“She Should Be Burnt At A Stake!” Newspaper Names & Shames Thunberg Trolls

“She Should Be Burnt At A Stake!” Newspaper Names & Shames Thunberg Trolls
B&T Magazine
By B&T Magazine



A British newspaper has named and shamed readers who trolled the teenage environmental activist Greta Thunburg.

Over the weekend, Thunburg was in the English city of Bristol for the Bristol Youth Strike 4 Climate (BYS4C) event that attracted some 15,000 supporters.

The arrival of the 17-year-old was clearly big news for the city and the local paper, The Bristol Post, who gave Thunberg’s visit and the rally significant coverage.

Problem was, whenever the publication posted stories about Thunberg, editors noted they were being inundated by negative, hateful comments.

Bristol Post editors decided to take matters into their own hands having seen a rise in threatening or violent comments about the teen activist on its social media pages.

Some of the comments included: “Can someone grab her pigtails and ms trunchable her over the fence.” “She should be burnt at the stake!” “Crush the bitch. Sounds good to me. Send her home” and “Her parents need to slap her with a brick.”

Rather than ignore the threats, the newspaper decided to publicly out those behind the comments. You can read the full reporting here.

Bristol Post senior reporter Tristan Cook wrote in his commentary: “Most of that abuse was just that – abuse, sharing unkind memes about her, calling her a ‘puppet’, questioning her own actions travelling the world, or just calling her names.

“These comments came in their thousands, day and night, filling Facebook pages and groups – faster in greater volume than anyone moderating those pages or groups, or Facebook itself, could hide or delete.”

 

 

 

 




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