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A dictionary of the manosphere: five terms to understand the language of online male supremacists
September 27, 2023By Robert Lawson, Birmingham City University Thot. White knight. Red pilled. Cuck. Beta. Soyboy. Unicorn. Chad. To many people, these words won’t mean much. To others, they are a core part of the vocabulary of the “manosphere” – a collection of websites, social media accounts and forums dedicated to men’s issues, from health and fitness ...
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The parallel economy: the rightwing movement creating a safe haven for deplatformed conservative influencers
July 26, 2023By Jing Zeng, Utrecht University and Daniela Mahl, University of Zurich The last few years have seen the west swept by political polarisation, much of which has played out online. Debates around race, gender and freedom of speech have splintered democracies, spread conspiracy theories and sparked a series of culture wars. One byproduct of this ...
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Developing a Responsive Regulatory Approach to Online Terrorist Content on Tech Platforms
July 19, 2023By Amy-Louise Watkin This article summarises a recent paper published in Studies in Conflict & Terrorism that forms part of a special issue on the practicalities and complexities of (regulating) online terrorist content moderation. The special issue contains papers that were presented at Swansea University’s Terrorism and Social Media Conference 2022. Tech platforms have already ...
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Off the Richter Scale: Tracking Misinformation in the Aftermath of the Kahramanmaras Earthquake – The Failing of Twitter’s Blue Tick Policy
July 12, 2023By Ashton Kingdon & Briony Gray The cost of misinformation can be deadly during crisis. Undermining public trust, emergency response effectiveness and potentially life-saving activities, misinformation has become an increasing trend in the aftermath of natural disasters that has spread like wildfire across a global audience. The expansion in the use of intelligence systems has ...
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Plotters: The UK Terrorists Who Failed – A Book Review
July 5, 2023A Book Review by Joe Whittaker It is often said that online terrorism research has a data problem. While there is a sizable empirical literature into the “supply” of extremist content, such as propaganda videos, social media analyses, or jihadist magazines, we still know very little about how actual terrorists act. This data problem is, ...
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Mobilising Extremism in Times of Change: Understanding the Far-Right’s Use of Toxic Communications
June 28, 2023by Jonathan Collins This article summarises a recent paper published in European Journal on Criminal Policy and Research The rise of harmful far-right narratives and the increasing reliance on social media platforms for socialising have created a fertile breeding ground for radical ideological movements and social divisions during the (and “post”) pandemic. However, there is ...
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The EU Internet Referral Unit (IRU): Addressing terrorist content online
June 21, 2023By Camille Antunes Online platforms and social media channels have given new opportunities for terrorists to reach more audiences, significantly enhancing their ability to radicalise and recruit. As a result, online monitoring has become vital to prevent the dissemination of violent extremist and terrorist content online that can contribute to radicalisation, and counter-terrorism operations. As ...
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Hate in the Homeland: Reorienting Our Analytic Perspective on Extremism – A Book Review
June 14, 2023A Book Review by Ashley Mattheis Hate in the Homeland: The New Global Far Right takes an innovative line of approach to exploring processes of radicalization through an analysis of spaces and places where interaction and engagement with extremism occur. This may seem a small shift but represents a major perspectival refocusing in both practical ...
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My Wish to be a #Tradwife: An Introduction to #tradwife Memes on Whisper
June 7, 2023By Ninian Frenguelli and Amy-Louise Watkin Research into online extremist behaviour is centred around Twitter, Facebook, Reddit, 4chan, Telegram, and Gab. Studies focusing on platforms where image sharing is the purpose (rather than text or video sharing) are generally underrepresented in the literature on online extremist content. Twitter, Facebook and YouTube account for 55%, 35% and 8.7% of the studies ...
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Mapping the Agenda for Incel Research: Over-trodden Paths vs. Unchartered Territories
May 24, 2023Stephane J. Baele The past few years have seen a sharp increase in the attention paid by extremism and terrorism scholars to the incel phenomenon, and to the manosphere more broadly. The 2018 Toronto van attack acted like an electroshock waking up the field to the reality and often violent consequences of the sprawling toxic ...