Intolerance, Islamophobia and propaganda increasing in Kyrgyz media

Intolerance in the media and the Internet of Kyrgyzstan gaining stable forms, while Islamophobia and propaganda increase. This is stated in the annual survey of the School of Peacemaking and Media Technology in Central Asia on the level of hate speech in 2016.

Preliminary results of the study indicate trends in the use of hate language, spread of propaganda in the media sphere in Kyrgyzstan.

Islamophobia in Kyrgyz media was registered in various texts, citations, positions, reports, speeches, speakers and respondents, visual content. The most common anti-Islamic rhetoric was expressed in the form of inhumane metaphors and demonizing of Muslims in Kyrgyz-and Russian-language media.

During media monitoring, the experts found more than 470 different articles, posts and images that contain anti-Islamic rhetoric in different media. Most of them — in the newspapers. In second place — on-line editions, which traditionally have a large number of forms of translational hate speech because of the republication of materials with negative content. Slightly less anti-Muslim rhetoric was recorded in social networks, and least of all — on television (5 percent).

«The level of Islamophobia in Kyrgyzstan's public space is greatly affected by the understanding of this issue by the authors, journalists, speakers and other content creators, who put their own stereotypes or propaganda in mass consciousness. The analyzed materials had a number of negative opinions, speeches, inadequate comparison of Islam with radical movements along with a veiled propaganda and quotations depicting lifestyle, clothing, norms of behavior in Islam," the report says.

There also increased the role of the Internet in spreading Islamophobia and its indirect impact on the radicalization of its users. Compared to the 2014 year, the dynamics increased more than threefold.