The study “Different Media, Different Audiences, Different Harassment? How the Journalist-Audience Relationship Shapes Experiences of Harassment” by Manuel Menke from University of Copenhagen and Christina Seeger from University of Klagenfurt focused on how different journalist-audience relationships in different media systems affect the experiences of harassment.

As shown in studies, hateful behavior by audiences is something that journalists increasingly face on regular basis. Although social media may have exacerbated the issue, it is not a new phenomenon: the history of modern press is replete with examples, as shown in study by Waisbord (2020). 

However, the harassment occurring in democracies with high press freedom should not be conflated with the oppression journalists face in countries with little or no press freedom. As shown, harassment, wherever it occurs, has a detrimental effect on freedom of speech and journalism. 

Harassment is the term most often used to describe hateful conduct by the audiences towards journalists. Miller (2021) defines harassment ‘as unwanted, abusive behaviors of mild to extreme kinds of verbal or physical abuse, including sexual or sexist behavior’. It covers both intended and unintended harassment, and distinguishing between the two would be practically impossible in research. 

The audience, in turn, consists not only of dedicated followers but also people who have encountered the news through incidental exposure, for example through the algorithms in social media. Further, digital platforms constitute a dynamic space where harassment is more frequent – most audience-journalist interactions occur in comment sections but letters to editor, calls and messages still have their place.

The impacts of harassment have also been studied. First of all, journalism is a profession where the unwritten rules of the trade often disregard emotions, seeing objectivity and emotional detachment as the norms. Even leaving the profession as a result of harassment is not unheard of, as is reduced productivity. 

Second, harassment is not distributed equally, but women and people of color are harassed more and more seriously; in addition, certain topics trigger more harassment, which may lead some journalists to avoid the topics. 

The authors, despite acknowledging the complexity and seriousness of the issue, nevertheless advocate moving from individual experiences to studying the journalist-audience relationship, and stress that different media attract different audiences, which results in different experiences of harassment.

The authors propose to fill the gap in existing literature by investigating how different audiences might alter journalists’ experiences of harassment: focusing on national and local media as well as media providing quality, tabloid, constructive, and young audience journalism. The study was done in Germany.

Germany has plentiful newspapers: several daily and weekly quality newspapers for the general audience, hundreds of local newspapers, and Bild, a national tabloid available in kiosks and online, plus eight additional regional or local tabloids.

The participants of the study were journalists working in print, digital, or social media within different national and local media, offering quality, tabloid, constructive, or young audience journalism. There were a total of 32 anonymous journalists: 15 women and 17 men. They were then interviewed using semi-structured interviews.

The findings, first of all, confirm that women are attacked more intensely, this was even the perception of the men. Race was not a factor here, but there were only 3 POC journalists in the sample – but the harassment was linked with the topics, like in previous research.

Journalists working in national outlets did not experience closeness with the audience. They even struggled to describe the audience beyond surface demographic factors. This may reflect that the audience of the national media are the general audience. However, the journalists were able to pinpoint where they themselves were different from the average reader – for example politically. 

The type of harassment included misogynistic and right-wing coordinated campaigns against journalists. This was in line with previous research. Many journalists in national outlets viewed the harassment as a normal hazard of the work. One woman journalist resignedly stated that a “shitstorm” was inevitable when writing about feminist issues as a young woman no matter the content.

In local outlets, in contrast, the journalists expressed closeness with the audience. There was significantly more focus on constructive, even affectionate, interaction than harassment. The audiences identify with “their” newspapers particularly in Germany with its history of local papers. 

Closeness then seemed to mitigate harassment, but this is not to say that there were no critical or negative experiences – but this is often done more in person and one participant claimed that in nine out of ten cases, the criticism fizzles out and the audience person is at the end grateful for having been taken seriously. 

Journalists from constructive and young audience outlets were more similar to local journalists than national in closeness with the audience. The journalists also viewed the audience more in terms of shared beliefs rather than demographic factors. The aims then are in line with the perceived characteristics, creating closeness. 

Typically, the negative feedback occurs when atypical readers come across the articles, rather than from the core audience. Nevertheless, constructive communication and a sense of community mitigates harassment. Some even described the amount of hate as “very little” or “close to zero”, expressing that the readers are “very nice”.

Tabloids on the other hand, are known for their emotive and provocative content, and this was also evident here. The journalists at tabloids appeared to anticipate hate in the comment sections (for example, when the topic was a crime committed by a non-German), and then sought to monitor the situation to prevent the comment section on becoming a platform for hate. 

However, the tabloid journalists themselves remained largely isolated from the hate that was directed at politicians and certain communities. They were perceived as allies by anti-press segments rather than as people who need to be intimidated. 

The findings, in conclusion, show that local, constructive, and young audience outlets allow journalists to forge close relationships with their audience that may serve as a buffer from harassment. The results may motivate newsrooms in Germany and elsewhere to put more focus on journalist-audience relationships.

The article “Different Media, Different Audiences, Different Harassment? How the Journalist-Audience Relationship Shapes Experiences of Harassment” by Manuel Menke and Christina Seeger is in Digital Journalism. (free abstract).

Picture: Untitled by Julia Solonina.

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