Manosphere and Cybermisogyny: Digital Discourses That Legitimize Sexual Violence Through Generative AI

Abstract

This article examines the discourses that legitimize and normalize digital sexual violence (deepnudes, pornographic deepfakes, and synthetic pornography generated using Generative Artificial Intelligence) through a mixed-methods design that combines Social Network Analysis (SNA) and Discourse Analysis applied to Instagram. Based on two distinct corpora, the study identifies eight discursive categories that operate on two complementary levels: a level of diffuse ideological normalization, centered on narratives of the objectification of women, male victimhood, the delegitimization of complaints, and anti-feminism; and a plane of reactive management, where violence that has already occurred is denied, minimized, or reversed. The structural analysis of hashtag co-occurrence graphs shows that these two ecosystems are not separate; rather, the manosphere actively colonizes spaces for feminist reporting, appropriating egalitarian vocabulary to block institutional recognition of violence. These findings have direct implications for the design of counter-discourse and media literacy strategies aimed at adolescents and young people.