Our project consists of an interactive infographic, which shows the pictures of four women journalists that have been victims of different types of violence or harassment. Here you can explore with some icons their stories, summarized in some small articles. Moreover, there is a function to listen to them.
The infographic is linked, via QR Code, to this report, in which we explain our choices, our point of view, our focus and our contribution to the UniMed project.
Through our work, we want to spread awareness about the multiplicity of violence, in order to make our readers more critical and self-conscious about the issue.
In fact, we chose four different journalists, with different backgrounds, different nationalities, different main topics they work about, different stories and types of violence suffered.
In order to highlight this multi-faced issue, we wrote their stories in four different ways.
We created our pieces in our own personal way, underlining our personal involvement in these stories: how we wrote reflects how these stories had an impact on us.
Our goal is to spread awareness about how violence, in particular violence against women and journalists, has so many shades and way to be excerpt.
In the common sense and public opinion violence is often associated to beat, homicide, rape, - which are all horrible crimes and they need to be stopped - but major media rarely talk about other forms of violence perpetuated against women journalists.
Here we mention rape threats, death threats, stalking, sexual blackmail, but we can think about so many more, for instance, all kind of blackmail and threats, psychological violence and toxic behaviors, verbal aggression, such as insults on social network, sexual harassment etc.… These serious issues are often left aside, so we wanted to focus the attention on what is considered “minor issue”.
We chose to report the following stories of Linda Pelkonen, Federica Angeli, Marta Fernández and Khadija Ismaiylova:
LINDA PELKONEN
Linda Pelkonen is a radio journalist, who works for the Finnish media company Yle.
She has previously worked as a parliamentary journalist and as a policy editor for MustRead, Ilta-Sanomat, New Finland, Iltalehti and Pohjalainen.
When, in 2015, a 14-year-old girl was raped in a small city in Finland, and a citizen of immigrant background was identified as the main suspect by the police, she was working as a freelance reporter for the Finnish online newspaper Uusi Suomi.
While studying the case, Linda found some problems with the police press release and decided to write a story to highlight the unusual way they identified the suspect’s ethnic identity.
The publication of the article transformed Linda into the target of a “storm” of hate speech and online abuses, that started when the anti-immigrant propagandistic website MV Lethi attacked her for the reporting of the case.
Linda was firstly accused of being protecting the rapist and, when some readers shared her personal phone number on the website, she was also harassed by insulting messages and intimidatory calls.
When she was threatened of rape, Linda finally went to the police, but she couldn’t find the authorities’ support since, according to the regional prosecutor, journalists “need to be able to endure more criticism than others”.
Luckily, this position was later overruled by the general prosecutor who, in order to avoid the creation of a dangerous precedent in matter of online harassment, decided to help her in the fight against the harassers.
Thanks to the UJF (Union of Journalists in Finland) and the Finland prosecutor’s office’ support, she could file a complaint, and in 2018 two of the three men identified as being behind the online abuses, were sentenced to prison by the Regional Court.
In 2019 the all the harassers were finally found guilty by the Helsinki Court of Appeal.
Linda Pelkonen’s case set an important precedent in Finland, since that was the first time that a complaint for this type of abuses led to a conviction, but also for worldwide journalists.
Even if these cases are still very rare, this one represents one small step in the fight against online harassment.
FEDERICA ANGELI
Federica Angeli is an Italian journalist, best known for her mafia investigations in Rome.
Passionate about what happens in the world and willing to critically investigate social processes and the cause of events, she graduated in sociology and then in law. She then began writing for the newspaper "La Repubblica", becoming an editor in 2005. Her field of interest is the crime and judicial chronicle.
She deals with numerous inquiries within the territory of Rome, most of them to expose acts of violence, beating, hazing by the Mafia and to give light to some questions not yet revealed. In 2013, she published an in-depth investigation on the link between various groups of the criminal sub-group in Ostia and the public administration. This investigation led to the arrest of 51 people on charges of corruption, infiltration in administrative bodies and in the allocation of social housing and taking away business from victims of usury.
It was 2013 when the first intimidating message arrived. On May 13th, with a colleague, she went to the Lido of Ostia Maggiore (Ostia) for an investigation on the influence of organized crime within the bathing business when she found herself face to face with Armando Spada, a member of the criminal group she accused: "I will shoot you on the forehead". Nevertheless, In 2018, she decided to testify in the trial against him. Other threats followed the one of Spada, some more subtle, as the one of the entrepreneur Paolo Riccardo Papagni: "Federica, you are young, you have a family ...". Papagni, who later tried to stop Federica’s investigations, justified himself saying that he just wanted to give her an advice and not to imply anything. Others threads, instead, were much heavier. All made by men, towards the journalist.
The decision now becomes an obligation: since 17th July 2013, Federica Angeli must live under escort in order to continue her work, without the fear of being attacked. However, the fear remains as strong as before. The death threats continue to pursue consistently: on 7th April 2018, an envelope addressed to her, containing a bullet, is delivered to her office at the Fatto Quotidiano headquarter.
Her life is not easy, she is forced to have at least two agents following her in every move, she is obliged to inform the day before if she wants to leave her home and she cannot show herself in certain places, such as some bars.
For her work and her courage, she was awarded by the President of the Republic Sergio Mattarella with the title of Officer of the Order of Merit of the Italian Republic.
It is 2021, after eight years, Federica Angeli still lives under escort.
MARTA FERNANDEZ
Marta Fernández is a Spanish journalist. She began to work between television sets and cameras on Telemadrid. She was followed by Televisión Española, CNN +, but she became popular when she began to present the news of Telecinco and then of Noticias Cuatro. She is incisive, fast, and credible, she immediately stood out among the great public figures of the media in her country.
She had so much potential and so many records, that the directors of Mediaset proposed her a difficult change, an upgrade from the news, to present the television program La Mañana del Cuatro. She accepted the challenge and achieved remarkable success.
She then ended up leaving television and signing for the newspaper 'El País' and Cadena SER.
The story: "Caution when opening". The warning was handwritten on an envelope sent to her home address, and it was only the first disturbing sign of what was to come. Inside, a handwritten letter as well. That was the first letter from El Pájaro Azul, the man who harassed Marta Fernández, host of Cuatro*, for two years, from 2017 to 2019.
"Hello, I’m EL Pájaro Azul", he introduced himself in one of the letters, "will you allow me to land on your left shoulder to talk to you? ... A coffee? ". He even threatened the journalist's partner: "Tell him that no one has property on you and that we could be friends, but it is too late, unless he apologizes" he assured.
"The harassment begins in a way that is impossible to detect," Marta told an Antena 3 program herself, "an individual begins to write to me through social networks. They were rare messages, but not worrisome." "Suddenly I was scared when one day he sent me a letter to my home address with a door number, floor and letter," she continues, her story, "the most shocking thing is that my stalker identified himself. He did not understand anything."
And from letters, El Pájaro Azul passed directly to the physical stalking at her home. "There are many days that I pass in front of your house, even though I can't see you on your balcony. I also remember that day you went out with that tight dress that marked your silhouette”.
Marta Fernández decided to make this episode public on Antena 3 after denouncing her stalker. Today he still has a restraining order of 500 meters in force.
KHADIJA ISMAYILOVA
WHO IS SHE? Khadija Ismayilova is an Azerbaijanian investigative journalist, born (in 1976) and raised in Azerbaijan. She is a journalist since her graduation in 1997.
HER JOB AND HER TOPICS: she is an investigative journalist, she was a journalist for Radio free Europe/Radio Liberty, an independent medium. Nowadays she is part of the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP), thanks to her best works. In fact, she is one of the journalists that investigate the corruption of the actual Azerbaijani president, Ilham Aliyev, and his family. She published, in 2010, a full article presenting evidence that the economic activity of the presidential family and their closest friend were factually illegal. For example, the president’s daughter Aliyeva owned a bank that had never been privatised. In addition, it was reported that Arzu Aliyeva had become co-owner of a company without ever winning the tender and had control of all the most profitable services of the airline Azerbaijan Airlines. In another article she revealed the nominatives of the offshore companies registered under the president’s daughters’ names. The Government refused to comment on these articles but the next year enacted some laws that blocked every consultation of datas regarding incomes, activities ecc… except for police or finance investigations. In 2012 with the OCCRP she published a report stating that a large amount of members of the presidential family and some government officials were owners of some companies in Czech Republic (the Azerbaijanian laws state that the president and the officials can’t possess economic activities, but their families can). Her actions against the government corruption and the censorship continued in 2013 when she exposed the fact that the list of nongrated people in Azerbaijan was composed almost exclusively by journalists and activists.
THE ATTACK: on March 2012 Khadija received in her mail some screenshots of a video, recorded with hiding cameras in her own bedroom, during and intimate moment with her boyfriend: it was sexual blackmail. The photos were attached to a public-humiliation threat and were sent also to her boyfriend, family and national media. The journalist refused publicly to surrender at the blackmail, so the videos are published on an opposition side, which deny any involvement: a defamatory campaign was on (the official appeal was immediately presented by the Ismayilova, but the investigation was opened after the video went public). These actions, perpetrated against the woman, were attempts to silence and censor the journalist. She investigated these events and found out a series of links to the government and decided to publish them.
The next year she was participating to a peaceful protest in Baku, where she was incarcerated and asked to pay a fine, but she refused because she wasn’t breaking any law. This led 220 hours of social service and more defamatory campaigns. The pick was touched in 2014, when she was arrested with the accusation of incitement to suicide of an ex co-worker, just the day after the Head of the Presidential Administration called her publicly a “traitor”. In 2015, why she was still under process, she was also accused of tax evasion and power abuse. She was incarcerated for 18 months for these two accusations, while the first one was withdrawn by his coworker as well. She was still on a travel ban.
THE END: She was released in 2016 thanks to the international organization pressure, but on probation. In May 2021 her travel ban was lifted and she moved out to England.
THE TYPE OF VIOLENCE: sexual blackmail, defamation, incarceration.
As these experiences show, these issues are impactful on the women that suffer them. That is why we want to bring to light what are considered in media landscape “minor issues”: in our opinion they should have more space in major media, such as television, newspapers, and radio. This could be useful in many ways: first, people that are suffering these violences as well can find the courage to report their abuser. Moreover, our work leads to the consciousness of the various shades of violence, that sometimes hide in what could seem a “normal action”. In this way we hope to stimulate people to be more aware of who they love, or who they meet. Finally, we hope that the media, talking about all the violence, will use a more responsible and conscious language, in order to face the biases in these narratives, such as victim shaming.
We wanted to share these stories because we know that everyone can fight violence against women, men, women, mothers, fathers, brothers, sisters, friends, strangers ecc…
If everyone knows the problem, can fight the problem.
By Giulia Bigarelli, Eugenia Sala, Anna Galante, Maria Curiel, Nicola Tosello
References:
La Repubblica https://roma.repubblica.it/cronaca/2020/11/30/news/minaccio_di_morte_la_giornalista_federica_an geli_condannato_a_un_anno_armando_spada-276476249/
Il sussidiario.net
https://www.ilsussidiario.net/news/federica-angeli-chi-e-le-minacce-di-mortedopo-la-sua-inchiesta-sulla-mafia-a-ostia/2179258/
Elconfidencial.com
https://www.elconfidencial.com/espana/2019-09-09/periodista-escritora-martafernandez-acosada_2215979/
HOLA.com
https://www.hola.com/actualidad/20190909148974/marta-fernandez-acosada-espejopublico/
La Voz de Galicia
https://www.lavozdegalicia.es/noticia/sociedad/2019/09/10/marta-fernandezconfiesa-terrible-acoso-sufrio-parte-hombre-durante-dos-anos/00031568100653764225922.htm
Front line defenders
https://www.frontlinedefenders.org/en/case/case-history-khadija-ismayilova
Institutional press institute
https://ipi.media/journalists-in-finland-face-unprecedented-levels-ofonline-abuse/
Union of Journalists in Finland
https://journalistiliitto.fi/en/court-of-appeal-rules-in-favour-ofjournalist-victim-of-hate-speech/
Video: The Pegasus Project: Life for Khadija Ismayilova in Azerbaijan’s Digital Autocracy https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AN7EOiyOvl4
Video
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OH9EVNiNxVc&t=36s
Documentary: A Dark Place: A Sofjo Documentary
https://vimeo.com/468522796
Video: Editors’ commitment instrumental to shielding journalists from impact of online abuse
https://youtu.be/JGth2L-Rd5I