Exile Without Escape: How Online Abuse Silences Central America’s Women Journalists

In an alarming pattern revealed by LatAm Journalism Review, women journalists from Central America continue to face vicious and gendered online assaults, even while in exile. Despite leaving their home countries, these professionals endure targeted campaigns of hatred that undermine both their safety and credibility in digital spaces.

One journalist, forced into exile due to threats against her daughters, explained that the abuse persisted long after relocation. She found professional opportunities severely limited, as hateful rhetoric and smear campaigns followed her to new platforms. Another exile described how spyware, including Pegasus, was used to invade her phone, indicating that repression extended beyond borders.

The abuse is deeply gendered. A journalist cited by the report described online threats rarely aimed at men, such as rape threats, admonitions to “find a husband,” or comments that trivialise female careers. These messages seek not only to silence women reporters but to erase their legitimacy and humanity.

Because journalism thrives in digital platforms, silencing women online effectively silences their work. As one affected journalist remarked, “journalism today requires digital space… these women are losing the natural space in the digital age to be journalists.”

The report emphasizes that this is not mere trolling; it’s systematic gender-based violence that pushes talented journalists out of the profession and deprives societies of critical voices. Anti-press harassment is fueling a crisis of representation and democratic discourse, especially in Central America’s exile community.

Without sustained support, through legal protection, digital safety training, and inclusion policies in host countries, these journalists risk permanent erasure. Their exile may grant physical safety, yet digital targeting continues to strip away their capacity to work, be heard, and sustain independent reporting.

Male or female, exile does not equate to protection. But for women journalists from Central America, it has meant exchanging one form of repression for another, this time in the pixelated shadows of social media harassment.

Reference –

https://latamjournalismreview.org/articles/even-in-exile-central-americas-women-journalists-face-relentless-online-attacks/