A study by the Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre involving a large group of Canadian journalists says that a quarter of those surveyed said they were harassed online at least once a week.wellphoto/Getty Images/iStockphoto
Anthony Feinstein is a professor in the Department of Psychiatry at the University of Toronto and a researcher at Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre.
Targeting journalists online for a litany of reasons has become a global phenomenon. Studies undertaken in North and South America, Europe, Asia and Australia over the past decade have described the nature of the threats, but not the psychological consequences of them. This changed earlier this month with a publication from my research group at Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre in the European Journal of Psychotraumatology.
Findings from a large group of Canadian journalists reveal that a quarter of them are harassed online at least once a week if not almost daily through a variety of platforms, X (formerly Twitter) being the most frequently used. A third of the sample was threatened with physical harm, one in five was harassed sexually, a similar number received death threats and almost more than 12 per cent received threats directed at their families.
This online barrage of abuse was associated with symptoms of significant emotional distress, anxiety being the most prominent, affecting 30 per cent of the sample. While the study’s methodology did not allow the researchers to make formal psychiatric diagnoses, the data revealed strong associations between the frequency of threats and symptoms of post-traumatic stress, depression and anxiety.
Looking beyond these symptoms, however, a more subtle marker of emotional distress was discernible. Online harassment is a potential source of moral injury. As defined by the Moral Injury Project at Syracuse University, the condition refers to the damage done to one’s conscience or moral compass when one perpetrates, witnesses or fails to prevent acts that transgress personal moral beliefs, values or ethical codes of conduct.
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The military has known about the challenges presented by moral injury for decades, but journalists have come late to the table. Recently, our research group developed and published a psychometric scale for quantifying the condition in journalists – the Toronto Moral Injury Scale for Journalists – and participants in the online harassment study were asked to complete it. While it is important to remember that moral injury is not considered a mental illness the way anxiety and depressive disorders are, the condition is associated with a number of negative emotions such as shame, guilt, disgust, despair and anger. The predominant emotion to emerge in the harassment study was anger. The moral-injury literature suggests that anger is more closely linked to the egregious behaviour of others, whereas shame and guilt are more likely to arise when individuals transgress their own moral compass. Such an explanation fits well with the journalist online-harassment data.
It is not hard to understand how moral distress and injury can arise from being subjected to vicious online abuse. Being threatened with death and rape, and having one’s children become the focus of an anonymous individual’s vitriol, strips away the thin veneer of civilization that provides society with a degree of comfort; its fragility is suddenly exposed. Good, accurate reportage and in-depth investigative news gathering keep us informed of what is going on in our community, country and the world at large. Work like this forms one of the bedrocks of civil society. For journalists to be attacked for doing it by nameless, faceless individuals is morally egregious. This is not how one should discuss and resolve differences of opinion.
One of the consequences that can come with moral injury is that if left unaddressed, it can lead to cynicism, disillusionment and a sense of estrangement from one’s work, profession and colleagues. It can undermine the noble goals that motivate many journalists, and tarnish the high ideals they ascribe to their profession.
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The online harassment study is not, however, filled with negative findings only. While journalists are acutely aware of the dark side of online harassment, they are equally aware of the benefits of sharing their work online. It allows them to reach a vast audience. Our data also show that many interactions with online readers are positive and affirming. There is good to be found alongside the hate and fury that are directed at the profession.
The immediate challenge for journalists and newsrooms in confronting online harassment is to ensure physical safety by having mechanisms in place to assess risk and respond appropriately to it. At the same time, journalists have to live with the uncomfortable reality that in a free, democratic and open society, there are variables in this equation that cannot be controlled. Retaining one’s own moral compass, remaining true to the ideals of good journalism, having ready access to therapy when needed, and retaining the support of one’s editors and management can offer a path forward.