Guidelines and Recommendations for ethical and non-discriminatory reporting about violence against women and girls in online sphere

Due to insufficient capacities and a lack of solid institutional framework for promoting zero tolerance to violence, the media in Serbia often contributes to sustaining gender-stereotypes, perpetuating traditional social norms and ‘victim blaming’, and condone VAWG and gender-based discrimination. The Guidelines are developed based on findings from the UN Women’s analyses of media reporting on VAWG on social media, online media monitoring report, feedback and inputs from journalists and review of the available codes of practices and ethics already adopted by the media outlets and associations. It gives the overview of legal framework and mechanism of protection in the domain of online media reporting. Through case studies, it presents online reports on femicide, sexual harassment in Serbian #metoo movement, cases of obstetric violence as well as reactions and comments of the audience of online media. Finally, it gives concrete set of advice and recommendations for editors, journalists and media workers for ethical and non-discriminatory media reporting. 

Author(s)/editor(s): Kosana Beker, Vesna Dobrosavljević, Sanja Radivojević