Today, as the #Christchurch attacker faces sentencing in New Zealand, CfMM has launched a groundbreaking report, "How The British Media Reports Terrorism."
Here's a thread of some of our key findings.
Full report available on our website: cfmm.org.uk/resources/publ…
Here's a thread of some of our key findings.
Full report available on our website: cfmm.org.uk/resources/publ…
Reporting of attacks is inconsistent, depending on who the perpetrator is, with white, non-Muslim perpetrators less likely to be referred to as #terrorists.
Words identifying #Muslims or #Islam are more frequently placed alongside “terror”, “terrorist”, “terrorism”, or “terrorist(s)” in comparison with the most frequent identifiers of #farright or #WhiteSupremacist terrorism.
Between 2015-2019, over half of the terms “terrorist”, “terrorism” or “terror” were used with "Islam” or “Muslim.” Almost nine times more than terms “far-right”, “neo-Nazi” or “white supremacist.”
During the period October – December 2018, at least one in four online articles mentioning one or more identifiers of Muslims and/or Islam fell under the theme of #terrorism or #extremism.
Headlines using religious terms such as “Allahu Akbar” imply that religion is always the motivator, ignoring other factors such as criminal history and mental health issues which may be at play, and which are often mentioned when the perpetrator is not Muslim.
However, significant improvements have been made in the past year, with greater recognition of #WhiteSupremacist terror, mainly as a result of major attacks in #Christchurch and #ElPaso:
In light of our findings, CfMM makes several recommendations for journalists and editors when reporting on potential terrorism:
To read the full report, please visit our website:
cfmm.org.uk/resources/publ…
cfmm.org.uk/resources/publ…
