Blog

By Ryan Scrivens, Thomas W. Wojciechowski, Tiana Gaudette, and Richard Frank There is an ongoing need for researchers, practitioners, and policymakers to identify and examine the online posting behaviors of violent extremists prior to their engagement in violence offline, but little is empirically known about their online presence generally or differences in their posting behaviors ...

By Joshua Bowes and Jennifer West Introduction In the immediate aftermath of Donald Trump’s victory in the 2024 presidential election, social media was replete with reactionary misogynistic hate and vitriol. Election experts and disinformation observers pointed to the manosphere as the biggest catalyst of votes for Trump, suggesting that thousands of young men turned out late on election day ...

Welcome to Volume 11, Issue 12 of the monthly VOX-Pol Newsletter. PUBLICATIONS VOX-Pol Member Ryan Scrivens and team have two new peer-reviewed articles coming out: Coming soon: a new VOX-Pol joint publication with the United Nations Interregional Crime and Justice Research Institute (UNICRI) titled, ‘Right- and left-wing violent extremist abuse of digital technologies in South America, Africa ...

By Stephanie Wescott, Monash University and Steven Roberts, Monash University The UK government has recently announced a review into their counter-terrorism strategy, focussing on responses to “extremist ideologies”. This announcement named misogyny as one of its extremist ideological trends of interest. Home Secretary Yvette Cooper said: For too long, governments have failed to address the ...

By Harald Sick and Maik Fielitz Tweets, blog posts, stories, reels, snaps, TikToks, short messages and live streams: there is a multitude of (self-)presentation types and, in principle, no restriction on which digital media formats extremist actors use. In times when the (counter) public is fragmented across many platforms, those who want to reach the ...

By Daniel E. Levenson In the early to mid-19th century the organizations and ideologues who would form the vanguard of modern terrorism did a remarkable job of leverage emerging technology for both training and operational purposes. This often took the form of experimentation with new (and often unregulated) materials such as dynamite and crude IEDs ...

By Sophia Rothut, Darian Harff & Cornelius Puschmann In today’s digitalised world, social media platforms have evolved into powerful channels for disseminating political information and shaping political opinion. While these platforms can enhance democratic processes by, for instance, increasing opportunities to participate in political discussions or acquire political knowledge, they also pose challenges, particularly with ...

Welcome to Volume 11, Issue 11 of the monthly VOX-Pol Newsletter. UPCOMING EVENT VOX-Pol partner project Tech Against Terrorism Europe (TATE) invites you to their final online webinar: Innovations & Insights. This two-hour webinar highlights the insights, lessons, and outputs developed during the TATE project. It will take place on Monday 9 December 2024 at 09:00 GMT | 10:00 CET.  ...

By Kamil Yilmaz and Joe Whittaker The past decade has seen several lone actor attacks conducted by men who identify as involuntary celibate (incels). The movement is well-known for being an online community of men who go online to discuss their inability to form sexual or romantic relationships, often resulting in extremely misogynistic online posts. ...

By Anna Kruglova This analysis will discuss the case of a Russian far-right movement named the Male State, and its transition from being one of the most notorious misogynist movements in Russia to one of the main online supporters and promoters of the war in Ukraine. When the war in Ukraine began, it became a ...