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'Stormfront Is Like a Second Home to Me': On Virtual Community Formation by Right-Wing Extremists'
Abstract
Although the subject of extreme right virtual community formation is often discussed, an online ‘sense of community’ among right-wing extremists has not been systematically analysed. It is argued that to study this phenomenon and to understand its backgrounds and function, the offline and online experiences and actions of those involved need to be taken into account. For this purpose, qualitative data has been collected on the web forum ‘Stormfront’, supplemented by extensive online interviews with eleven of its members. It is demonstrated that those experiencing stigmatisation in offline social life regard the forum as a virtual community that functions as an online refuge, whereas those who – due to special circumstances – do not experience offline stigmatisation do not display an online sense of community. It is concluded that offline stigmatisation underlies virtual community formation by Dutch right-wing extremists. Because this mechanism may have broader significance, additional hypotheses for future research are formulated.
... One of the most common White Supremacist symbols, 88 is used throughout the movement." These coded elements often appear in messages, hashtags, and in the "handle" or username associated with a writer (see also De Koster & Houtman, 2008). A more subtle code construction consists of preceding and following someone's (((name))) with three parenthesis marks, which denotes that the subject is Jewish (see Hübscher & von Mering, 2022). ...
... Research finds that some of its right-wing extremist users are stigmatized in their offline lives, when they espouse the views offline that Stormfront, in contrast, welcomes. As a result, Stormfront members "can express themselves freely, and generally feel accepted by the others" (De Koster & Houtman, 2008, p. 1166, experience camaraderie, and enjoy a sense of community. In some cases, they come to know each other as individuals and develop interpersonal relationships online, in ways more refined than simple in-group identification; some members remember one another's birthdays and offer support and comfort to one another in response to "unpleasant events in their offline lives" (p. ...
... These notions of social support among people who may be unlikely to find support elsewhere in their lives, and the emotional benefits of receiving it, map onto some of what we see in online hate communities as well. Recall the description of Stormfront participants described earlier in this chapter, who "can express themselves freely, and generally feel accepted by the others" (De Koster & Houtman, 2008, p. 1166, and, as we said, experience camaraderie, and enjoy a sense of community. DeKeseredy and Schwartz (2016) applied these principles to one form of online hate, the exchange of image-based involuntary sexual abuse, commonly referred to as "revenge porn." ...
... Moreover, insofar, little research into this area has actually gone beyond (certainly valuable) descriptions and deconstructions of online content and discourse (cf., Ben-David & Matamoros-Fernández, 2016;Cammaerts, 2009;Ernst et al., 2017;Hameleers, 2019;2020;Klein & Muis, 2019) to instead ask the above questions and try to understand what meanings and experiences underly this discourse. To do this, I posit, it does not suffice to only consider online content and discourse; instead, one must also ethnographically engage offline with the people shaping this discourse (see De Koster & Houtman, 2008). ...
... Krämer et al. (2021) for instance show how concepts of belonging and solidarity are discursively constructed on social media through the discussion of populist right-wing worldviews, alongside expressions of other everyday lifestyle issues. Moreover, by actually engaging offline with members of Dutch right-wing extremist web forums, De Koster and Houtman (2008) similarly found that users mainly ventured online in search of belonging and recognition in the face of real-life stigmatisation. ...
... Similar to what others have argued before (De Koster & Houtman, 2008;Krämer et al., 2021), these Facebook communities offer respondents a sense of belonging to likeminded people -an ingroup. Carla for instance mentioned that she had connected online to other rightwing groups, with whom she now organised offline protests and activities. ...
Exclusionary populist radical-right sentiments have flooded liberal-democratic societies and their digital landscapes in recent decades. A key feat of such populism is nativism: the vehement opposition to non-native Others supposedly threatening the native majority’s national identity. Arguing for the importance of creating deep understandings in order to respond to the exclusionary nature of such nativism, this article builds on ethnographic research that engaged with the narratives of Dutch nativists active within an ever-more pertinent context: the virtual community. By acknowledging my own subjectivities that often contrasted sharply with those of my respondents, I ventured across what Hochschild calls the empathy wall to find moments of mutual recognition by extensively talking with and listening to my respondents. This approach, I argue, creates new insights into ways to understand and respond to nativist sentiments within liberal-democratic societies, and offers new understandings of the role digital media play for nativist supporters.
... Researchers, practitioners, and policymakers have paid close attention to the presence of terrorists and extremists online in recent years, with a particular emphasis on the digital patterns and behaviors of the extreme right (see Conway et al., 2019; see also Holt et al., 2020). It should come as little surprise that researchers have focused on the activities of RWEs on various platforms, including on websites and discussion forums (e.g., Back, 2002;Bliuc et al., 2019;Burris et al., 2000;De Koster & Houtman, 2008;Futrell & Simi, 2004;Holt et al., 2020;Scrivens et al., 2020b;Scrivens, 2020;Wojcieszak, 2010), mainstream social media sites including Facebook (e.g., Ekman, 2018;Nouri & Lorenzo-Dus, 2019;Scrivens & Amarasingam, 2020;Stier et al., 2017), Twitter (e.g., Ahmed & Pisoiu, 2020;Berger, 2016;Berger & Strathearn, 2013;Burnap & Williams, 2015;Graham, 2016), and YouTube (e.g., Ekman, 2014;Munger & Philips, 2020;O'Callaghan et al., 2014), fringe platforms including 4chan (e.g., Finkelstein et al., 2018;Papasavva et al., 2020) and Gab (e.g., Zannettou et al., 2018;Zhou et al., 2019), and digital applications such as TikTok (e.g., Weimann & Masri, 2020) and Telegram (e.g., Guhl & Davey, 2020;Urman & Katz, 2020). But these studies, similar to criminological research on the causes of violent extremism and terrorism in general, lack comparison groups, despite a significant need to focus on comparative analysis and consider how violent extremists are different than non-violent extremists (Becker, 2019;Chermak et al., 2013;Freilich & LaFree, 2015;Jasko et al., 2017;Knight et al., 2019;LaFree et al., 2018). ...
... Understandably, Stormfront has been the focus of much research attention since its inception, including an assessment of recruitment efforts by forum users (e.g., Hale, 2010;Lennings et al., 2010;Wong et al., 2015), the formation of a virtual community (e.g., Back, 2002;Bowman-Grieve, 2009;De Koster & Houtman, 2008) and collective identity (e.g., Futrell & Simi, 2004;Perry & Scrivens, 2016), the extent to which Stormfront is connected to other racial hate sites (e.g., Burris et al., 2000;Gerstenfeld et al., 2003), and how Stormfront discourse is less virulent and more palatable to readers (e.g., Daniels, 2009;Meddaugh & Kay, 2009). ...
... This, in turn, may have motivated them to connect and communicate with RWEs on the broader forum. Research has similarly found that the creation of extremist forums sparked the interest of supporters and sympathizers of the RWE movement to interact with one another, free from the geographic barriers that once made it difficult to communicate, and on a global scale (Back, 2002;Burris et al., 2000;De Koster & Houtman, 2008 Third, violent RWEs who first became active early in the lifespan of the sub-forum tended to post less on the broader forum compared to violent users who became active later in the lifespan of the sub-forum who posted more in the forum. For the violent RWEs who first engaged early in the lifespan of the sub-forum, it is reasonable to assume that, because of the offline activities they were engaged in (i.e., violence), they were concerned that by being prolific posters in an open access forum, it could put them at risk of being identified by law enforcement and intelligence agencies -a finding supported by previous research (e.g., Gaudette et al., 2020). ...
There is an ongoing need for researchers, practitioners, and policymakers to detect and assess online posting behaviors of violent extremists prior to their engagement in violence offline, but little is empirically known about their online behaviors generally or the differences in their behaviors compared with nonviolent extremists who share similar ideological beliefs particularly. In this study, we drew from a unique sample of violent and nonviolent right-wing extremists to compare their posting behaviors in the largest White supremacy web-forum. We used logistic regression and sensitivity analysis to explore how users’ time of entry into the lifespan of an extremist sub-forum and their cumulative posting activity predicted their violence status. We found a number of significant differences in the posting behaviors of violent and nonviolent extremists which may inform future risk factor frameworks used by law enforcement and intelligence agencies to identify credible threats online.
... One explanation lies in the types of people attracted to White nationalist ideologies. One interesting pattern shared among those attracted to extremist groups (e.g., racial or religious extremism) is that these individuals are often lonely and on the margins in society (e.g., social outcasts); are dissatisfied with the system; and are looking for a sense of community, belonging, relevance, and greater agency to change their life outcomes (De Koster & Houtman, 2008;Doosje et al., 2016;Kruglanski et al., 2014Kruglanski et al., , 2015Odag, Leiser, & Boehnke, 2019;Renström, Bäck, & Knapton, 2020). ...
... Research on the psychological and situational factors that lead a person to embrace White nationalist ideologies suggests that these people have some common characteristics of those radicalized in other contexts (e.g., violent Islamic or political extremism). These traits include social isolation; feelings of disenfranchisement from mainstream norms or expectations; a need to mitigate a grievance or trauma; or a quest for a sense of belonging, importance, and significance (De Koster & Houtman, 2008;Odag, Leiser, & Boehnke, 2019;Renström, Bäck, & Knapton, 2020, see quest for significance theory; Kruglanski, Chen, Dechesne, Fishman, & Orehek, 2009, Kruglanski, Gelfand, Bélanger, Sheveland, Hettiarachchi & Gunaratna, 2014. Furthermore, models used to understand radicalization strategies of extremist groups like Al Qaeda and especially the more decentralized, internet, and social media-based strategies used by the Islamic State (Gresser, 2018;Kruglanski, Chen, Dechesne, Fishman, & Orehek, 2009;Kruglanski et al., 2014;Kruglanski, Gelfand, Bélanger, Hetiarachchi, & Gunaratna, 2015), have striking parallels with the largely decentralized processes associated with recruitment into White nationalist ideologies and movements. ...
... A fourth and crucial component is socialization, wherein an individual begins to solidify their beliefs through further education and interactions with others who share this newfound worldview (Webber & Kruglanski, 2016). These social networks provide the longed-for sense of community and belonging with people who reaffirm their value (e.g., as Whites in America) and validate their grievances and scapegoats (De Koster & Houtman, 2008). The socialization stage is vital for transforming a particular worldview frame into an identity. ...
The rise in White nationalist ideology in America is one of the pressing issues of our times. In this article, we make the case that White nationalists both extol the talents and virtues of White Americans and idolize and romanticize a former White‐dominated America, while simultaneously condemning and demonizing the current state of America for Whites. This fundamentally ambivalent ideology contributes to dangerous downstream consequences such as fomenting violence against groups that threaten Whites’ status and resources and even calling for outright civil war. This article also examines the psychological impact of rapid demographic and cultural changes on groups in positions of power, and how these changes make some Whites, especially those who might already be suffering from instability, disenfranchisement, and loss, gravitate to groups who validate their fears and transform them into aggrieved entitlement and moral outrage. Finally, this article proposes policies that decision‐makers and other leaders can take to undo the foundational ideologies that White supremacy is built upon and to help curtail its spread.
... In this article, we provide -to the best of our knowledge -the first qualitative analysis of the far-right virtual community on Gab. Previous research on far-right virtual communities emphasises the role of a sense of offline stigmatisation in producing this sense of community on the Internet (De Koster and Houtman, 2008). Building on this, we argue that on Gab, there is a specifically online sense of persecution or victimhood at the hands of 'Big Tech' that unifies the far-right community on the platform. ...
... Rather, it is characterised by individual users that have voluntarily come together sharing a degree of like-mindedness in worldview, in order to discuss and exchange ideas (Bowman-Grieve, 2009;Ridings and Gefen, 2004;Simi and Futrell, 2006). These processes of interaction and exchange among members reinforce a sense of belonging, as shared ideas and feelings are affirmed by members of the in-group (Bowman-Grieve, 2009;De Koster and Houtman, 2008;Perry and Scrivens, 2016). What matters is whether the members 'experience their online interactions as a community' (De Koster andHoutman, 2008: 1157). ...
... These processes of interaction and exchange among members reinforce a sense of belonging, as shared ideas and feelings are affirmed by members of the in-group (Bowman-Grieve, 2009;De Koster and Houtman, 2008;Perry and Scrivens, 2016). What matters is whether the members 'experience their online interactions as a community' (De Koster andHoutman, 2008: 1157). Hence, virtual communities function as 'real social spaces' in which 'processes of identity negotiation that lead to the acceptance of ideologies' (Bowman-Grieve, 2009: 990) are navigated, and where political action can be secondary to 'sustaining a network of like-minded individuals' (Caren et al., 2012: 165). ...
With large social media platforms coming under increasing pressure to deplatform far-right users, the Alternative Technology movement (Alt-Tech) emerged as a new digital support infrastructure for the far right. We conduct a qualitative analysis of the prominent Alt-Tech platform Gab, a social networking service primarily modelled on Twitter, to assess the far-right virtual community on the platform. We find Gab’s technological affordances – including its lack of content moderation, culture of anonymity, microblogging architecture and funding model – have fostered an ideologically eclectic far-right community united by fears of persecution at the hands of ‘Big Tech’. We argue that this points to the emergence of a novel techno-social victimology as an axis of far-right virtual community, wherein shared experiences or fears of being deplatformed facilitate a coalescing of assorted far-right tendencies online.
... The contemporary research intermixing the themes of emotions and belonging in far-right online spaces is limited to a handful of studies (Askanius, 2021;J. Collins, 2023;De Koster & Houtman, 2008;Jasser et al., 2023;Marcks & Pawelz, 2022;Törnberg & Törnberg, 2023 which predominantly fixate on the hate-filled threats these two devices generate. For instance, J. Collins (2023) documents the purposeful use of societal insecurities in the far right's mobilization strategy, illustrating a collective anxiety model that continuously fluctuates between anxiety need and creation. ...
... Therefore, future research should investigate-across different disciplinary techniques and datasets-the intricate dimensions of techno-sociality, positionality, and culture entrenched within these virtual spaces. For instance, methodologies such as interviewing, as exemplified in the work by De Koster and Houtman (2008) on Stormfront, could offer a more profound understanding of the motivations and experiences of these online participants. While the existing literature appropriately emphasizes the discursive dangers of these platforms, such studies merely scratch the surface. ...
This article challenges prevailing assumptions that fringe social media platforms predominantly serve as unmoderated hatefilled spaces for far-right communication by examining the userbase’s emotional connection to these environments. Focusing
on Gab Social, a popular alternative technology website with affordances akin to Twitter, Facebook, and Reddit, and its
subgroup, “Introduce Yourself,” the research investigates how participants discuss their attachment and sense of membership
within a far-right online community. Employing a constructivist grounded theory approach and a thick data mixed-methods
technique encompassing netnography and sentiment analysis, I uncover the complex and impassioned narratives underlying
users’ sense of emotional belonging on the platform. The resulting findings demonstrate how counter-mainstream media act
as a unifying force by catering to the social needs of participants seeking an in-group of like-minded individuals. Moreover,
I argue that fringe social media platforms offer participants far more than mainstream platforms, providing a positive interactive
environment and a new virtual home for those feeling rejected and antagonized by other communities, institutions, and
organizations, both online and offline. Therefore, the work offers valuable empirical insights into the emotional emphasis
participants place on fringe social media and its implications for fostering attachment, community formation, and identity
construction within far-right online counterpublics.
... Right-wing media have been the subject of extensive research in the past several decades. This field tends to focus on extremist media, for example the thoroughly studied white supremacist forum Stormfront (Bowman-Grieve, 2009;Bright et al., 2022;De Koster & Houtman, 2008;Kleinberg et al., 2021). Emerging research on right-wing alternative news sites, which have become popular since the 2016 election of Donald Trump as president of the United States, has focused mainly on the highly polarized American context (Rae, 2021). ...
... The internet has provided far-right supporters with the opportunity to come together, exchange ideas, and form a virtual community (Bowman-Grieve, 2009). Users of far-right alternative media see these online spaces as a refuge where their extreme views are shared rather than condemned (De Koster & Houtman, 2008). These platforms are instrumentalized by far-right actors for various purposes such as recruitment and mobilization for offline actions, but also for the online dissemination of ideologies (such as anti-genderism, explained below), identity formation, and community building (Miller-Idriss, 2020). ...
This study investigates virtual community-building practices and discriminatory views in PAL NWS, a Dutch-speaking Belgian far-right alternative news medium, by examining discussions in the comments sections. Thematic analysis was applied to a total of 1,127 comments by 343 users in response to 50 articles about LGBTI topics. The findings show that far-right alternative news sites can function as virtual communities that facilitate polarization. The comments exhibited a high level of hostility towards LGBTI individuals, particularly toward transgender people and public displays of LGBTI inclusion. Furthermore, Muslims were homogeneously perceived as homophobes, and LGBTI topics were understood as (woke) ideological suppression by a dogmatic minority. The results of this study have implications for understanding the dynamics of comments sections on alternative media and the potential for far-right news platforms to facilitate the spread of intolerance.
... We explored similarities and differences between their use of cultural anchoring and identity talk to situate themselves inside or outside of the Incel community. Stigma often leads extremists to conceal their identity from outsiders (Simi and Futrell 2009), and those who experience offline stigmatization tend to regard online extremist forums as places of refuge (De Koster and Houtman 2008). In their research on white power activism, Pete Robert Futrell (2006, 2015) demonstrate that extremists use online forums as free spaces where they can insulate themselves from outsiders and freely express aggression and hostility toward those whom they believe to be in power. ...
... Although free spaces can play a helpful role in disengagement from extremism, it is important to remember that free spaces typically foster commitment and devotion among extremists (Simi and Futrell 2015). Stigma drives extremists into free spaces where they may insulate themselves from mainstream outsiders and celebrate their hate amongst like-minded individuals (De Koster and Houtman 2008;Simi and Futrell 2006, 2009. Here, extremists may "overcome isolation, despair, and hopelessness, which might otherwise sap their devotion" to their ideological culture (Simi and Futrell 2015: 7). ...
Role exit is a complex process that can be especially complicated for extremists, whose identities are stigmatized. Such stigmatization often leads extremists to seek refuge in “free spaces” where they may insulate themselves from the mainstream and celebrate their ideology amongst likeminded individuals. Yet, stigma may also push those who desire to exit an extremist role to seek out their own free spaces where they can disengage from extremist ideology with others who wish to disengage. In this study, we analyze posts obtained from two Incel digital forums: a forum of active Incels and a forum of exiting Incels. We compared the ways that active and exiting Incels use free spaces to situate themselves inside or outside of this extremist community. Our analysis demonstrates that free spaces, which social movement scholars argue foster commitment among extremists, may offer exiting extremists insulation from active extremists while also keeping them tethered to hostile ideology.
... But social media not only offer tactical tools for these movements; they also serve as communitarian space for negotiations and identity-formation within movements (Törnberg & Törnberg, 2022). Studies on platforms such as Gab and Stormfront have demonstrated that such online spaces can provide a form of sanctuary for constructing counter-narratives to mainstream ideas (Törnberg & Törnberg, 2021) and for developing a collective identity (Bowman-Grieve, 2009;Jasser, McSwiney, Pertwee, & Zannettou, 2021;Koster & Houtman, 2008;Perry & Scrivens, 2016). ...
... Online communities like Stormfront, therefore, not only provide a platform for the far right to articulate contentious opinions and ideas (Koster & Houtman, 2008), but they also serve as a form of "emotional refuge" (Reddy, 2001): a space for collective emotional work where members can express and collectively interpret feelings and emotional responses in ways that would not be accepted in mainstream society. While previous research has emphasized the role of sociability and interaction in fostering a sense of community on social media, this study has accentuated these communities' central function in facilitating the emotional processes that transform a set of individuals into a community, and a community into an active political entity. ...
... Various personal attributes have been identified as risk factors for online radicalization, such as emotional vulnerability (Angus, 2016), personal identity crises (Cowan, 2017;Nienierza et al., 2019), some mental health problems (Cherney et al., 2020), preferences for hierarchy and dominance, low civic, media and digital literacy (Briggs & Feve, 2013), partisan political identities, pre-existing extremist attitudes (Nienierza et al., 2019), online news consumption Piazza and Guler, and younger age (Awan, 2017;Harris-Hogan & Barrelle, 2016;Nienierza et al., 2019). Furthermore, a key vulnerability are offline experiences of personal grievances, of race conflicts (Bliuc et al., 2019;De Koster & Houtman, 2008), and offline interactions with extremist others (Cherney et al., 2020;Gaudette et al., 2020;Nasser-Eddine et al., 2011). The online context is particularly conducive to lone wolf terrorists (Clemmow et al., 2020) and female extremist actors (Nuraniyah, 2019;Phelan, 2020;Scrivens et al., 2020;Shapiro & Maras, 2019;Vergani & Bliuc, 2015). ...
... often fail to recognize extremist threats online as such and are particularly vulnerable to extremist outreach onlineNienierza et al. (2019) Offline experiences and relations are a key factor of online radicalization Offline experiences can contribute to a user's receptiveness to online radicalizationBliuc et al. (2019) Extremist communities provide social support online and shelter from an offline world perceived as hostile, reaffirming extremist ideologiesDe Koster and Houtman (2008) Offline relations to close relatives, teachers or good friends are often the first contact with extremist ideologies Gaudette et al. ...
Online extremism remains a persistent problem despite the best efforts of governments, tech companies and civil society. Digital technologies can induce group polarization to promote extremism and cause substantial changes to extremism (e.g., create new forms of extremism, types of threats or radicalization approaches). Current methods to counter extremism induce undesirable side‐effects (e.g., ostracize minorities, inadvertently promote extremism) or do not leverage the full potential of digital technologies. Extremism experts recognize the need for researchers from other disciplines, like information systems, to contribute their technical expertise for understanding and countering online extremism. This article aims to introduce the field of information systems to the issue of online extremism. Information systems scholars address technology‐related societal issues from a sociotechnical perspective. The sociotechnical perspective describes systems through a series of interactions between social (structure, people) and technical components (physical system, task). We apply the sociotechnical perspective to (1) summarize the current state‐of‐the‐art knowledge of 222 articles in a systematic multi‐disciplinary literature review and (2) propose specific research questions that address two questions (How do digital technologies augment extremism? How can we successfully counter online extremism?).
... They have found similar shelter in the discreteness and anonymity of the internet (Kaplan, Weinberg, & Oleson, 2003). They turn that anonymity to their advantage in online forums where ideas rejected by society can be expressed and discussed without relational or professional recourse (Der Koster & Houtman, 2008). These forums and discussions cultivate a sense of community that brings users back regularly (Der Koster & Houtman, 2008). ...
... They turn that anonymity to their advantage in online forums where ideas rejected by society can be expressed and discussed without relational or professional recourse (Der Koster & Houtman, 2008). These forums and discussions cultivate a sense of community that brings users back regularly (Der Koster & Houtman, 2008). Both groups capitalize on the ease of access to, and transmission of information by hosting their own websites, magazines, and propaganda (Conway, 2017, p. 83;Der Koster & Houtman, 2008). ...
Radicalization is the transition into acceptance and approval of extremist beliefs and actions, including condoning or committing acts of violence. In recent decades, the internet has played a crucial role in the radicalization of extremists and terrorists, as well as facilitating radical groups' recruitment efforts. The present review briefly discusses what radicalization is and how it unfolds in a general sense, before exploring how the internet is involved in three kinds of radicalization. The first is the deliberate radicalization and recruitment of new members into formally organized extremist groups (e.g. white supremacist militias and radical Islamic terror groups), and the second is self-radicalization via the internet, wherein unstable, discontent, and/or disenfranchised individuals pursue increasingly radical ideas and communities online until they condone or commit acts of violence on their own, without formal membership into an organized group. The third type of radicalization explored is stochastic or probabilistic radicalization, in which individuals encounter seemingly or actually benign ideas, beliefs, and pundits online, and are slowly radicalized via increasingly bold and dramatic content being suggested by the recommendation algorithms of Google and Youtube. The review clarifies some distinctions between the three types, before a brief summary and discussion. Content warnings: discussions of violence, bigotry, and hate.
... The internet provides a space for individuals to interact with others of similar mindsets (Bliuc, Faulkner, Jakubowicz & McGarty, 2018). When reviewing cyber-racism Bliuc et al. (2018) found that extreme farright groups provided a means for individuals to satisfy their need for belonging (Borum, 2014) through providing a transnational community online (Bliuc et al., 2018;De Koster & Houtman, 2008;Rogers & Carter, In Press). Forums provided a space for in-groups to validate extremist ideologies through facilitating interactions between individuals holding similar ideologies (Bliuc et al., 2014). ...
... The need for belonging reflects the social nature of humans and the motivation to form and maintain social relationships (Baumeister, Brewer, Tice & Twenge, 2007). The fear of exclusion may motivate individuals to join extremist groups, not because of any affinity with the ideology, but in order to gain a sense of community (Borum, 2014;De Koster & Houtman, 2008). Therefore the process of radicalisation may have its roots in social rather than ideological groundings (Borum, 2014). ...
The Online Islamophobia Project was an 18 month research project
that ran between June 2020 and December 2021 and examined the
interaction between miscommunications and conspiracy theories in
relation to key factors such as anonymity, membership length, peer
groups and postage frequency, within the context of the current Covid-19
pandemic and Islamophobia on social media. The project was hosted at
Birmingham City University and funded by the UKRI and Economic and
Social Research Council (ESRC) under their Covid-19 rapid response call.
The project explored irrational beliefs and thoughts that are disseminated
on social media, covering important coverage of communications
surrounding conspiracy theories online whilst paying attention to
the content associated to racist ‘infodemic’ messages. The project
also sought to provide insights into the drivers of Covid-19 narratives
and consequences in fuelling existing extreme communications and
Islamophobic language both online and offline.
... The ideology of the Alt-Right is characterized by advocating for a culturally and ethnically homogenous society for White people, while at the same time opposing multiculturalism and egalitarianism (Main, 2018). Alt-righters have largely mobilized online, attracting mostly anonymous supporters, and have no formal organization or clear membership criteria (Berger, 2018;De Koster & Houtman, 2008;Hartzell, 2018). ...
... In the case of the Alt-Right, it is an ultra-conservative and explicitly racist group that is largely incongruent with mainstream American values of egalitarianism (De Koster & Houtman, 2008;Simi & Futrell, 2015). The movement also goes against mainstream norms to be (or at least, appear) nonracist and nonprejudiced, in a society with norms of egalitarianism (Crandall et al., 2002). ...
The rise of far-right movements calls for greater understanding of how the public responds to such movements. In the context of the United States, we examined the role of normative beliefs about the Alt-Right in shaping public reactions toward the movement (three studies, total N = 1,379). Specifically, we examined how perceived prevalence (high descriptive norms) and acceptability (high injunctive norms) of the Alt-Right are linked to public attitudes toward that movement. We found limited evidence of a threat response—that is, perceived prevalence of the Alt-Right did not consistently predict more negative reactions toward it, such as fearing its potential harm to society. There was, however, more consistent evidence of a normalization response—that is, perceived acceptability of the Alt-Right predicted more positive reactions toward it, such as showing leniency toward their activities. These findings underscore the importance of far-right movements in possibly shaping normative standards in society, and how such norms are linked to public attitudes.
... It is widely accepted that the Web has become a virtual "forecourt" for the promotion of far-right ideology and activism, and influence on individuals receptive to recruitment and radicalization and their targets and victims (Daniels, 2009;Kingdon, 2021;Scrivens, 2021;Zempi & Awan, 2016). Analysis of the far right's use of the Web to recruit and radicalize, as well as spread their ideas, has generally focused on the content featured on websites (Back, 2002;Blazak, 2001;Brown, 2009;Levin, 2002;Perry & Olsson, 2009), and Web forums (Bowman-Grieve, 2009;Caren et al., 2012;De Koster & Houtman, 2008;Lokmanoglu & Veilleux-Lepage, 2020), but less so on the history and operation of these for the movement, organization, and wider far-right and racist systems (see Daniels, 2009;Winter, 2019). ...
In response to the data revolution, academic research and media attention have increasingly focused on the technological adaptation and innovation displayed by the far right. The greatest attention is paid to social media and how groups and organizations are utilizing technological advancement and growth in virtual networks to increase recruitment and advance radicalization on a global scale. As with most social and political endeavors, certain technologies are in vogue and thus draw the attention of users and regulators and service providers. This creates a technological blind spot within which extremist groups frequently operate older and less well regarded technologies without the oversight that one might expect. This article examines the less well-studied traditional and official websites of the Ku Klux Klan, the most established and iconic of American far-right organizations. By incorporating non-participant observation of online spaces and thematic analysis, this research analyzes the evolution of 26 websites, from their emergence in the early 1990s to the present day. We examine the ways in which traditional printed communications and other ephemera have progressed with advances in technology, focusing on the following central elements of Klan political activism and community formation: Klan identity, organizational history, aims and objectives; technology and outreach, including online merchandise and event organization; and the constructions of whiteness and racism. The results add value and insight to comparable work by offering a unique historical insight into the ways in which the Klan have developed and made use of Web 1.0, Web 2.0, and Web3 technologies.
... Delgado Ontivero y Sánchez Sicilia, 2023) 1 . Esta diseminación por las redes sociales no les ha hecho perder su carácter comunitario: desde su léxico común hasta su componente social (Beyer, 2014;Marwick y Furl, 2021), pasando por su papel como refugios para personas que se sienten marginadas por su ideología, alienadas de la sociedad o preocupadas por la deriva del mundo (De Koster y Houtman, 2008), se constituyen y actúan como comunidades. De hecho, cuando se analizan sus contenidos, los discursos puramente políticos no son tan prevalentes como las conversaciones en torno a experiencias cotidianas (Holt et al., 2020). ...
Redpilled es un término con el que las comunidades en línea del espectro reaccionario identifican su posición política: aunque pueden agruparse dentro del espectro de la extrema derecha, los estudios de estos espacios destacan su carácter heterogéneo e indefinido. El presente trabajo aspira a contribuir al estudio de estas comunidades en línea considerándolas como espacios de construcción y resignificación de conceptos para la confrontación ideológica. Para ello, se argumentará que constituyen comunidades discursivas que emplean el lenguaje para conseguir objetivos ideológicos y que la doctrina kantiana del esquematismo puede contribuir a explicar el modo en que dicho lenguaje mantiene su coherencia, pese a la heterogeneidad del grupo y lo impreciso de los conceptos que se manejan.
... Their study provides further confirmation of several of Simi and Futrell's findings and is also one of the few studies that engage with the research literature on 'sense of community'. As De Koster andHoutman (2008, p. 1167) point out, part of the value of extremist online communities, a point I reiterate below, is that it allows individuals to feel like they are part of a broader 'embattled' sub-group: individuals linked transnationally undergoing the same struggle. As they (2008, p. 1167 ...
... Understandably, Stormfront has been the focus of much research attention since its inception, including an assessment of recruitment efforts by forum users (Hale, 2010;Lennings et al., 2010;Wong et al., 2015), the formation of a virtual community (Back, 2002;Bowman-Grieve, 2009;De Koster & Houtman, 2008) and collective identity (Futrell & Simi, 2004;Perry & Scrivens, 2016), the extent to which Stormfront is connected to other racial hate sites (Burris et al., 2000;Gerstenfeld et al., 2003), and how Stormfront discourse is less virulent and more palatable to readers (Daniels, 2009;Meddaugh & Kay, 2009). Although a number of emerging digital spaces have been adopted by the extreme right in recent years, Stormfront continues to be a valuable online space for researchers to assess behavioural posting patterns. ...
Little is known about online behaviors of violent extremists generally or differences compared to non-violent extremists who share ideological beliefs. Even less is known about desistance from posting behavior. A sample of 99 violent and non-violent right-wing extremists to compare their online patterns of desistance within a sub-forum of the largest white supremacy web-forum was analyzed. A probabilistic model of desistance was tested to determine the validity of criteria set for users reaching posting desistance. Findings indicated that criteria predicted “true” desistance, with 5% misidentification. Each consecutive month without posting in the sub-forum resulted in a 7.6% increase in odds of posting desistance. There were no significant differences in effects for violent versus non-violent users, though statistical power was low.
... In such cases, perceived inequality gives rise to grievance, which fuels radicalisation (on the nature and role of 'grievance', see Pilkington and Vestel, this volume). The feeling of having received 'unjust treatment' by authorities is one of the main frames of thought identifi ed among supporters and activists in diff erent countries (De Koster and Houtman 2008;Klandermans and Mayer 2009;Rhodes 2011;Pilkington 2016). Activism provides a mechanism for resisting this perceived second- (Bartlett, Birdwell and Littler 2011: 174) through a discursive reordering of privilege and prejudice in which 'we' are seen as the discriminated and those in power are exposed as a liberal elite of 'do-gooders' who have little understanding of the everyday worlds of ordinary people (Pilkington 2016: 228). ...
... Their study provides further confirmation of several of Simi and Futrell's findings and is also one of the few studies that engage with the research literature on 'sense of community'. As De Koster andHoutman (2008, p. 1167) point out, part of the value of extremist online communities, a point I reiterate below, is that it allows individuals to feel like they are part of a broader 'embattled' sub-group: individuals linked transnationally undergoing the same struggle. As they (2008, p. 1167 ...
... w https://www.reuters.com/business/cop/facebook-climate-change-can-falsehoods-be-reined-2022-02-23/. 3. polarization/homophily ap,aq (McPherson, Smith-Lovin, and Cook 2001;De Koster and Houtman 2008;Colleoni, Rozza, and Arvidsson 2014;Bakshy, Messing, and Adamic 2015;Barberá 2015;Kurka, Godoy, and Zuben 2016;Allcott and Gentzkow 2017;Fourney et al. 2017;Ferrara 2017;Bail et al. 2018;Grinberg et al. 2019;Rauchfleisch and Kaiser 2020;Kaiser and Rauchfleisch 2020;Baptista and Gradim 2020;Zhuravskaya, Petrova, and Enikolopov 2020), 4. riots/genocide (Zeitzoff 2017;Hakim 2020), 5. cyberbullying (Zych, Ortega-Ruiz, and Rey 2015;Hamm et al. 2015;Paluck, Shepherd, and Aronow 2016), 6. suicide, depression, eating disorders, etc. (Luxton, June, and Fairall 2012;O'Dea et al. 2015;Choudhury et al. 2016;Primack et al. 2017;Robinson et al. 2016), 7. and insane profits (Oates 2020). ...
There has been considerable work recently in the natural language community and elsewhere on Responsible AI. Much of this work focuses on fairness and biases (henceforth Risks 1.0), following the 2016 best seller: Weapons of Math Destruction . Two books published in 2022, The Chaos Machine and Like, Comment, Subscribe , raise additional risks to public health/safety/security such as genocide, insurrection, polarized politics, vaccinations (henceforth, Risks 2.0). These books suggest that the use of machine learning to maximize engagement in social media has created a Frankenstein Monster that is exploiting human weaknesses with persuasive technology, the illusory truth effect, Pavlovian conditioning, and Skinner’s intermittent variable reinforcement. Just as we cannot expect tobacco companies to sell fewer cigarettes and prioritize public health ahead of profits, so too, it may be asking too much of companies (and countries) to stop trafficking in misinformation given that it is so effective and so insanely profitable (at least in the short term). Eventually, we believe the current chaos will end, like the lawlessness in Wild West, because chaos is bad for business. As computer scientists, this paper will summarize criticisms from other fields and focus on implications for computer science; we will not attempt to contribute to those other fields. There is quite a bit of work in computer science on these risks, especially on Risks 1.0 (bias and fairness), but more work is needed, especially on Risks 2.0 (addictive, dangerous, and deadly).
... With their capacity to generate collective identities, while also facilitating the exchange of resources and information (Della Porta and Wagemann, 2012b), they both create a feeling of inter-group solidarity and introduce shared goals and enemies, thereby strengthening even further the cooperation links between different groups. Studies on violent radicalization stress that isolated individuals can find a common identity via extreme-right Web sites, which foster the comforting sense that they are not alone, but part of a community [7] (De Koster and Houtman, 2008). ...
This article constitutes a first step in understanding how Internet memes are used in extreme-right online milieus and formulating appropriate policy responses. First it looks at existing literature on memes as communication units. Secondly, it looks at the particular ways in which transnational extreme-right groups use Internet memes. Thirdly, it discusses the applicability of these memes to resilience-building projects targeting the extreme right. The article’s conclusions discourage the use of Internet memes by state and security actors, while highlighting positive uses by grassroots organisations. Some notes on further necessary research conclude the piece.
... Die wenigen, auf qualitativen Interviews mit (ehemals) rechtsextremen Personen basierenden Studien geben zuweilen eher Aufschluss über die instrumentelle Nutzung des Internets durch die Szene und ihre Funktionäre als über die biografische Bedeutung des Internets für die eigene Hinwendung zur Szene (Neumann 2015;Koehler 2014;Koster/Houtman 2008). Sie belegen etwa, dass das Internet als kostengünstiges Organisations-und Kommunikationsmittel, als Möglichkeit (auch verbotene) rechtsextreme Inhalte und Produkte zu verbreiten und zu beziehen sowie zum unzensierten ideologischen Austausch genutzt wird. ...
... This leads to the emergence of a group identity that accepts and values harmful language, which in turn makes some of the most extreme users be perceived in positive light. This also resembles typical mechanisms that occur on extremist (jihadist, farright activist) forums (De Koster and Houtman, 2008;Chua, 2019), and suggests that measures opposite to those functioning on extremist forums should be employed in social networking platforms, which aim at a more civilized and friendly interaction. ...
We conduct a large scale data-driven analysis of the effects of online personal attacks on social media user activity. First, we perform a thorough overview of the literature on the influence of social media on user behavior, especially on the impact that negative and aggressive behaviors, such as harassment and cyberbullying, have on users' engagement in online media platforms. The majority of previous research were small-scale self-reported studies, which is their limitation. This motivates our data-driven study. We perform a large-scale analysis of messages from Reddit, a discussion website, for a period of two weeks, involving 182,528 posts or comments to posts by 148,317 users. To efficiently collect and analyze the data we apply a high-precision personal attack detection technology. We analyze the obtained data from three perspectives: (i) classical statistical methods, (ii) Bayesian estimation, and (iii) model-theoretic analysis. The three perspectives agree: personal attacks decrease the victims’ activity. The results can be interpreted as an important signal to social media platforms and policy makers that leaving personal attacks unmoderated is quite likely to disengage the users and in effect depopulate the platform. On the other hand, application of cyberviolence detection technology in combination with various mitigation techniques could improve and strengthen the user community. As more of our lives is taking place online, keeping the virtual space inclusive for all users becomes an important problem which online media platforms need to face.
... Young Neo-Nazis in Sweden said they were first attracted by the "hard and bad" music the extremists played, then later joined them (Kimmel, 2007, p. 10). Hard right music scenes can appear like subcultural refuges to troubled young people (De Koster & Houtman, 2008, p. 1155. Arno Michaelis, former leader of white power band Centurion, recalls being inspired by British skinhead group Skrewdriver in the 1990s. ...
This chapter looks at how the Far Right appeals to the imagination of young people by leveraging the fantasy genre in popular culture. Thus, the ordinary young white man is invited to become a hero fighting for his people and his land. Aryan and Viking warrior myths grant heroic masculine status and the promise of transcendence. The chapter provides coverage of some extreme Far Right groups and utopian fantasies. Although small in size, hyper-violent Neo-Nazi, and militant vigilante groups represent a subcultural vanguard in the Far Right movement. The extreme renegade identities and actions of their primarily male members provoke the imagination of a range of white youth, drawing them towards less extreme fantasy strands of the Far Right movement such as the Soldiers of Odin and the online cult of the Frog-God Kek.
... Young Neo-Nazis in Sweden said they were first attracted by the "hard and bad" music the extremists played, then later joined them (Kimmel, 2007, p. 10). Hard right music scenes can appear like subcultural refuges to troubled young people (De Koster & Houtman, 2008, p. 1155. Arno Michaelis, former leader of white power band Centurion, recalls being inspired by British skinhead group Skrewdriver in the 1990s. ...
This chapter introduces the topic of young people and the Far Right, pointing out that it is not the young raging Neo-Nazi that dominates the ranks of the Far Right movement, but rather ordinary young people, especially young white men, who are drawn in by the forceful propaganda. Although women are certainly present, the Far Right is more popular with men. I first provide some definitions for critical analysis: discourse and subject position. Four important themes are then discussed: Youth, class, masculinity, and race. The politics of hate speech are considered using the lens of necropolitics from philosopher Achille Mbembe. Finally, the Far Right is examined as an example of a social movement, one that may pull in young people rather like a subculture.
... Young Neo-Nazis in Sweden said they were first attracted by the "hard and bad" music the extremists played, then later joined them (Kimmel, 2007, p. 10). Hard right music scenes can appear like subcultural refuges to troubled young people (De Koster & Houtman, 2008, p. 1155. Arno Michaelis, former leader of white power band Centurion, recalls being inspired by British skinhead group Skrewdriver in the 1990s. ...
This chapter looks at how the ultra-nationalist discourse of the Far Right reaches out to young people by considering examples from Germany, France, the UK, the USA, Canada, and Australia. Ultra-nationalism proclaims the superiority of one’s own racial constituency, and white victimhood in the face of continued immigration. According to white supremacist discourse only the white people (variously defined) should hold the reins of sovereignty. The Far Right encourages sentimental attachment to the imagined nation of traditional working people who have been betrayed by uncaring elite leadership. Palingenetic ultra-nationalism proposes that a rebirthed ultra-nationalist regime—forged in conflict—will prioritize youth, heroism, and national greatness. That represents both a promise and a vigilante adventure for angry young people seeking answers. The endgame is a white ethnostate.
... Young Neo-Nazis in Sweden said they were first attracted by the "hard and bad" music the extremists played, then later joined them (Kimmel, 2007, p. 10). Hard right music scenes can appear like subcultural refuges to troubled young people (De Koster & Houtman, 2008, p. 1155. Arno Michaelis, former leader of white power band Centurion, recalls being inspired by British skinhead group Skrewdriver in the 1990s. ...
This chapter looks at how the Far Right reaches out to young people online. Those aged 15–24 are the most connected users of social media worldwide. Far Right discourse uses the technological affordances of digital platforms to draw in both floaters who enjoy causing trouble and angry young people looking for political answers. Algorithms and bots channel youth interests, encouraging belief in white victimhood, anti-feminist, and homophobic propaganda, and alleged wicked corruption of government, intellectual, and scientific elites. Online anonymity guarantees the wide dissemination of fake news, conspiracy theory, and hate speech. Memes, trolling, hacking, doxxing, and clickbait are then used by young Far Right supporters in the propagation of hate discourse generated by right-wing influencers.
... Young Neo-Nazis in Sweden said they were first attracted by the "hard and bad" music the extremists played, then later joined them (Kimmel, 2007, p. 10). Hard right music scenes can appear like subcultural refuges to troubled young people (De Koster & Houtman, 2008, p. 1155. Arno Michaelis, former leader of white power band Centurion, recalls being inspired by British skinhead group Skrewdriver in the 1990s. ...
This final chapter reveals much about the radicalization journey of young people in the Far Right by focusing on how they exit. Using publicly available accounts, I consider push and pull factors for both recruitment and departure. For committed members, getting out requires a decision with serious consequences. When youth first engage with the sphere of politics-in-action they usually want to express something about themselves and their lives, and join a heroic cause that will change the world. Yet once the thrilling rebellious possibilities have started to fade, disillusioned young supporters may start to see little future for themselves in the movement. This is true for both young men and young women. I conclude with reflections on how the Far Right ultimately crushes youthful hopes and fantasies.
... Young Neo-Nazis in Sweden said they were first attracted by the "hard and bad" music the extremists played, then later joined them (Kimmel, 2007, p. 10). Hard right music scenes can appear like subcultural refuges to troubled young people (De Koster & Houtman, 2008, p. 1155. Arno Michaelis, former leader of white power band Centurion, recalls being inspired by British skinhead group Skrewdriver in the 1990s. ...
‘In this brilliant book, Pam Nilan provides a transversal overview of key dimensions to understand Far Right appeal among young white men in the 21st century, from the gamification of hate to social media, from conspiracy theories and fantasy stories that re-enchant their world to the quest of belonging and agency.’
—Geoffrey Pleyers, F.R.S.–FNRS Professor of Sociology, Université Catholique de Louvain, Belgium
‘“Let’s face it, mate, if we don’t do something about it right now, in 20 years we’re going to be forced to speak Arabic and under Sharia law.” The words of the homeless, white young man aged 21, who had never had a job, took me by surprise in 2017. They would not surprise me now. Nilan’s scholarly and engaging text has appraised me of the sense of “aggrieved entitlement” held by the “lost” white working class, youth in particular, who can become recast as the heroic defenders of a lost white utopia.’
—Professor Howard Williamson, CVO CBE FRSA FHEA, Professor of European Youth Policy, University of South Wales
This book looks at how young people get attracted to the Far Right, especially young white men. We may never know why a young individual ends up there, yet two things are obvious. First, Far Right propaganda appeals to the fantasy imagination and to the emotions. Second, supporting the Far Right is a decision often made by digitally-networked 15-25 year olds looking for answers and wanting to express their anger. However, many later become aware of a yawning gulf between the ideal future they envisioned, and what happens in the here and now. Accounts of the Far Right often focus on terrorist events, plots or extreme acts of violence. However, the emphasis here is on rather ordinary young people and how they get involved in a social movement that promises adventure and belonging. The aim is to better understand how their hate practices are framed and channeled by the persuasive discourse of the Far Right.
... It is a well-established fact that the Internet has enabled hate groups to engage in a variety of communicative practices, including building online communities and networks; providing information to their supporters; mobilising to activism; engaging in disinformation, propaganda, and hate campaigns; and recruiting new members (Brown, 2009;Caiani & Parenti, 2016;De Koster & Houtman, 2008;Ekman, 2019;Haanshuus & Jupskås, 2017). In this article, we explore practices of online uncivility by investigating how uncivility is conveyed through news produced by uncivil actors -particularly news published on the neo-Nazi website Frihetskamp [Freedom Fight]. ...
This study explores how an extreme far-right alternative media site uses content from professional media to convey uncivil news with an antisemitic message. Analytically, it rests on a critical discourse analysis of 231 news items, originating from established national and international news sources, published on Frihetskamp from 2011–2018. In the study, we explore how news items are recontextualised to portray both overt and covert antisemitic discourses, and we identify four antisemitic representations that are reinforced through the selection and adjustment of news: Jews as powerful, as intolerant and anti-liberal, as exploiters of victimhood, and as inferior. These conspiratorial and exclusionary ideas, also known from historical Nazi propaganda, are thus reproduced by linking them to contemporary societal and political contexts and the current news agenda. We argue that this kind of recontextualised, uncivil news can be difficult to detect in a digital public sphere.
... The relationship between these two distinct types of engagement to the concept of an online community of practice needs further discussion and elaboration. Studies of one well-known extremeright web forum, Stormfront, have suggested that engagement between participants constitutes an online community (Bowman-Grieve, 2009;De Koster & Houtman, 2008;Thompson, 2001). Likewise, research from outside terrorism studies has provided accounts of how corporate 'virtual communities of practice' can increase engagement, build trust and maximise knowledge-sharing (Gammelgaard, 2010;Haas et al., 2020). ...
Learning in extremist settings is often treated as operational, with little regard to how aspiring participants in extremist settings engage with complex and abstract ideological material. This paper examines learning in the context of the amorphous network of digital channels that compose the extreme-right online milieu. Through an in-depth qualitative analysis, we explore how well the prevailing model of extremist ideological learning (in ‘communities of practice’) accounts for the behaviour of aspiring participants of Fascist Forge, a now-defunct extreme-right web forum. The findings suggest that some of the social aspects of communities of practice have been replicated in the online setting of Fascist Forge. However, for a combination of technical and ideological reasons, the more directed and nurturing aspects of learning have not. Several issues are raised about the role of ideological learning in online communities, notably the open accessibility of extremist material, the lack of ideological control leading to potential mutation and innovation by self-learners, and the role of digital learning in the preparation, shaping and recruitment of individuals for real world organising and activism.
... Finally, studies on social movements argue that the Internet can help in generating collective identities by facilitating the exchange of resources and information, as well as creating solidarity and shared objectives ( Della Porta and Mosca 2006 ) and this is a crucial function for those radical-right political actors, who often feel marginalised from society. As it has been illustrated by recent research, "social media" works "as a second home" for radicals, and a form of "virtual shelter" for these groups ( De Koster and Houtman 2008 ). ...
Over the last decade, European democracies have experienced a dramatic rise in radical right popularity and mobilization. The growth of these actors has been mirrored online, however, to date, while research on Western right wing extremism on the web is increasing; scarce attention has been devoted so far on Eastern and Central Europe---where actually these forces are strikingly successful in recent year. In this chapter, by focusing on four CEE countries (Slovakia, Hungary, Czech Republic and Poland) and the entire party-movements communities of the radical right within them, the intensity, forms of the activism of the radical right on the Internet will be unveiled, with a particular attention to construction of collective identities and political engagement though visual and narrative repertoires.
... These dynamics are good, even, if self-presentations, idealization, and reciprocation intensify ideas that are societally benevolent or morally righteous. Precisely the same dynamics, however, may look very different from the outside if the links and memes and advocacies that perpetuate certain online relationships are extremist, hostile, or hateful (see, e.g., De Koster & Houtman, 2008). The potential for hyperpersonal dynamics to explore self-presentation, idealization, reciprocation, and collaborative reification among members of online hate groups provides a rather sobering extension of the model. ...
Research on the hyperpersonal model originally described how the substitution of language for nonverbal cues, necessitated by text-based computer-mediated communication systems, transforms users’ reception, self-presentation, composition, and reciprocal reinforcement of messages in ways that create socially desirable relationships online. This article reviews the model after 25 years. It explicates the original model and mentions a sample of illustrative findings. It reflects on the state of internet diffusion and research traditions in the 1990s that affected the model’s original focus, and how these conditions have changed. It enumerates contexts that continue to meet the model’s original boundary assumptions, and some boundary expansions. It explores ways in which the model’s principles extend into contemporary multi-modal social media. It illustrates the evolutionary applicability of the model through cases of deceptive online romances, including contemporary online romance scams. It concludes by suggesting future research examining how many contemporary social media performances and responses comport with and illustrate the model’s tenets, at scale.
... Furthermore, we include Germany and the United States as countries to find out whether national context (i.e., location and language) has an influence on the networks and potential formation of an algorithmic formed community. We rely here on prior research (De Koster & Houtman, 2008;O'Callaghan et al., 2014;Rauchfleisch & Kaiser, 2020) that puts emphasis on country-specific as well as far-right communities. We expect to find country-specific bubbles, even in the far-right that can mainly be explained with a shared language. ...
Algorithms and especially recommendation algorithms play an important role online, most notably on YouTube. Yet, little is known about the network communities that these algorithms form. We analyzed the channel recommendations on YouTube to map the communities that the social network is creating through its algorithms and to test the network for homophily, that is, the connectedness between communities. We find that YouTube’s channel recommendation algorithm fosters the creation of highly homophilous communities in the United States ( n = 13,529 channels) and in Germany ( n = 8,000 channels). Factors that seem to drive YouTube’s recommendations are topics, language, and location. We highlight the issue of homophilous communities in the context of politics where YouTube’s algorithms create far-right communities in both countries.
... The above questions have prompted many academicians to conduct observations regarding this issue. Some of them are Acquisti, Gross, and Stutzman (2011), Boyd (2010), Boyd, Hargittai, Schultz, and Palfrey, (2011), De Koster and Houtman (2008, Ellison, Heino, and Gibbs (2006), Ellison, Hancock and Toma (2012), Lev andLewinsky (2004), Nakamura, (1999), Scheidt (2001), Ashirova et.al (2016), Gonibeed (2014), Starks (---), and many others. ...
This study investigates nicks (nicknames) of Facebook users (Facebookers). It specifically reveals the process of how Facebookers associate themselves with their nicknames and with all things around them. This study also finds out the factors that contribute to the choice of Facebookers to use their nicknames. This study uses sociolinguistic to approach the data. The data were obtained by using content analysis method. The data analysis method used to analyze the data was the Correlation Method with referents as the determining elements. The result of the study shows that there are personal identities associated to the nicknames used by Facebook users. It also shows that the uses of the nicknames by the Facebook users are influenced by their personal fancies (personal labelization). Besides, there are fifteen factors contributing to the choices of nicks (nicknames) by Facebook users, five major reasons that caused the informants to create the unique nicks and three issues which can be summarized related to personal autolabelization phenomena.
... Further, broadly analyzed pipelines exist in which dedicated far-right communities on Reddit,4Chan, and Twitter generate content that is disseminated upward to mainstream news and social networks, wielding disproportionate influence by optimizing news flows on the web (Zannettou et al., 2017). Some of these spaces offer true anonymity (4Chan), deidentification via use of pseudonyms (Reddit), or optional deidentification by use of pseudonyms (Twitter), thus allowing more extreme actors space for organizing their activities and circumventing national laws that would obstruct other forms of organizing (Bartlett, Birdwell, & Littler, 2011;Caiani & Wagemann, 2009;De Koster & Houtman, 2008; see also Holtz, Kronberger, & Wagner, 2012). ...
Social media has been integral for the organization and success of right-wing populist movements in the United States and Europe. Within online communities, discussions take place in which ideologies are formulated, iterated upon, and disseminated. One particular forum, hosted on the popular website reddit.com, r/The_Donald, has received media attention for its political influence. Despite the influence of online spaces in populist, far-right movements, relatively little attention has been paid to qualitative content of discussions that take place within such spaces, including r/The_Donald. Guided by a social representations approach , we analyzed how discussions on r/The_Donald represent sociopolitical groups. We focused on discussions of political affiliations, race relations, immigration , and culture. From a dataset of 8,198 posts, we selected 1,292 segments from 883 unique Reddit usernames and analyzed them using qualitative content analysis. The results showed that the majority of posts discussed liberals, race relations, and conspiracy theories, and in these posts, liberals and liberal ideas were delegitimized and mocked through their representations. These posts represented conservatives through antinomic contrast and comparison to liberals and
... However, this alternative strategy seems to be less effective, so that actual network dismantling calls for a high number of cycles of removal that may practically amount to break down the whole network. The reason for this is intuitive: users who post the most inflammatory content need not be socially prominent, and one might even argue that it is the most marginal users who have the strongest incentive to post the most inflammatory content to gain more credit and visibility in their online community 58 . As a consequence, a lot of energy is spent in removing users who have very little effect on the network structure. ...
Online social networks are the perfect test bed to better understand large-scale human behavior in interacting contexts. Although they are broadly used and studied, little is known about how their terms of service and posting rules affect the way users interact and information spreads. Acknowledging the relation between network connectivity and functionality, we compare the robustness of two different online social platforms, Twitter and Gab, with respect to banning, or dismantling, strategies based on the recursive censor of users characterized by social prominence (degree) or intensity of inflammatory content (sentiment). We find that the moderated (Twitter) vs. unmoderated (Gab) character of the network is not a discriminating factor for intervention effectiveness. We find, however, that more complex strategies based upon the combination of topological and content features may be effective for network dismantling. Our results provide useful indications to design better strategies for countervailing the production and dissemination of anti-social content in online social platforms.
This study aims to improve the operational efficiency of Vietnamese securities companies by analyzing international practices and deriving pertinent lessons. Employing a research sample of secondary data, including audited financial statements and financial safety ratio reports from 70 Vietnamese stock market companies between 2013 and 2020, the study adopts analytical, synthetic, and comparative methodologies, underpinned by historical materialism. It meticulously investigates and evaluates practical aspects of business efficiency in securities companies, pinpointing specific challenges impeding operational efficiency in the Vietnamese context. The findings emphasize the need for substantial financial resources, advanced technical infrastructure, enhanced human resource quality and research activities, development of consulting services, and diversification of business operations and investor clientele. Additionally, it highlights the importance of flexible business strategies and effective utilization of company strengths. These insights offer a blueprint for Vietnamese securities firms to improve their performance and competitiveness in the global market.
This edited volume examines the ways in which rapidly changing technologies and patterns of media use influence, and are influenced by, our emotional experiences. Following introductory chapters outlining common conceptual frameworks used in the study of emotion and digital media effects, this book is then organized around four general areas highlighting the intersection of technology use and emotional experience: how people experience, and researchers measure, emotions in response to digital media use; potential emotional harms and enrichments resulting from online behaviors; the socio-emotional dynamics of online interaction; and emotion’s role in engagement with online information. Chapters span a wide range of topics, including psychophysiological and neuroscientific responses to new media, virtual reality, social media and well-being, technology addiction, cyberbullying, online hate and empathy, online romantic relationships, self-presentation online, information seeking, message sharing, social support, polarization, misinformation, and more. Through a social scientific lens, contributing authors provide nuanced, interdisciplinary perspectives on contemporary social phenomena, offering cogent reviews and critiques of the literatures and avenues for future research. In essence, this volume highlights the centrality of emotions in understanding how ever-present media technologies influence our lived experiences.
This article describes and discusses a comparative semiotic analysis of online text collected from eight extreme right websites and four violent jihadi groups’ online magazines. The two datasets, which comprise just over 1 million words each, were analyzed using LIWC software. The core issues explored were the shared and different linguistic patterns used among extreme right and violent jihadi extremists and the emotional, cognitive, psychological, and social dimensions of the online textual discourses of each ideological grouping and what function these played in their overall political rhetoric. The findings bring to light some nuanced differences and similarities in the cognitive, social, psychological, and temporal dimensions of language used by each. For example, while both types of ideological text showed the same level of certainty in arguments as a cognitive process, the language depicting social and emotional processes, and religion were used more often by the violent jihadi extremists (VJEs) than the extreme right. The findings also point to the fact that VJEs were more likely than right-wing extremists to discuss the future and promise change as motivational incentives.
In the early morning of July 2, 2020, 46-year-old Manitoban Corey Hurren drove his pickup truck through the front gates of Rideau Hall in Ottawa. There, he picked up five of his loaded guns and wandered around the property until confronted by Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) officers, who diffused the situation and convinced Hurren to surrender peacefully after 90 minutes (Humphreys in Correy Hurren on Rideau Hall Attack: ‘I Figured as Soon as I Got on the Property, I Would Get Shot Down’. National Post, 2021). During the aftermath of the event, it was revealed that Hurren was an avid conspiracy theorist and anti-COVID-19COVID-19 activist who dabbled in and consumed online content from far-rightFar-rightwebsitesWebsitesand social mediaSocial media.
Right-wing extremists, among other extremists, continue to exploit the power of the Internet and associated technologies by connecting with the like-minded from around the globe and developing a sense of identity there. A growing body of literature has been dedicated to exploring this phenomenon, with an interest in how online identities of these adherents develop over time. Overlooked in these discussions, however, has been an assessment of how the development of identities of violent right-wing adherents compare to their non-violent counterpart. This study explores how 49 violent and 50 non-violent right-wing extremists frame their identities over time on a popular online space of the extreme right, Stormfront. The results highlight the extent to which the collective identities of both groups take shape over time. We conclude with a discussion of implications of this analysis and avenues for future research.
Digital footprints from social media enable us to study the far right in novel ways. In contrast to traditional methods such as interviewing, the examination of online discourse is non-reactive: the data are ‘given’ and as such not influenced by researchers. Social media thus allow us to unobtrusively get an insight into real-life everyday discussions among far right supporters. Social media also provide far right leaders the opportunity to circumvent traditional news channels, making their voices heard without interference from gatekeepers and journalists. This chapter reviews the methodological opportunities and challenges of using social media as a source of data. We focus on online discourses of the far right on Twitter and Facebook. To put flesh to the bones, we apply our review to two concrete research questions. First, to what extent are there differences between and within far right parties and movements in the outgroups that their followers discuss? Second, to what extent do far right leaders moderate their ideological outlook once they become member of a government?
Sense of virtual community (feelings of identity, belonging, and attachment) is an essential component of virtual communities. In this chapter, we develop a model of how sense of virtual community develops in professional virtual communities. Based on sense of virtual community models in social virtual communities, we expect that the exchange of support, development of a group identity, and group norms will lead to a stronger professional sense of virtual community. Unlike social virtual communities, we also predict that employee/members occupational identification will increase professional sense of virtual community, particularly when the virtual community can provide support and information not available in the employee/member’s face-to-face life. Finally, we propose that increased occupational commitment, professional networks, and employee performance are outcomes of sense of virtual community in professional virtual communities.
It is crucial to model missing ratings in recommender systems since user preferences learnt from only observed ratings are biased. One possible explanation for missing ratings is motivated by the spiral of silence theory. When the majority opinion is formed, a spiral process is triggered where users are more and more likely to show their ratings if they perceive that they are supported by the opinion climate. In this paper we first verify the existence of the spiral process in recommender systems by using a variety of different real-life datasets. We then study the characteristics of two key factors in the spiral process: opinion climate and the hardcore users who will give ratings even when they are minority opinion holders. Based on our empirical findings, we develop four variants to model missing ratings. They mimic different components of the spiral of silence based on the spiral process with global opinion climate, local opinion climate, hardcore users, relationships between hardcore users and items, respectively. We experimentally show that, the presented variants all outperform state-of-the-art recommendation models with missing rating components.
Metods and techniques for qualitative content analysis approaching media content are scarsely elaborated. In this article the first results of an investigation of different operating procedures in the field of qualitative analysis of media content are presented. To describe the method used in the field the concepts 'Famework'and 'Logic' (Krippendorf, 1980) were used as sensitizing concepts. Inspired by Glaser and Strauss, a comparative analysis of research articles results in a reconstruction of five distinctive procedures and a schematic representation of five types of qualitative content analysis as the first step in the codification of current methods in qualitative content analysis.
This article explores the way in which a specific immigrant group – Indians outside India – utilizes the dwelling space offered by the synthesis of real spaces and virtual spaces to create a unique immigrant identity. The argument is offered that the combination of the real and the virtual produces a cybernetic space where the immigrant identity can thrive without being controlled within the increasing anti-immigrant sentiments of the real world. Using illustrations from internet discourse it is demonstrated that cybernetic space offers a ‘safe’ alternative living space where the marginalized immigrant can find a voice.
Inaugural lecture.
Rede uitgesproken bij de aanvaarding van het ambt van hoogleraar in de Algemene Sociologie aan de Universiteit van Amsterdam op 14 mei 2004
This paper outlines some of the issues involved in the development of human relationships in cyberspace. Set within the wider context of the Internet and society it investigates how geographically distant individuals are coming together on the Internet to inhabit new kinds of social spaces or virtual communities. People ‘live in’ and ‘construct’ these new spaces in such a way as to suggest that the Internet is not a placeless cyberspace that is distinct and separate from the real world. Building on the work of other cyberethnographers, the author combines original ethnographic research in Cybercity, a Virtual Community, with face-to-face meetings to illustrate how, for many people, cyberspace is just another place to meet. Second, she suggests that people in Cybercity are investing as much effort in maintaining relationships in cyberspace as in other social spaces. Her preliminary analysis suggests that by extending traditional human relationships into Cybercity, they are widening their webs of relationships, not weakening them. Human relationships in cyberspace are formed and maintained in similar ways to those in wider society. Rather than being exotic and removed from real life, they are actually being assimilated into everyday life. Furthermore, they are often moved into other social settings, just as they are in offline life.
At the start of the third millennium social scientists’ preoccupation with the weakening of Gemeinschaft is–particularly in western postmodern societies–again at its peak. Waning social capital is believed to have undermined community, as reflected in widespread feelings of social mistrust, in citizens turning away from prime institutions and political authorities, and even engaging less in informal interactions. This diagnosis of civil society as advanced by especially American scholars would be a very serious account of our present times, if the debate and research in this field were not impaired by a set of equally serious theoretical and methodological problems. This article addresses a number of these basic problems. The main issue is the lack of sensitivity in civil society studies to new, alternative and innovative forms of solidarity, connectedness and civic and political engagement, particularly those facilitated by the Internet. It is time to thoroughly define today’s forms of civil society made by contemporary people with contemporary means, in a contemporary world. This article aims to reframe the civil society research agenda.
The study of cybercommunity is inevitably linked to the development of the internet amid other cultural phenomena, and cybercommunity as a cultural practice has clearly reached a point of critical mass. The concept of online community has become increasingly diluted as it evolves into a pastiche of elements that ostensibly ‘signify’ community. This study grapples with the concept of community in cyberspace and suggests alternative ways of characterizing online social relations that avoid the vagaries of ‘community’. Based on interviews and a theoretical consideration of online community, it finds that the metaphor of ‘community’ in cyberspace is one of convenient togetherness without real responsibility. This study suggests a symbolic interactionist approach to the examination of online social relationships that is free of the controversy and structural-functional baggage of the term ‘community’. It suggests that community is an evolving process, and that commitment is the truly desired social ideal in social interaction, whether online or offline.
In this paper we use methods of social network analysis to examine the interorganizational structure of the white supremacist movement. Treating links between Internet websites as ties of affinity, communication, or potential coordination, we investigate the structural properties of connections among white supremacist groups. White supremacism appears to be a relatively decentralized movement with multiple centers of influence, but without sharp cleavages between factions. Interorganizational links are stronger among groups with a special interest in mutual affirmation of their intellectual legitimacy (Holocaust revisionists) or cultural identity (racist skinheads) and weaker among groups that compete for members (political parties) or customers (commercial enterprises). The network is relatively isolated from both mainstream conservatives and other extremist groups. Christian Identity theology appears ineffective as a unifying creed of the movement, while Nazi sympathies are pervasive. Recruitme...
Professed and suspected members of hate organizations have been involved in a number of highly publicized violent episodes in recent years. It has been suggested that there are connections between web sites operated by extremist organizations and select episodes of violence (including the Littleton, Colorado, school shooting and Benjamin Smith's 1999 Independence weekend Midwest shooting spree). The proliferation of the internet in the lives of the American public raises new possibilities for this medium's use by groups and individuals preaching hate and intolerance. This exploratory study examines the web sites operated by a sample of recognized extremist organizations to better understand how the internet is used to transmit ideologies and facilitate communication. Issues explored include the types of resources extremist sites made available to general users, categories of information provided to users, methods of communicating within the group, and mechanisms used to appeal to specific audiences.
Over the previous decade, white supremacist organizations have tapped into the ever emerging possibilities offered by the World Wide Web. Drawing from prior sociological work that has examined this medium and its uses by white supremacist organizations, this article advances the understanding of recruitment, identity and action by providing a synthesis of interpretive and more systematic analyses of thematic content, structure and associations within white supremacist discourse. Analyses, which rely on TextAnalyst, highlight semantic networks of thematic content from principal white supremacist websites, and delineate patterns and thematic associations relative to the three requisites of social movement culture denoted in recent research – namely identity, interpretational framing of cause and effect, and political efficacy. Our results suggest that nationalism, religion and definitions of responsible citizenship are interwoven with race to create a sense of collective identity for these groups, their members and potential recruits. Moreover, interpretative frameworks that simultaneously identify threatening social issues and provide corresponding recommendations for social action are employed. Importantly, and relative to prior work, results show how the interpretation of problems, their alleged causes and the call to action are systematically linked. We conclude by discussing the framing of white supremacy issues, the organizations' potential for recruitment, and how a relatively new communication medium, the Internet, has been cheaply and efficiently integrated into the white supremacist repertoire. Broader implications for social movement theory are also explored.
For several years many of us at Peabody College have participated in the evolution of a theory of community, the first conceptualization of which was presented in a working paper (McMillan, 1976) of the Center for Community Studies. To support the proposed definition, McMillan focused on the literature on group cohesiveness, and we build here on that original definition. This article attempts to describe the dynamics of the sense-of-community force — to identify the various elements in the force and to describe the process by which these elements work together to produce the experience of sense of community.
We conducted semistructured interviews with 38 participants in White racist In-ternet chat rooms, examining the extent to which people would, in this unique environment, advocate interracial violence in response to purported economic and cultural threats. Capitalizing on the anonymity and candor of chat room interactions, this study provides an unusual perspective on extremist attitudes. We experimentally manipulated the nature and proximity of the threats. Qualitative and quantitative analyses indicate that the respondents were most threatened by interracial marriage and, to a lesser extent, Blacks moving into White neighborhoods. In contrast, job competition posed by Blacks evoked very little advocacy of violence. The study affords an assessment of the advantages and limitations of Internet-based research with clandestine populations.
Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to Jack Glaser, Goldman School of Public Policy, 2607 Hearst Ave., University of California, Berkeley, CA 94720-7320 [e-mail: glaserj@socrates.berkeley.edu]. We wish to thank Jon Drummond, Rob MacCoun, and seven anonymous reviewers for their very helpful comments on earlier drafts.
The aim is to demonstrate how cyber-ethnography has become the most appropriate tool in reaching a definition of the virtual community. It is argued through the cyber-ethnographic examination of two virtual communities that, interpretative research methods traditionally associated with the social sciences enforce preconceived ideas and normative frameworks on to the virtual community. Cyber-ethnography allows a reflexive methodology to emerge, thus enabling the participants of virtual communities to define their own reality and perimeters. It is propounded that there are two elements to the virtual community. First, it is emphasized that a hybrid space is rapidly emerging that is neither absolutely physical or virtual. Through its convergence with the physical the virtual community's existence is apparent, though not unconditionally virtual. Secondly, the participants are depicted as having a transitory, unconditional relationship with the virtual community. That is; they will only participate for short periods when they require use of the resources that the virtual community has to offer.
This paper explores online and off-line identities and how relationships are formed and negotiated within internet environments that offer opportunities to meet people online and move into relationships off-line. To do this it draws on an analysis of users experiences of internet dating sites that are designed for those who wish meet others in the hope of forming an intimate relationship. Locating analyses in the context of the individualised sociability of late modernity, it is argued that virtual interactions may be shaped by and grounded in the social, bodily and cultural experiences of users. It is shown that disembodied anonymity that characterises the internet acts as a foundation for the building of trust and establishing real world relationships rather than the construction of fantasy selves. The paper concludes with a discussion of the wider significance of this for understanding disembodied identities and interactions and the impact of cyberspace on off-line sociability.
Social science research on stigma has grown dramatically over the past two decades, particularly in social psychology, where researchers have elucidated the ways in which people construct cognitive categories and link those categories to stereotyped beliefs. In the midst of this growth, the stigma concept has been criticized as being too vaguely defined and individually focused. In response to these criticisms, we define stigma as the co-occurrence of its components-labeling, stereotyping, separation, status loss, and discrimination-and further indicate that for stigmatization to occur, power must be exercised. The stigma concept we construct has implications for understanding several core issues in stigma research, ranging from the definition of the concept to the reasons stigma sometimes represents a very persistent predicament in the lives of persons affected by it. Finally, because there are so many stigmatized circumstances and because stigmatizing processes can affect multiple domains of people's lives, stigmatization probably has a dramatic bearing on the distribution of life chances in such areas as earnings, housing, criminal involvement, health, and life itself. It follows that social scientists who are interested in understanding the distribution of such life chances should also be interested in stigma.
lienating for some, yet most intimate and real for others, emerging communications technologies are creating a varied array of cyberspace experiences. Nowhere are the new and old more intertwined, as familiar narratives of the past and radical visions of the future inform our attempts to assess the impact of cyberspace on self and society. Amidst the dizzying pace of technological innovation, Annette N. Markham embarks on a unique, ethnographic approach to understanding internet users by immersing herself in on-line reality. The result is an engrossing narrative as well as a theoretically engaging journey. A cast of characters, the reflexive author among them, emerge from Markham's interviews and research to depict the complexity and diversity of internet realities. While cyberspace is hyped as a disembodied cultural arena where physical reality can be transcended, Markham finds that to understand how people experience the internet, she must learn how to be embodied there_a process of acculturation and immersion which is not so different from other anthropological projects of cross-cultural understanding. Both new and not-so-new, cyberspace provides a context in which we can ask new sorts of questions about all cultural experience.
This book explores the brave new world of social relations as they have evolved on the Internet. It examines how men and women negotiate their gender roles on an online forum the book calls BlueSky. The result is an analysis of the emerging social phenomenon of Internet-mediated communication and a study of the social and cultural effects of a medium that allows participants to assume identities of their own choosing. Despite the common assumption that the personas these men and women craft for themselves bear little resemblance to reality, the book discovers that the habitués of BlueSky stick ... More
This book explores the brave new world of social relations as they have evolved on the Internet. It examines how men and women negotiate their gender roles on an online forum the book calls BlueSky. The result is an analysis of the emerging social phenomenon of Internet-mediated communication and a study of the social and cultural effects of a medium that allows participants to assume identities of their own choosing. Despite the common assumption that the personas these men and women craft for themselves bear little resemblance to reality, the book discovers that the habitués of BlueSky stick surprisingly close to the facts of their actual lives and personalities.
This book explores the brave new world of social relations as they have evolved on the Internet. It examines how men and women negotiate their gender roles on an online forum the book calls BlueSky. The result is an analysis of the emerging social phenomenon of Internet-mediated communication and a study of the social and cultural effects of a medium that allows participants to assume identities of their own choosing. Despite the common assumption that the personas these men and women craft for themselves bear little resemblance to reality, the book discovers that the habitués of BlueSky stick ... More
Internet Society investigates Internet use and its implications for society through insights into the daily experiences of ordinary users. Drawing on an original study of non-professional, 'ordinary' users at home, this book examines how people interpret, domesticate, and creatively appropriate the Internet by integrating it into the projects and activities of their everyday lives.
American extremists have traditionally cultivated technology to enhance efficiency and pro mote goals. This article concentrates on how domestic right-wing and other extremists have used computer networks to these ends. Although the concept of a guerrilla insurgency through "leaderless resistance " became a factor in right-wing extremist movements before the Internet's advent, cyberspace hastened its popularity. The Internet has been useful to hatemongers and extremists because it is economical and far reaching, and online expres sion is significantly protected by the First Amendment. Various court decisions have estab lished that not all communication is protected, in cyberspace or elsewhere. Although the government cannot regulate Internet expression because it offends sensibilities, it can regu late expression that constitutes crimes that fall under various unprotected areas of speech. Courts have convicted hatemongers who use the Internet to communicate threats rather than merely ideas. Private service providers and foreign governments have greater latitude to prohibit offensive and hateful expression that does not constitute a threat.
The rise of the internet has tremendous impacts on homosexual communities in Taiwan. The internet has created a medium where homosexual people can form virtual communities to seek for emotional support without fearing the disclosure of their sexual preferences and causing unwanted negative consequences. The internet has become a medium where homosexual communities can share information with each other and voice their concerns to the public. Thus, the internet may become what Ithiel de Sola Pool (1984) called 'the technology of freedom' for homosexual communities. The purposes of this paper are set to discuss whether academic homosexual individuals perceive the internet to be more fair and impartial in terms of news reporting than traditional mass media and to investigate why they use the internet. This paper employs a questionnaire survey method to collect data for the questions. The quantitative analysis of survey data (N=701), from a self-completed questionnaire using modified snowball sampling of gays and lesbians from Taiwan. Principal component analysis with varimax rotation led to seven factors that account for 66.31% of the variance. These factors are social interaction and information, entertainment and relaxation, personal revelation, preference, privacy and escapism, pass time and, novelty-seeking. Correlation analyses also suggested that respondents' demographics, internet usage frequency and, time are associated with their use motivation. As an exploratory study of an academic homosexual population and their internet use behaviour in Taiwan, this study raised more questions than it intended to answer. The use of individual media by this group needs further study.
The paper examines and critiques some of the libertarian rhetoric surrounding the 'virtual community'. In so doing, it argues that cyberlibertarians have misunderstood what community is by placing too much emphasis on a disembodied individual. Although it remains influential, cyberlibertarian rhetoric is a far cry from the everyday practices that are being constructed and reproduced via the Internet. By drawing attention to such practices, the paper attempts to bring to the fore the sociality of cyberspace interactions and redefine the virtual community in line with Maffesoli's concept of 'neo-tribe'. The Internet is thus thought to open up a new space where human 'will to live' is expressed in a social and embodied fashion (Maffesoli 1996).
The development and growth of the Internet and World Wide Web have provided a new and persuasive medium for business, education, and social interaction. Examination of hate group Web sites reveal world views that cast organizations' aims in mainstream and traditionally American terms. This article uses Ernest Bormann's fantasy theme analysis to examine hate group Web sites as a means to understand the world views expressed and the resulting potential for persuasion.
The popularity of Internet communities has raised the question of how they relate to offline communities. Yet there has been hardly any research that focuses on this question. This article examines the relationship between online and offline communities through a case study of the community formed on a bulletin board on the world-wide web and the women’s group in Hong Kong, the Queer Sisters, who created the board. The study finds that the community formed on the bulletin board is largely autonomous in relation to the offline group. Informed by ‘medium theory’, this article highlights the social potential of the Internet in forming communities. However the article also argues that contingent conditions have an important influence on whether online communities are autonomous in relation to the offline communities.
Using an interdisciplinary perspective, this study provides a hyperlink and content analysis of 44 U.S. domestic and 40 Middle Eastern extremist groups' websites to analyze their use of computer-mediated communication (CMC) to support collective identity and mobilization. The findings contrast Middle Eastern extremist groups ' use of the Internet to develop virtual communities and support their virtual command/control operations with the U.S. domestic groups ' focus on communication and ideological indoctrination. Finally, the results suggest that the usages of CMC are underpinned by the geographical reach of extremist groups' campaign as well as their strategic goals, ideologies, needs, and political legitimacy, driving the various groups to use CMC in a distinctive manner.
From the Publisher:Alienating for some, yet most intimate and real for others, emerging communications technologies are creating a varied array of cyberspace experiences. Nowhere are the new and old more intertwined, as familiar narratives of the past and radical visions of the future inform our attempts to assess the impact of cyberspace on self and society. Amid the dizzying pace of technological innovation, Annette N. Markham embarks on a unique, ethnographic approach to understanding Internet users by immersing herself in online reality. The result is an engrossing narrative as well as a theoretically engaging journey. A cast of characters, the self-reflexive author among them, emerge from Markham's interviews and research to depict the complexity and diversity of Internet realities.
While cyberspace is hyped as a disembodied cultural arena where physical reality can be transcended, Markham finds that to understand how people experience the Internet, she must learn how to be embodied there--a process of acculturation and immersion which is not so different from other anthropological projects of cross-cultural understanding. Both new and not-so-new, cyberspace provides a context in which we can ask new sorts of questions about all cultural experience.
This paper examines the use of the Internet as a new public platform for communication that is increasingly being utilized by the Muslim migrant communities in the Netherlands. The paper will review the topics that are currently being articulated and the issues discussed on the Internet. It shall highlight the significant role the new communication medium plays in the lives of young Muslims who are seeking their own response to the challenges of living in a Western society, independent of the older generations. The paper will also show that the users' common interest in Islam unites them on a virtual forum while each participant may also have his or her own individual motives. It will be demonstrated that the mailing list transcends ethnic boundaries while it also establishes links between the gendered communities of men and women, which is facilitated by the anonymity of the Internet services. The paper will show that at a time of increasing hostility towards Muslims in the surrounding society, their sense of community is being strengthened by the use of the powerful medium of communication provided by the Internet.
The aim is to demonstrate how cyber-ethnography has become the most appropriate tool in reaching a definition of the virtual community. It is argued through the cyber-ethnographic examination of two virtual communities that, interpretative research methods traditionally associated with the social sciences enforce preconceived ideas and normative frameworks on to the virtual community. Cyber-ethnography allows a reflexive methodology to emerge, thus enabling the participants of virtual communities to define their own reality and perimeters. It is propounded that there are two elements to the virtual community. First, it is emphasized that a hybrid space is rapidly emerging that is neither absolutely physical or virtual. Through its convergence with the physical the virtual community's existence is apparent, though not unconditionally virtual. Secondly, the participants are depicted as having a transitory, unconditional relationship with the virtual community. That is; they will only participate for short periods when they require use of the resources that the virtual community has to offer.
In this study, we examine the direct and vicarious impact of the social processes of felt and enacted stigma and their impact on the lives of individuals with disabilities and their families. Specifically, findings of interactive interviews with eight adults with disabilities and seven mothers of children with disabilities were analyzed for themes related to components of stigma described by Link and Phelan (2001): labeling, stereotyping, separation, status loss, and discrimination within the context of power differential. Findings suggest that while these social processes can have important negative psychosocial consequences for individuals living with disabilities, the severity of the consequences varies among the components. Findings also indicate that these individuals find varied and creative ways to resist and actively counter the negative effects of stigma in their lives. Findings support the complexity of the experience of stigma and the importance of the socio/cultural context to the lived experience of disability.
Critiques of modern societies often cite the loss of community as a result of weak connections with local places and changing modes of social interactions. We will argue that both the loss of community and attempts to regain community can be understood as a series of debates progressing from one environment to another. Specifically, community was seen as being lost from its original environment, the local place, typically a village or a residential neighborhood. Then came the claim that community could be regained in the environment of shared space, typically voluntary associations or work groups. The most recent candidate for regaining community is the digital environment of cyberspace. Using existing research, we seek to determine if virtual communities are indeed true communities. Can the virtual community provide two of the core elements—common ties and social interaction—without identification with place? We explore each of these environments as we search for community and the qualities necessary to establish community, finding that virtual communities are spatially liberated, socially ramified, topically fused, and psychologically detached, with a limited liability. In this sense, if we understand community to include the close, emotional, holistic ties of Gemeinschaft, then the virtual community is not true community. That does not necessarily imply, however, that Internet relationships are the antithesis of true community relationships. The Internet may either reduce community, reinforce community, or provide a weak replacement.
This paper explores on-line and off-line identities and how relationship are formed and negotiated within internet environments that offer opportunities to meet people on-line and move into relationship off-line. To do this it draws on an analysis of users experiences of internet dating sites that are designed for those who wish meet others in the hope of forming an intimate relationship. Locating analyses in the context of the individualized sociability of late modernity, it is argued that virtual interactions may be shaped by and grounded in the social, bodily and cultural experiences of users. It is shown that disembodied anonymity that characterizes the internet acts as a foundation for the building of trust and establishing real world relationship rather than the construction of fantasy selves. The paper concludes with a discussion of the wider significance of this for understanding disembodied identities and interactions and the impact of cyberspace on off-line sociability.
Extremists, such as hate groups espousing racial supremacy or separation, have established an online presence. A content analysis of 157 extremist web sites selected through purposive sampling was conducted using two raters per site. The sample represented a variety of extremist groups and included both organized groups and sites maintained by apparently unaffiliated individuals. Among the findings were that the majority of sites contained external links to other extremist sites (including international sites), that roughly half the sites included multimedia content, and that half contained racist symbols. A third of the sites disavowed racism or hatred, yet one third contained material from supremacist literature. A small percentage of sites specifically urged violence. These and other findings suggest that the Internet may be an especially powerful tool for extremists as a means of reaching an international audience, recruiting members, linking diverse extremist groups, and allowing maximum image control.