News
Quo vadis, Serbia?
How did the defenders of Serbia’s shameful past get the right to paint murals of war criminals?How did we get to the point of considering activists as rioters and arresting them? In commemoration of the International Day against Fascism on November 9, the Youth Initiative for Human Rights in Serbia announced that it would paint …
Editor of the Antimigrant portal acquitted of Charges of Inciting Intolerance Against Migrants
Fatmir Alispahić, founder and editor of the Antimigrant portal, was acquitted of charges of inciting national, racial, and religious hatred, strife, and intolerance. In the rationale of the verdict of the Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina, Judge Goran Radević explained that Alispahić was acquitted, among other things, because the Prosecutor’s Office of Bosnia and Herzegovina …
Call to media: putting an end to sensational reporting on the murder of the minor in Fier
Reporting Diversity Network 2.0, concerned about the way the media are reporting the case of the murder of a minor from Fier, draws the attention of those behind the sensational headlines and reports, in order to take measures in stopping harmful reporting practices. Not only the nature of the crime, but the way it was …
HATE SPEECH IN THE WESTERN BALKANS: October Monthly Highlights
Throughout the month of October, the RDN monitoring team has detected a range of hateful narratives and discourse. During this month there has been a rise in hate speech including ethnic discrimination, homophobia and sexism across the Western Balkans. Homophobia in Albania and Serbia Pristina artist Astrit Ismaili appeared at the Athens Biennale dressed as …
THE PASSIVITY OF THE INSTITUTIONS TOWARDS THE (RESURRECTION OF) THE PUBLIC ROOMS
It looks like the Macedonian society as a whole has been turned into a large public room, into a voyeuristic chamber in which everyone caresses to peek into the intimacy of a stranger and to appropriate a part of the privacy of the other. This, coupled with the slow or non-existent reaction and the absence …
TROLL OF THE MONTH: A private group on Facebook who shared inappropriate photos of underage Roma girls
The Balkan Troll of the Month is an individual, a group of individuals or a media outlet that spreads hate on the internet based on gender, ethnicity, religion, or other diversity categories. The Balkan Troll is selected based on hate speech incidents identified across the Western Balkans region. Our October Troll of the Month is …
THE BURDEN OF INFORMATION MANIPULATION: WHO SUFFERS THE CONSEQUENCES
Evangelical pastor Akil Pano, leader of the Albanian Coalition for the Protection of the Family, in a Facebook post, reported on a form/questionnaire coming from a kindergarten in Tirana, where the terms ‘mother’ and ‘father’ had been substituted with ‘parent 1’ and ‘parent 2.’ Pano argued that the “Gay Agenda” has being implemented, stating that …
MATTEL’S GENDER-NEUTRAL DOLLS CREATE STIR IN THE SERBIAN MEDIA
In late 2019, Mattel, a USA toy company, launched “world’s first gender-neutral doll”. Recently, the Creatable World doll became available in Serbia and some of the most influential media in the country reported on it. Some also created a platform to discuss the changes gender inclusive toys will bring to our society. The Serbian media …
BEING TRANS IN SERBIA: THE MEDIA’S SILENCE
Serbia seems to have built a wall of silence around the trans community. This approach is flawed in many aspects, especially as some from the trans community report it can have detrimental consequences. “Gender is one aspect of our identity and it is defined as one’s innermost concept of self as a man or a …