The Launch of the Silence Hate Media Projects

21 February 2019

Region: Europe

Screen_Shot_2019-02-21_at_3.35.02_PMFollowing Media Diversity Institute (MDI) and Silence Hate’s Media Camp in London in April of last year, fourteen teams and individual journalists from across Europe have been selected to produce stories and campaigns countering hate speech against migrants. After several months of hard work, many of these journalists are in the final stages of their projects.

The first media project within Silence Hate to go public is called The Undocumented. The Undocumented is a series of podcasts produced by Greek journalists that gives a voice to migrants facing hate speech and discrimination.

“We are really glad to introduce a new format to Greece’s media landscape and society, since podcasts are not that popular in the country,” says Greek journalist Sotiris Sideris, who worked alongside Aristea Protonotariou, the project’s creator and producer.“Each episode of our first season has something new to say by focusing on refugee stories that go unseen, underreported, or undocumented by the mainstream media,” he continues. “That’s also the biggest challenge we’ve had to face; the ability to present something different and interesting to both Europeans and refugees or migrants. We are not presenting any of these stories just because there is space to fill in your free time. We are presenting them because we think that, by developing a new and creative counter-narrative, we can combat and prevent hate speech against a population at risk of marginalisation.”

Another media project being published this month is “My Journey,” a short team by an Italian team of journalists that tells the story of migrants and refugees passing through the so-called Balkan route, comparing today’s migrants with the experiences of migrants 20 years ago in the same region.

#SilenceHate is a project led by the Italian organisation COSPE with participation of prominent European organisations such as MDI, Amnesty Italy and Poland, EFJ, Karpos, Zaffiria and the Cyprus Community Media Centre. The aim of the project is to combat and prevent online hate speech against migrants by developing new and creative counter-narratives.