The #MeToo Movement makes its Appearance in Greek Society. Representation of the Victims in the Media.

Valosis, Konstantinos

4. term

European Studies, Master

2023

2023-05-30

49 pages

The feminist #MeToo movement, which began in the United States and became known in 2017 and extended to many nations around the world, brought the subject of female sexual harassment and violence into the public’s eye. The movement occurred during a period when there was an escalating trend of promoting feminism across media, and according to my research, the accusations from famous people attracted the media's interest in promoting the movement further to the public. The #MeToo, followed the revelations of sexual abuse in Hollywood and became a landmark movement that would spread from country to country and continent to continent, pulling back the black veil of silence that had covered every act of sexual, and not only, violence, while giving women, above all, the courage to confront their perpetrators. However, one of the most prominent criticisms of the digital feminist #MeToo movement's coverage by the Media is that it focuses on women celebrities while reinforcing well-known trends pertaining to the publication of sexual harassment cases against women and also feminism. This thesis was inspired by the extensive media coverage that the Greek #MeToo movement received, as well as the fact that the majority of those made by females, who were treated differently by the media based on their public status. Although the debate was open, some incidents never went to justice (perhaps because not all are proven without cameras or written testimonies), but at least this gave the courage to victims of sexual abuse or violence to speak up. The thesis aims to investigate how the media portray in their headlines alleged harassment victims, concentrating on the contrasts and similarities between celebrities and public figures. More specifically, for my research I used two different online media outlets, Thetoc.gr and Gossip-tv.gr, and their coverage of two cases that started the #MeToo movement in Greece. The first one is hosting “hard news”, which basically deals with more political and societal issues and the second one “soft news”, which covers stories about celebrities and famous people. The first case is about the athlete Sofia Bekatorou and her confession against an agent of the Hellenic Sailing Federation, and the second case is about three actresses Eleni Drosaki, Anna Maria Papacharalampous and Penelope Anastasopoulou where they accused a famous actor - director- of sexual harassment. The media outlets and their headlines are evaluated based on their quantity, classification within the web pages, and content.

MeToo ; Greek ; movement

Download
View record in AAU Student Projects