‘Resilience in Journalism’ article series begins

* Image: Yağmur Karagöz - bianet

Click to read the article in Turkish

As part of the "RESILIENCE: Civil society action to reaffirm media freedom and counter disinformation and hateful propaganda in the Western Balkans and Turkey" project, the "Resilience in Journalism Articles" article series will begin on bianet English on Monday (January 10).

Seven articles will be published in the series which features the media criticisms on hate propaganda and disinformation written by editors working for various independent media outlets in Turkey.

Published in Turkish on December 8-14, 2021, the article series is the latest work undertaken as part of the "Resilience" project.

Before this article series on media criticism, two reports were published as part of the Resilience project: "Hate and Propaganda Media in Turkey: Affiliations, Models and Patterns" and "Hate and Disinformation Narratives in the Online Mediascape in Turkey".

Most recently, a fact sheet titled "National Regulatory and Self-Regulatory Framework Against Hate Speech and Disinformation in Turkey" was published on November 25, 2021, offering a summary of the legal framework pertaining to hate speech and disinformation in Turkey, drawing attention to the practices of "Equality" institutions such as the Human Rights and Equality Institution of Turkey (TİHEK), giving an idea about the adequacy of the legal framework and making policy recommendations.

'Editors for Trust' forum

The editors who wrote the media criticism articles as part of this article series met in Montenegro's Njivice for another event of the project, the "Editors for Trust" forum, on October 13-16, 2021.

The forum focussed on editors' role in restoring trust in the media. With the participation of over 30 editors from the Western Balkans and Turkey, the forum's main objective was to enable editors to exemplify hate narratives, disinformation and propaganda in the media through various cases, to share studies and reports and to seek solutions for these problems together.

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With the coordination of bianet's Nazan Özcan, the following editors attended the forum from Turkey: Pınar Tarcan (bianet); Selay Dalaklı (bianet); Murat Bayram (Botan International); Murat Bay (sendika.org); Gözde Çağrı Özköse (Mezopotamya Agency); Eren Topuz (Gazete Duvar)

Media criticism articles

The aim of the media criticism articles on hate propaganda and disinformation in the media is to revive media criticism as a type of journalism, encourage critical approaches and benefit from the interests of various social actors such as academics, activists and independent journalists in media literacy. With these articles penned by editors working for independent media outlets, it is aimed to draw attention to the importance of editorial diligence and technical and ethical aspects of editorship when it comes to the spread of disinformation and hate in the media.

The Resilience in Journalism Articles will begin with the interview of Nazan Özcan, the editor of the article series, with Prof. Yasemin İnceoğlu. The interview draws attention to the line between freedom of expression and hate speech and offers a general framework regarding the patterns, models and narratives of hate speech and disinformation in the media.

Eren Topuz from Gazete Duvar news website, with his article titled "The Hate of the Fourth Estate", offers a compilation of the hate media's ownership structure. He takes a look at the hate media and the current state of the media-capital relations in Turkey by recalling the period before the Justice and Development Party (AKP) came to power in 2002.

Selay Dalaklı from bianet.org, with her article titled "Boğaziçi University protests: Media's hate for the colors of the rainbow", offers an insight into how the hate and propaganda media specifically targeted LGBTI+s during the Boğaziçi University protests against appointed rectors and moves on to discuss how these news stories should have been reported.

Murat Bayram from Botan International, with his article titled "Media in Kurdish threatened with extinction in Turkey", gives examples of how the existence of the media in Kurdish is threatened in Turkey and the ways in which the media in Kurdish has been turned into an object of hate.

Murat Bay from sendika.org, with his article on "hate for refugees", addresses disinformation in the media about the Syrian refugees living in Turkey and the governments' role in anti-refugee hate speech.

Gözde Çağrı Özköse from Mezopotamya Agency (MA), with her article on "the state's disinformation killing people in Turkey", focuses on what two Kurdish villagers went through when they turned out to be in a hospital two days after being detained in Van's Çatak on September 11 and a medical report confirmed that they had been thrown from a helicopter. Özköse elaborates on how this process was served to the press by disinformation.

Lastly, Pınar Tarcan from bianet.org, in her article on "disinformation and news that have become toxic", gives examples of hate speech against LGBTI+s and the news reported in the press during the pandemic by referring to some pro-government newspapers. Legal regulations pertaining to disinformation are also included in her article.

(SA/NÖ/SD)