Polarization and incivility in digital debates on women’s rights in Spain. Not just a matter of machismo

ABSTRACT

As is the case in many other countries, Spain faces the challenge of drastically reducing the presence of gender violence. In this paper, we analyse how public digital debate in Spain gives insight into this topic. Specifically, we are interested in analysing the ways in which processes such as polarization or incivility are manifested on social networks. Our thesis is that, in addition to the central role played by structural machismo, there are particular characteristics of online debate that regulate the presence of polarization and incivility. In order to assess this, we analyse two case studies on Twitter, ‘La Manada’ and ‘Cuéntalo’. We demonstrate how spontaneous digital debates favour the emergence of negative behaviours, while those that, as is the case with ‘Cuéntalo’, are organized and structured, favour more respectful, less polarized communication.

KEYWORDS:

• Digital communication
• polarization
• incivility
• machismo
• misogyny
• gender violence
• Twitter

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Data availability

The data that support the findings of this study are available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request.

Notes

1. One of the most important effects of this case was the reopening of the debate in Spain on the regulation of sexual crimes in Spain (Acale Sánchez & Faraldo Cabana, 2018).

Additional information

Funding

This research has been partially supported by the Government of Spain, Grant Plan Nacional de I+D+i, PID2019-106254RB-100 and PGC2018-096509B-I00.

Notes on contributors

Juan Antonio Guevara

Juan Antonio Guevara graduated in Psychology and has a Master's degree in Social Psychology as well as a Master's degree in Methodology of behavioural & health sciences. He is a PhD student in Data Science. Universidad Complutense de Madrid. [email protected]

Julia Atienza-Barthelemy

Julia Atienza-Barthelemy graduated in Physics and has a Master's degree in Computational Engineering and Mathematics. She is a PhD student in Complex Systems. Universidad Politécnica de Madrid.

Daniel Gómez González

Daniel Gómez, Professor in the Department of Statistics and Data Science at Universidad Complutense de Madrid, is Director of “Instituto Universitario de Evaluación Sanitaria and Co-Director of the ‘Data Science and Soft Computing for Social Analytics and Decision Aid’ research group. [email protected]

José Manuel Robles

José Manuel Robles, PhD in Sociology and Political Sciences, is a Professor in the Department of Applied Sociology at Universidad Complutense de Madrid and Co-Director of the ‘Data Science and Soft Computing for Social Analytics and Decision Aid’ research group. [email protected]