We Liberal Democrats believe misogyny should be recognised within hate crime legislation
Wera Hobhouse is the Liberal Democrat MP for Bath
Over the past few months, I have been campaigning for legislation to combat the alarming trend of ‘nightlife’ filming. Women are being filmed in public without their knowledge or consent, often in inebriated states, with this footage then shared online for millions to view. Collectively, this content has been viewed more than 3 billion times in just three years.
Algorithms are not neutral. They elevate what captures attention, and what captures attention is often what is extreme, polarising, or degrading. These ‘nightlife videos’ are accompanied by a barrage of misogynistic comments and abuse, driving engagement and generating profit for the video’s creator. In this environment, misogynistic content is not just present, it is incentivised and rewarded.
For the victims, the impact is devastating. They are ridiculed, humiliated, face reputational damage and left fearing for their safety in public. And yet, once again, the law is scrambling to catch up.
I saw this during my campaign to make the disgusting act of ‘upskirting’ – taking photographs or videos under a person’s clothing without their consent – a criminal offence, which led to the Voyeurism (Offences) Act 2019. At the time, there was a clear gap in the law and an urgent need to act. But even then, it was obvious that we were responding to one manifestation of a much wider problem.
Today, we are seeing increasingly sophisticated forms of online abuse, from AI-generated deepfake imagery to coordinated harassment campaigns. It is happening at a pace and scale that we have not seen before.
Technology has made it easier to commit these acts, and social media platforms have made it easier for them to spread, but the underlying issue has not changed.
Violence against women and girls is an epidemic in the UK. One in four women in England and Wales will experience domestic abuse in their lifetime. One in four have been raped or sexually assaulted since the age of 16. These are not isolated crimes. They are part of a wider pattern.
In December, the Government published its new Violence Against Women and Girls strategy. Its focus on prevention, education and early intervention is welcome, and long overdue.
But there is a conspicuous omission. Despite recognising the need to address the drivers of abuse, the strategy makes no commitment to recognising misogyny as a hate crime.
Not long ago, following the rape and murder of Sarah Everard, there was much political momentum behind doing exactly that. Labour themselves committed to making misogyny a hate crime. Yet now they’re in Government, we have heard very little about it.
Instead, we are left navigating the same reactive approach: legislating against each new form of technology-facilitated abuse as it emerges, without addressing the hostility towards women that underpins them.
We Liberal Democrats believe misogyny should be recognised within hate crime legislation, not as a new standalone offence, but as an aggravating factor in sentencing, and something police are required to record.
This matters for three reasons. First, it would help us properly understand the scale of the problem. Without consistent recording, misogyny remains largely invisible in official data, despite being a common factor in many forms of abuse.
Second, it would improve accountability. Where crimes are motivated by hostility towards women, that should be reflected in how they are investigated and prosecuted, just as it is for other forms of hate crime.
And third, it would recognise what many women already know: that these experiences are not random. They are rooted in attitudes towards women that continue to shape behaviour, both offline and online.
Recognising misogyny as a hate crime will not, on its own, end violence against women and girls. But it would be an important step towards treating this as a connected problem, rather than a series of unrelated offences.
If we are serious about prevention, we cannot ignore the role misogyny plays. If we continue to avoid naming it, we will remain stuck in a cycle of reacting to harm, rather than preventing it.
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