The third training of the series of trainings for tackling hate speech in the media took place on October 20, 2015 in Strumica. These trainings organized by the Metamorphosis Foundation and the OSCE Mission to Skopje are primarily intended for editors, journalists and news portals administrators. The one-day training was attended by 25 representatives of the media, including representatives of the local media that informed the public about this training.

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The trainings aim to strengthen the capacity of online media personnel in Macedonia to recognize and tackle hate speech and speech inciting violence and hate crimes, and to promote the professional journalistic standards in synergy with the Media Fact-Checking Service.

The training covered the following topics:

  • Introduction to the topic of hate speech
  • Legal frameworks related to hate speech
  • Efforts of OSCE’s Mission to Skopje in this area
  • Participation in the community aimed at combating hate speech
  • Identifying hate speech according to the methodology of the Media Fact Checking Service
  • Societal responsibility of the media (news portals)
  • Development of internal mechanisms for self-regulation within a single media: Developing a policy on hate speech, registration, restrictions on user generated content, comments on social media, notice and take down mechanism

The first mobile application in the world for combating hate speech was presented at the training. The application aims to provide more efficient information and to raise the public awareness about hate speech, providing citizens with quick and innovative access to the latest news in this area, and with access to educational and expert resources. The “Ne mrazi” (Don’t hate) app is the first smartphone application of this kind in the world, and can be downloaded for free by the users of the most popular operating systems; Android users can download it from Google Play and iOS users can download it from the Apple Store.

During the session for discussions, representatives of the media stated that the trainings in this area help them in dealing with hate speech on the Internet, a phenomenon they are facing in everyday life.

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