Hate as a ‘hook’: The political and affective economy of ‘hate journalism’

Abstract

The article looks to identify and contextualise the shift of journalism towards emotion in terms of broader socio-political shifts. It focuses on ‘hate journalism’, a term we use to describe a new kind of journalism that emerged in Greece during the debt crisis years and is ideologically close to neo-fascist, and ethnonationalist political positions. We understand hate as an action oriented socio-cultural practice and examine the conditions of production and deployment of hate through focusing on Makeleio, the most successful example of this kind of journalism. Within this context, hate is produced and circulated as a ‘hook’ to attract and entice users, by mirroring their emotions; it further constitutes a means of producing and diffusing ideology by helping readers manage uncertainty through putting forward authoritarian solutions. In doing so, hate journalism is involved in social reproduction processes by which (Greek) society produces and sustains itself as ethnically pure, culturally Christian, and gendered as masculine and virile. Readers are invited to recognise themselves and their practices and vernacular, to be consoled and offered solace and comfort within an unmoored world. They, in turn, offer support to this journalism through consuming it.