Belgrade (AFP) – As Pride events got underway in Europe in June, disinformation and hate speech targeting the LGBTQ community spread across social media, triggering extreme online responses, including incitements to violence.
Issued on: 23/06/2023 - 04:24
Advocacy groups across Europe said the deluge of toxic content online is part of an overall trend of rising anti-LGBTQ sentiment worldwide. But the community is coming under particular pressure during public events -- including those associated with Pride, they noted.
The surge in online disinformation and vitriol is all the more worrying after a spate of violence during Pride events last summer in Europe.
One social media post in Polish falsely stating that the army would create "LGBT units" was shared across Telegram, Twitter and Facebook in Serbia.
That prompted some users to comment that the new soldiers should be "burned at the stake", while others praised Hitler's persecution of gay men.
Another false claim, that the Arc de Triomphe in Paris had been turned into a rainbow art installation, went viral in multiple European languages. Facebook users responded with slurs -- one person calling for LGBTQ people to be burned and executed.
In Hungary, where government and pro-government media personalities often use anti-LGBTQ rhetoric, Pride celebrations were referred to online using derogatory, homophobic slurs.
Online, some posts smeared the LGBTQ community with claims of child abuse.
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