The safety threats experienced by UK journalists and their physical, emotional, and mental well-being

Source: Reuters Institute –

 

6.1 Introduction

This chapter outlines our findings concerning the safety threats that UK journalists¹ experienced, from surveillance and hate speech to legal threats and sexual harassment. Firstly, we explain why this topic was introduced into the survey for the first time, and how it was approached and measured. Secondly, we report how frequently UK journalists said they experienced various safety threats and felt stressed at work. Thirdly, we describe how worried they were about their physical, emotional, and mental well-being. Next, we highlight how gender, the medium, and journalists’ seniority affected their experience of safety and well-being. Finally, we summarise our findings and suggest directions for future research. This chapter aims to support media workers, newsroom directors, media activists, policymakers, journalism educators, and scholars specialising in journalism who seek to protect reporters facing attack and inequalities in the news industry, promote press freedom, and protect reporters’ safety and well-being in the UK.

 

6.2 Journalism in a climate of hate: focusing on journalists’ safety and well-being

The increasingly hostile work environment for journalists in various countries on the democratic spectrum has attracted growing academic and media attention over the past decade (Miller 2021; Waisbord 2020). The rise of anti-media populists on the one hand (Panievsky 2021; Relly 2021) and digital platforms as a direct path to contact journalists on the other (Chen et al. 2018; Lewis et al. 2020) have made political attacks on the media particularly pervasive – including in contexts like the UK, where press freedom is considered relatively protected. Newsrooms worldwide have not yet figured out how to address this techno-political setting, with journalists under attack repeatedly reporting inadequate newsroom policies and insufficient organisational support when coping with personal and aggressive attacks and threats (Holton et al. 2021; Nelson 2023). After decades of journalists’ safety being considered a central issue mainly in the Global South and authoritarian contexts, media scholars and practitioners now pay more attention to threats to journalism in the Global North. In the US, most journalists reported experiencing online harassment to some extent (Lewis et al. 2020). In Sweden, an overwhelming majority received offensive and insulting comments, and a third reported experiencing threats at work (Nilsson and Örnebring 2016). The 2023 survey finds that, among UK journalists, the three most common safety threats are hate speech, public discrediting, and other threats and intimidation (see Figure 6.1). Stress is also a common part of working life for news personnel with 54% of participants responding they experienced work-related stress often or very often (see Figure 6.2).

Figure 6.1

Figure 6.2

In the UK, the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), Women in Journalism, and the National Union of Journalists (NUJ) have documented a significant rise in harassment against journalists, with women and journalists with minoritised characteristics (such as racialised minorities, religious minorities, and LGBTQ+ communities) particularly vulnerable (NUJ 2020; Philips et al. 2023). While sexism and other forms of prejudice are not new to journalism, hostile rhetoric by powerful political figures, combined with social media platforms for angry audiences, requires women journalists to invest more energy, labour, and time in handling online and offline attacks (Kim and Shin, 2022; Miller and Lewis, 2023). One consequence of this is significantly higher levels of stress among women when compared with men. One third of women and about one quarter of men in the survey reported experiencing work-related stress ‘very often’ (see Figure 6.2). Gender non-conforming people also reported high levels of stress. One important note on gender is that only six participants identified as gender non-conforming, therefore statistical comparisons could not be made with such a small sample. The inclusion of results from such a small sample on Figure 6.2 is to promote inclusion and not to infer any overall patterns. In terms of race and ethnicity, mixed and multiple ethnic groups and the other ethnic group category reported higher levels of stress, but again, statistical comparisons cannot be made because of the small number of respondents.

Echoing the increasing awareness of mental health, the burgeoning literature on journalists’ safety has turned towards studying journalists’ happiness and well-being (Bélair-Gagnon et al. 2023; Storm 2024). Qualitative interviews, for instance, found the social environment and newsroom culture in which UK journalists work less supportive than that surrounding journalists in Germany (Šimunjak and Menke 2023).

Journalists’ safety is critical not only for their personal well-being and job satisfaction (Blumell et al. 2023), but also for press freedom and democracy. Attacks against ‘the media’ were found to have a chilling effect in multiple countries, with targeted journalists practising self-censorship, avoiding certain beats and communities, or leaving the profession altogether (Miller 2023; Panievsky 2022).

Our understanding of how media bashing affects journalists’ safety and well-being in different contexts and, in turn, shapes the news they produce, requires further empirical evidence. This is why two questions were added to the survey: (1) ‘In the last five years, how often have you experienced any of the following actions related to your work as a journalist?’ with options ranging from ‘stalking’ and ‘surveillance’ to ‘hateful speech’ and ‘public discrediting’; and (2) ‘Thinking about your work, please tell me how strongly you agree or disagree with the following statements: ‘I am worried about losing my job in journalism within the next 12 months’, ‘I am concerned about my physical well-being’, and ‘I am concerned about my emotional and mental well-being’.²

This is the first systematic, representative survey mapping journalists’ experiences of safety and well-being in the UK. Previous research on UK journalists produced alarming evidence concerning the extent of threats and actual violence journalists face, but none of these reports used a representative sample as the 2023 survey did (see Chapter 11).

 

6.3 Gendered safety and well-being in the newsroom

In the survey, women reported higher levels of ‘very often’ across five of the ten safety threat variables compared with men (see Figure 6.3). Men reported ‘very often’ slightly more often for the threats of ‘arrests, detentions or imprisonment’, ‘legal actions’, and ‘surveillance’. One explanation for this gap might be how higher-ranked journalists are more likely to experience legal actions (see Figure 6.8) and women are underrepresented in the higher rank (see Chapter 2). Respondents who identified as gender non-conforming also reported high levels of safety threats; however, the sample was too small to generalise (n = 6).

One safety threat that disproportionately affects women is sexual harassment. According to our findings, 22% of UK women journalists reported experiencing sexual harassment over the previous five years due to their professional work (10% ‘rarely’, 8% ‘sometimes’, 3% ‘often’, 1% ‘very often’). However, this figure should be approached with caution, since online surveys are not an ideal method to discuss such sensitive and stigmatised issues.

Figure 6.3

We also found gender differences in how journalists perceived their job security and well-being. While concerns about physical well-being (see Figure 6.4) were almost equal among men and women (23% and 24% agreed or strongly agreed they were concerned, respectively), concerns about emotional and mental well-being were higher among women journalists (49% compared with 43% among men) (see Figure 6.5). Fears of losing their job within the next 12 months were also higher among women – 33% expressed such worries, compared with 27% among men (see Figure 6.6). As for women, the few respondents who identified as gender non-conforming also reported lower levels of job security and physical, mental, and emotional well-being; however, the sample was too small to generalise.

Figure 6.4

Figure 6.5

Figure 6.6

These findings mirror evidence coming from outside the UK. Gender is a well-documented factor shaping attacks against journalists (e.g. Chen et al. 2018). Women journalists – especially from minoritised backgrounds – are more likely to experience harassment, intimidation, and threats compared with their colleagues (e.g. Obermaier 2023). Online harassment was labelled ‘the new frontline for women journalists’ following a 15-country survey that found 73% of women journalists reported online abuse; 20% of those also subsequently experienced offline harassment (Posetti et al. 2021). Women journalists were found to be targeted more often than their colleagues – but also differently. Sexual harassment, for instance, tends to disproportionately affect women journalists (Blumell and Mulupi 2024). Moreover, gender inequality shapes both attacks on the media and the response to them. Newsroom norms that punish reporting online violence as signs of ‘weakness’, for instance, make it harder to counter online attacks against women journalists (Claesson 2023).

In addition to the gender differences, we found some discrepancies between journalists from different ethnicities. Although the overwhelming majority of our respondents identified as White, making straightforward comparisons with journalists from other ethnicities difficult, the data still suggest that journalists from Black, Black British, Caribbean, or African backgrounds, for instance, experienced higher levels of stress at work – 75% reported feeling stressed at work ‘often’ or ‘very often’, compared with 53% of White journalists. Journalists from Asian or Asian British backgrounds reported more worries about losing their jobs than journalists who identified as White, but the underrepresentation of these groups in UK newsrooms, and the size of the sample, means that we cannot provide comparative statistical analysis. Further qualitative investigation into these underrepresented groups of journalists is needed.

In 2021, the Home Office and the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport held a ‘call for evidence’ on journalist safety, where journalists were encouraged to report their experiences. More than four in five journalists who responded to the call experienced threats, abuse, or violence related to their journalistic work, including violence, death threats, bullying, sexism, racism, and homophobia, and more than a third of women respondents indicated that they did not feel safe operating as a journalist in the UK (NUJ 2020). While this evidence strengthens the impression that many journalists in the UK feel unsafe, it did not offer a comprehensive view of the media industry. The 2023 survey, which is representative of the population of UK journalists, helps map the centres of risk to journalists’ safety and well-being. Due to the sensitive nature of these risks – particularly sexual harassment – a combination of our representative quantitative overview and further qualitative work is needed to better monitor and protect UK journalists against these risks in the future.

Addressing the gender and racial safety gap is critical for the future of newsroom equality. Continuing efforts and coalitions, like the Expert Women Project (Franks and Howell 2019) have had a positive impact on gender inequality in UK media. The share of women in top editing positions in the UK, for instance, has grown from 29% in 2020 to 40% in 2024, higher than in countries like Germany, Spain, and Finland (Ross Arguedas et al. 2024). Nevertheless, gendered discrimination remains a substantial challenge. Initial evidence indicates that women journalists are more likely to use avoidance strategies – like self-censoring and considering quitting – in response to online attacks (Sampaio-Dias et al. 2023; Stahel and Schoen 2020). Thus, if support and training for journalists under attack remain insufficient, newsroom equality in the UK (see Chapter 1) might further deteriorate.

 

6.4 Find a happy medium: types of media and journalists’ safety

Who are the likely targets of harassment and intimidation in the UK media? Beyond gender, race, and ethnicity, previous research indicates that visibility and certain news beats, among other variables, increase the likelihood of journalists being targeted (Lewis et al. 2020; Stahel 2023; Waisbord 2020). While physical attacks on journalists are associated with war reporting and investigative reporting, particularly in authoritarian countries, the kinds of threats that the UK respondents reported on – from online harassment to public discrediting – have been shown to disproportionately affect journalists who cover controversial topics (North 2016).

We found that the media cultural background of UK journalists’ main employer was another factor that correlated with higher levels of experienced risks and threats. Journalists at an outlet with a TV or newspaper background reported the highest levels of hate speech (57% of TV journalists and newspaper journalists reported experiencing it ‘sometimes’, ‘often’, or ‘very often’) and other threats or intimidation (21% for TV and 23% for newspapers) (see Figure 6.7). Newspaper journalists faced the highest levels of legal action taken against them (9% reported facing legal threats ‘sometimes’, ‘often’, or ‘very often’). The overwhelming majority of UK journalists, nonetheless, said they never experienced legal actions directed against them.

Figure 6.7

Figure 6.8

The explanation for why these two groups suffer disproportionally might be different, however. TV reporters were previously found to be more targeted than others due to their higher visibility (e.g. Miller and Lewis 2023; Stahel 2023). Moreover, the decades-long campaign against the BBC (Barwise and York 2020; Mills 2016) might have contributed to the particularly hostile environment that TV journalists describe. The high levels of intimidation towards newspaper journalists, however, might result from the exceptionally partisan and tabloid nature of large sections of the British press.

Concerns about job loss also varied based on medium: while 35% of newspaper journalists and 36% of journalists who had no main employer expressed fear of losing their jobs only 25% of journalists who worked for news agencies, 26% of radio journalists, and 27% of TV journalists expressed similar concerns (see Figure 6.6). These findings could be explained by two factors: first, the ongoing decline in newspaper readership and decades of budget cuts in newspapers across the UK. Second, journalists with no main employer tend to do more freelance work and have unstable contracts. Fears of job loss among journalists is a critical factor, as it might have a chilling effect, jeopardising journalists’ willingness to produce independent investigative reporting or stand up to those in power for the fear of losing their livelihood.

 

6.5 Breaking ranks: journalists’ seniority and safety

Finally, we found a correlation between journalists’ reported experiences of safety threats and their seniority within the newsroom.

We classified all respondents as either ‘higher ranked’, for those with strategic authority in the newsroom, ‘middle ranked’, for those with operational authority, or ‘lower ranked’, for those with no management role. We found that lower-ranked journalists experienced hate speech and public discrediting of their journalistic work significantly more frequently than those of the higher rank (see Figure 6.8).

Lower- and middle-ranked respondents were also more worried about losing their jobs – 34% and 33% respectively agreed or strongly agreed when asked if they were concerned about losing their job in the upcoming year, compared with 25% of higher-ranked journalists (see Figure 6.6). Higher-ranked respondents, however, reported experiencing legal actions related to their work more than the other two groups of journalists. 10% of higher-ranked respondents reported experiencing legal threats related to their work at least ‘sometimes’, more than lower-ranked (4%) and middle-ranked respondents (4%) (see Figure 6.8).

 

6.6 Conclusion: safer future for UK journalism

This chapter provides evidence for the gendered nature of the risks to UK journalists’ safety and well-being. It also highlights the different experiences reported by journalists working for TV and newspapers compared with those working for other media, like news agencies and internet natives. Finally, it exposes the discrepancies between the types of threats experienced by journalists of different levels of seniority in the newsroom. These findings can be helpful for future research and advocacy to meet the current challenge of attacks on journalists in the UK.

Race and ethnicity, which were found to shape the spread, intensity, and nature of attacks against journalists (e.g. Obermaier 2023), did not produce significant statistical differences in the survey. However, as the overwhelming majority of all the respondents to the survey identified as White (90%, see Chapter 1), further research will be needed to account for the role of race and ethnicity in UK journalists’ safety and well-being. A 15-country UNESCO report found that Black, Indigenous, Jewish, Arab, and Asian women journalists were experiencing ‘the highest rates and most severe impacts of online violence’, highlighting the intersectional dimension of online attacks on reporters (Posetti et al. 2021). However, the approaches and legal limitations to measuring the racial nature of attacks against journalists vary significantly between countries. More qualitative work, focused on the UK news industry, is hence called for.

There is a growing demand for better protective measures, proactive monitoring, and support systems for journalists due to increasing evidence that the resources in place are insufficient. This includes policies aimed at preventing violence, providing legal protections, and offering organisational backing, professional training, and psychological support (e.g. the UN Plan of Action on the Safety of Journalists 2021). This chapter is intended to contribute to these ongoing efforts by media practitioners, outlets, and researchers.

 

Footnotes

 

 

 

Read More – https://reutersinstitute.politics.ox.ac.uk/uk-journalists-2020s/6-safety-threats-experienced-uk-journalists-and-their-physical-emotional