A big portion of victims who are involved in deepfake crimes are minors, including Fatima*, also a minor at the time of the incident.

Further complicating the matter is X's GorkAI. The Guardian reports on there being one nonconsensual image per minute using Grok AI's image generation tool on X. Young girls are targeted more often than one can imagine.

Ayesha*, another victim, was even younger when a similar incident happened to her. “I was really young, 11, I think… I didn’t understand what I was looking at or how it even existed,” she said. “All I remember is that I was scared… and I felt this weird sense of guilt and embarrassment.” Being so young, she couldn't even grasp the concept of what a deepfake could be. “This incident happened at a time when AI wasn't even as advanced as it is today.”

Her pictures were taken from her WhatsApp profile, an extreme violation of privacy as well as consent that isn't discussed enough.

Power dynamics in deepfakes

In Pakistan and South Asia, the issue is far more complex; it's a structural problem. One of the reasons why such technology is weaponised against women is tied to patriarchy. Fatima* agrees with this sentiment when asked about it.

“I feel like it is deeply tied to patriarchal structures because, in South Asian cultures, women are usually dehumanised or there to serve the benefit of the male interest, and due to this, they're just viewed through this male lens, and they have nothing outside of it,” Fatima* said, further explaining how women are judged through the expectations that are set up by our purity culture and how women's bodies are inherently seen as wrong or impure, and hence, why deepfakes carry such strong consequences for women themselves rather than the perpetrators.

Low media literacy in South Asia

Another reason why this issue is particularly dangerous for women is the low media literacy rate in Pakistan; the general population here does not understand the concept of deepfakes and has a hard time differentiating what's real and what isn't.

In their research paper on deepfakes, researchers Huda Imran and Madiha Maqsood write: “Dealing with media literacy in the modern digital world is crucial to possessing or developing media literacy that would enable people to use and examine media critically. This also fosters a more enlightened and knowledgeable audience base that has no trouble distinguishing between an original piece and a fake replication.”

To understand what this means in the context of deepfakes, if people can't distinguish what's real and what isn't, it can lead to women's lives being at risk. With a deep-rooted honour and purity culture, women are at the forefront of facing the consequences of people not understanding AI. With the possibility of women being imprisoned or harmed at the pretext of a man's actions.

Psychological consequences of deepfakes

The impact doesn't just end there; it seeps through the lives of these young women, impacting the way they see and use the internet. “I didn’t want to post myself or express myself in any way,” Ayesha* said.

The fear is not just of the judgment; it's also of it happening again, and also about the permanence of the pictures on the internet. It doesn't matter whether the pictures are real or not; for Fatima*, the effects were long-term, developing body dysmorphia and a disconnect from her sense of self. “I didn't feel safe in my own body,” she said, indicating how the incident completely changed the way she viewed herself.

Studies show that half of deepfake victims contemplate suicide and have thoughts about self-harm. Fatima*, in response to the incident, adapted herself to the system.

“I adopted this personality of a very religious individual,” developing this coping mechanism as a form of social protection. Religious conformity made her feel a sense of safety, and it aligned with already existing social norms; however, it came at a price of suppressing herself as an individual. This is a normal reaction from women, especially those who don’t get support from those around them, so conformity feels like a safety blanket. This also makes the victims resort to self-censorship and being extremely vigilant of what they post, suppressing their ideas and limiting internet usage as a form of protection.

Legal loopholes and low conviction rates

Despite the severity of such cases, legal remedies remain limited. While Pakistan’s Prevention of Electronic Crimes Act (PECA) 2016 addresses certain forms of online abuse, it does not explicitly cover deepfakes or AI-generated intimate imagery.

An article published on the website of UN Women highlights these legal challenges, noting that “In many countries, deepfake porn or AI-generated nude images fall into legal grey areas, leaving survivors unsure whether the abuse is even illegal and whether perpetrators can be prosecuted.”

The lack of clear legal protections can embolden perpetrators while discouraging victims from seeking justice. In both cases examined for this story, the women chose not to report the abuse. The same UN Women article further notes that “Even when laws exist, enforcement frequently fails. Investigators need digital forensics expertise, cross-border coordination, and platform cooperation to build a case, and most justice systems don't have adequate resources for any of these.”

For many survivors, shame, fear of social stigma, and uncertainty about legal recourse combine to create significant barriers to reporting, allowing such abuse to persist with little accountability.

The hesitation to report digital abuse is not unique to these two women. Many victims avoid coming forward due to fears of backlash, institutional shortcomings, and lengthy reporting processes that often force them to relive their trauma. As a result, perpetrators frequently escape accountability while survivors are left feeling unsupported.

The issue underscores the need for stronger reporting mechanisms, better support systems, and more effective enforcement. Until perpetrators face real consequences for violating women's privacy and rights, many will continue to act with impunity. Protecting young women from technology-facilitated abuse requires both institutional reform and a broader shift in societal attitudes.

— Names of the victims have been changed to protect their identities and privacy.

Aimon Azhar is a Mass Communication Student at NUST, Islamabad.

Disclaimer: The viewpoints expressed in this piece are the writer's own and don't necessarily reflect Geo.tv's editorial policy.