The present article explores the interface between online misogyny and xenophobia in the context of both
socio-cultural factors which are conducive to verbal aggression against women and cyberspace’s technological affordances. The
former, as will be argued, can be linked to “rape culture”, where the notions of rape and sexual violence are used not only as
instruments of subjugation and domination, but also as tools to legitimize racial, ethnic, or religious hatred. In the case of the
latter, anonymity, interactivity and connectivity will be discussed as factors which facilitate generating, amplifying and
perpetuating hateful and aggressive content online. Applying the Media Proximization Approach (Kopytowska 2013, 2015a, 2018a,
2018b, 2020) and drawing on
previous research examining online xenophobic discourses and hate speech, the article scrutinizes hate speech targeting female
politicians, namely Angela Merkel, current Chancellor of Germany, and Ewa Kopacz, former Polish Prime Minister, for their
pro-refugee stance and migration policy. Data-wise, the examples analyzed will be taken from the corpora comprising comments
following online articles in niezalezna.pl (a Polish conservative
news portal) and YouTube videos on migrants and refugees.
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