Katrin Göring-Eckardt on Hate Speech: Internet hate keeps women away from politics

Digital violence against women

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"Piece of shit", "Sick in the head", "Insane" - What politicians like Renate Künast have to put up with online according to a court order can be very rough and threatening. Hostility on the Internet is particularly common for women like the Green Party politician. According to the Green Group leader Katrin Göring-Eckardt, this prevents many women from a political career.

"Unfortunately, it happens too often that women in particular are hostile to social networks, right up to stupid turn-ons on the street or actual attacks and threats," said Goering-Eckardt to the newspapers of the Funke media group. Many women are concerned about this.

Göring-Eckardt reported on his own experiences: "I was already spit on while jogging or insulted in a café - and politicians are regularly threatened online, including me." That is stressful. However, it is more difficult for women in local politics, who are often on their own. "They always have such hostility directly on the skin."

Lambrecht receives death threats for draft law

Federal Justice Minister Christine Lambrecht (SPD) recently said in the "Handelsblatt" that she had received death threats in the course of the debate about a bill to combat hate crime.

According to the draft bill, social networks should no longer only remove certain illegal content, but also report content and IP address to the Federal Criminal Police Office so that criminal prosecution can be initiated. They should also be obliged to provide passwords to authorities. If the networks do not cooperate, they face fines of millions. The judiciary also wants to act harder against the threat or approval of future imaginary crimes.

Green politician Künast had launched a movement against Hate Speech after her defeat at the Berlin regional court. Together with network activists and women's rights activists, she wants to act across the party "against digital violence". The sexist dimension of hate or online violence is laughed at too often.