{"id":757,"date":"2024-04-18T11:10:34","date_gmt":"2024-04-18T10:10:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.uwe.ac.uk\/policing\/?p=757"},"modified":"2024-04-25T15:19:05","modified_gmt":"2024-04-25T14:19:05","slug":"x-free-speech-vs-extreme-narratives-sexism-and-misogyny","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.uwe.ac.uk\/policing\/x-free-speech-vs-extreme-narratives-sexism-and-misogyny\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018X: free speech vs. extreme narratives \u2013 sexism and misogyny\u2019\u200b\u00a0"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Author: Claire Bowers UWE Bristol<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

In February 2024, six members of the UWE Bristol Team (Claire Bowers, Jack James, Katie Etherton, Dr Jennifer Holmes, Claudia McCready and Eve Smietanko) presented at the third annual colloquium of the European Society of Criminology Working Group on radicalisation, extremism, and terrorism at the University of Portsmouth. This week\u2019s blog, authored by Claire and with input from all of the research team, takes a look at the important issues that this research seeks to explore.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Introduction<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Issues of sexism and misogyny continue to be hugely topical within Policing. From acknowledged concerns of institutional misogyny in the Met<\/a>, chronicled within the Casey report (2021)<\/a>, to the ongoing Angiolini Inquiry<\/a> investigating how serving officers David Carrick and Wayne Couzens were able to commit such horrific crimes. This is reinforced by the recent College of Policing 2023 Action plan entitled \u2018Tackling sexism and misogyny in policing\u2019<\/a> whose review of published and unpublished evidence identified more than 200 ways in which sexism and misogyny are present in a policing context. Misogyny is a form of violence against women (Arsawati and Bunga, 2021) and gender-based violence is on the increase, partly due to the virtual space which did not previously exist (Singh and Singh, 2021; Yar and Steinmetz, 2024). As a group of six academics who teach on the policing programme, we are interested in the role that social media, particularly the platform \u2018X\u2019 formally known as Twitter, may play in fuelling this crisis.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Our research proposal, presented at the 2024 Annual Terrorism and Extremism Colloquium, was triggered by recent events in the media, and particularly the influence of Elon Musk\u2019s acquisition of Twitter\/X in October 2022. At a cost of $44 billion on 28th<\/sup> October 2022, Musk announced to all \u201cthe bird is freed.\u201d<\/a> A self-declared \u2018free speech absolutist\u2019, Elon permitted the return of prominent public figures, such Donald Trump, Tommy Robinson, and Andrew Tate back to the site (Griffin, 2022).  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Background to our research<\/h2>\n\n\n
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The online sphere (Papacharissi, 2022) can be a place of community and acceptance, but it has also become a place where extreme views can thrive and flourish. Since the dawn of social media there has been concern around its policing of hate speech. In 2018, 23% of women polled across eight countries stated that they had experienced harassment or abuse online (Amnesty International, 2018)\u200b. Of those women, 47% stated the abuse or harassment was sexist or misogynistic. We expect that this statistic is likely to have increased, something we hope to explore in our research. <\/p>\n\n\n

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Since social media has become mainstream, there has been increasing concern around online safety and what role companies such as Twitter should play. In the latter half of the 2010s, more safety advice and tools were added such as the ‘harmful reply’ nudge. Since the transition from Twitter to X there has been concern that the safety features are no longer as effective, with much of the team responsible for this facility being laid off when Musk took over (Brewster, 2024). <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Studies have been carried out into the effect that Musk has had on X since his takeover. For example, the Institute for Strategic Dialogue completed research for BBC Panorama in 2023. This found that in the days after Musk’s takeover there was an increase in new accounts created, that followed known misogynistic and abusive channels. Interestingly misogynistic views were not dominant but often included in more clear ideologies around anti-liberalism and pro-free speech. The research showed that there is a potential link between Musk’s own ‘free speech absolutist’ stance and a more permissive environment where hate speech can flourish. Other forms of hate speech have increased on the platform, for example antisemitism has doubled since Musk took over X (Miller et al, 2023). Research also suggests that people hold positive views of figures such as Andrew Tate, a self-proclaimed misogynist (Radford, 2023), especially from younger populations.  Polling data released by Skiner and Gottfried on behalf of IPSOS (2024) shows that young UK males are far more supportive of Tate than females and older males and surveys from 2022 illustrate that 56% of young male fathers also hold positive views of him (Internet Matters, 2023). <\/p>\n\n\n\n

About our research<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

64% of women see sexism as a major problem in the UK (Young Women\u2019s\u202fTrust,\u202f2019) and research from Stop Hate (2023) show extensive increases (as high as 322%) in incident reports relating to gender. This persistent trend of research and high-profile cases have led to a momentum for change (Chattier, 2020) telling us that women have had enough. <\/p>\n\n\n

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There has been little research into misogynistic hate speech on the app since Musk\u2019s takeover, and all of these appear to focus on the quantitative rise rather than the experience of its users. In our research we want to adopt a mixed methods approach, using both qualitative and quantitative methods to better understand the experiences of those using the platform.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

What do we want to find out?<\/strong> <\/h2>\n\n\n\n