TO BE OR NOT TO BE RADICAL. FROM ONLINE DISCURSIVE AGGRESSIVENESS TO OFFLINE AGGRESSION Cover Image

TO BE OR NOT TO BE RADICAL. FROM ONLINE DISCURSIVE AGGRESSIVENESS TO OFFLINE AGGRESSION
TO BE OR NOT TO BE RADICAL. FROM ONLINE DISCURSIVE AGGRESSIVENESS TO OFFLINE AGGRESSION

Author(s): Andrei Vlădescu
Subject(s): Social Sciences, Studies in violence and power
Published by: National Institute for Intelligence Studies
Keywords: Discursive aggression; online harassment; cyberbullying; hate speech;

Summary/Abstract: The exponential development of virtual collective communication favours notonly the personal development of individuals but also new ways of expressing negativefeelings and thoughts stimulated by the possibility of anonymity and real timedissemination of the opinions. Actually any field of the social life can be reached by thephenomenon of discursive aggression and online harassment, as well as by the launchingof rumours or expressing unfavourable opinions towards an individual, a social group(regardless of the catalyst that underpinned its creation – ethnicity , religious,professional or other) or a community.The new form of harassment, called cyberbullying, can reach mass dimensionswhen its support are social platforms that favour the rapid distribution of content,adhesion and rallying to a cause, such as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram or YouTube, andthe forms in which carry out include: repeated humiliation of a person; sending obscenemessages and offensive content; ridiculing by creating a bogus account or blogcontaining biased information. From the same perspective, online aggression can havemultiple effects, manifested individually or together: diminishing the sense of security;increasing anxiety; changes in mood or behaviour; feeding racial or religious prejudices.On the other hand, whatever it is called cyberbullying, cyberstalking or hatespeech, online aggression can be speculated by entities interested in generating shorttermor medium-term social tensions or animosities among supporters of divergingpolitical trends, with direct impact on the occurrence of violent incidents, and in the longterm generate a fracture between governors and citizens, or even to a diminished thecohesion of a nation, social disorder and dilution of the rule of law.

  • Issue Year: 2018
  • Issue No: 19-20
  • Page Range: 125-136
  • Page Count: 11
  • Language: English