Can women ever be truly safe when misogyny has gone digital?

Once again, the findings are expected to reveal what so many of us already know: sexism and misogyny are not relics of the past. They are daily realities shaping how girls move through the world.

It should trouble us all that in 2025, a teenage girl cannot post a photo online without bracing herself for unsolicited comments about her body.

That she cannot walk home without rehearsing safety plans in her head. That she learns early on to weigh every word she speaks for fear of being labelled “too much” or “not enough.”

The truth is stark: while we have made huge strides in women’s rights, we are failing to protect the next generation. The threat has shifted.

Misogyny is no longer confined to the street corner or the classroom, it now flourishes, unfiltered, in the digital spaces our daughters inhabit.

The Digital Spillover

Online platforms are not neutral playgrounds. They are breeding grounds where harassment is normalised, where “locker room talk” is broadcast at scale, and where algorithms feed harmful content straight into the hands of children.

In Girlguiding’s 2024 survey, 77% of girls and young women reported experiencing online harm, and over half saw sexist ‘jokes’ or hate speech.

What begins on a phone does not stay on a phone. It shapes how girls are treated in school corridors, in friendship groups, even in their own families.

The Cost of Silence

We often tell girls to toughen up, block and report, or ignore it. But every sigh, every “just don’t look at it,” teaches them that their discomfort is less important than keeping the peace.

Silence comes at a cost: 57% of 17–21-year-olds say they know a girl their age who has been sexually harassed online. Yet most still feel they can’t step away because they’d “miss out on too much.”

This isn’t a personal failing—it’s the result of platforms designed to keep them hooked, no matter the harm.

What Needs to Change

Protecting girls requires more than awareness campaigns. It demands structural change:

Parents must model open conversations about consent, respect, and digital literacy—not just hand out phones and hope for the best.

Schools need resources and training to tackle sexism as seriously as academic failure. Safeguarding must evolve to match the online world.

Tech companies must be held accountable. Girls are already telling us what they need: remove harmful content (50%), tackle violence and abuse against women and girls online (48%), and take reports more seriously (46%). Safety cannot be optional.

Policymakers must recognise digital misogyny as a public health issue, not a private inconvenience. Regulation has to keep pace with reality.

Thriving, Not Just Surviving

The measure of a society is how safe its youngest members feel. Right now, too many girls are surviving in spite of their environment, rather than thriving because of it.

Safety is not just the absence of harm—it is the presence of freedom. Freedom to take up space, to speak, to create, to lead.

If we want girls to grow into women who believe in their own worth, then we must stop treating their safety as negotiable. It is their right, and our collective responsibility to make it real.

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Sara-Louise Goode is a mentor, EQ educator, and international speaker specialising in confidence, emotional intelligence, and self-worth for women and teenage girls.

LBC Opinion provides a platform for diverse opinions on current affairs and matters of public interest.

The views expressed are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the official LBC position.