Hate speech towards LGBT in Ukrainian online media

Abstract

The article presents the results of a content-analytical study of 243 publications in online media of Ukraine during 2021 in comparison with the results of earlier monitorings of Ukrainian offline and online media. Analysis of both scientific literature shows that hate speech against minorities (in particular, LGBT) is an urgent issue that has a distinct practical dimension, because the spread of hate in the online environment can have the nature of an epidemic and be accompanied by an increase in violent acts. Although the results have a number of limitations (different ways of forming selective sets of media materials in the analyzed studies, lack of research consensus on the definition of hate speech, attribution of the collected data to the period before the beginning of the massive invasion of the Russian Federation troops on the territory of Ukraine and impossibility of reflecting the state of society in the war time), it showed that the number of news related to LGBT was decreasing, despite of media samples design. Publications containing hate speech were from 2 to 25%. Hate speech in these publications was usually quotes and does not express the position of the journalist. Hate speech arose in the context of both public and internal actions of the LGBT community and was accompanied by calls for violence or violence itself. Stronger hate speech was more typical for anonymous internet commentators, street hooligans (including those from organized right-wing gangs), and small local public figures. The collected materials are analyzed in the paradigm of R. Connell’s hierarchy of masculinities. Hate speech is characteristic primarily for the statements of athletes, military and politicians, that is, those who are associated in the public consciousness with the stereotypical image of a “real man”. In further studies, approaches to the formation of media samples should be standardized, as well as, the tools for automatic or semi-automatic content analysis should be developed. All this will facilitate the study of changes in hate speech in the public space.