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Journalists of Color and Online
Harassment: Individual Impact and News
Consequences
TRIGGER WARNING: Explicit sexual & racial language may be displayed and discussed.
Dr. Michelle Ferrier | Founder, Troll-Busters.com | @yoursosteamAugust 9, 2017|National Association of Black Journalists| New Orleans
Feeling abandoned by management and at risk as professional and personal lives blend.
INDIVIDUAL EFFECTS ON JOURNALISTS
Journalists make the perfect target for trolls. They must use social media and engage as part of their work.
Journalists and their natural curiosity also feed into the dynamic. Journalists want answers and they want to understand who and why they are being targeted.
Professional culture sees harassment as part of the job, viewing it as critique and free speech.
Significant professional harm can result from harassment.
FINDINGS:
PROFESSIONAL CULTURE
EFFECTS OF ONLINE HARASSMENT
INDIVIDUAL
The online harassment
of journalists can
create a chilling
effect—journalists may
avoid online contact,
reduce the media
content they create,
and share and withdraw
from reporting, social
media, and other job-
related activities.
NEWS ENTERPRISE
The chilling effect on individual journalists and journalistic lines of inquiry can lead to the silencing of diverse voices in the media, the technological takedown of a media site, or the abandonment of a line of investigative inquiry.
Gets rape jokes and threats through messages on Facebook,
emails. Tweets attacked her appearance. Users dug up old
photos. The article wasn’t about her at all .
“It’s men always and I usually notice on FB that it’s almost
always white men.”
“I won’t go on camera for anything because of Facebook
commenters.”
Has been re-victimized when articles were reposted without
her knowledge.
“We can’t get off of these things. So sick of people…when I’m
not even supposed to be working. You can’t get a break
sometimes.”
CANDIDATE L: CAUCASIAN
Email: Called her “nigger bitch”. Wasn’t a month that
went by that she wasn’t called a nigger, bitch, ho. 11
years, not a week. “You really are a nigger bitch.
We’ll rape you and throw you in the gutter. ”
Management told her not to worry about the emails.
She began watching over her shoulder and taking
extra precautions driving to and from work .
“I did not like who this was making me. Paranoid and
vigilant that is.”
“I was emotional and felt disrespect for my craft.
This is emotional and economic violence.”
CANDIDATE K: AFRICAN-AMERICAN
Tweets question validity of her work. Coverage of
immigration issue.
Twitter user tweeting incessantly at her calling her
work fake and biased. In a 24-hour period, 25-50
tweets from one individual.
Especially used when she was using Facebook Live
for protests and vigils and needed to monitor social
media and respond to viewers.
“I grew up on the Internet. I have to use my real
name. I have to be in these spaces.”
CANDIDATE B: CAUCASIAN
Used the word “alleged” in story. People jumped on her word choice on Twitter.
“I felt l ike I needed to respond because it questioned my abilities. It questioned my skil ls as a journalist…and this could hurt me in the future.”
Management advised not responding .
“I felt angry and helpless. Open season on me. It unfairly exposed me simply for doing my job.”
“I came to feel that if I wrote certain stories – police misconduct or police shooting – I braced myself for backlash from readers. I didn’t want to write those stories . I triple/quadruple checked things, giving no claim for attacks. ”
“I wonder if I’m being less aggressive, with an inclination to retreat. I have to make sure I don’t do that.”
CANDIDATE D: AFRICAN-AMERICAN
For additional information: Dr. Michelle Ferrier, Founder