Digital Violence and Strategies for Resistance with Ingrid Brodnig and Fiorentina Azizi-Hacker von Zara
Online hate affects many people. Ingrid Brodnig has studied the entire field of digital violence in depth. In the digital space, people are made to feel insecure and can even be marginalized. Certain forms of digital violence affect women in particular. What can be done to combat digital violence, both on an individual and a collective level? Ingrid Brodnig offers clear suggestions and strategies for this. As for what needs to be done at the institutional level, that’s the focus of the #GegenHass online counseling center run by Zara and led by Fiorentina Azizi-Hacker. She advocates for victim-centered support in addressing experiences of online hate.
Ingrid Brodnig is an author and journalist. Her work explores the impact of digitalization on our society, with a particular focus on addressing disinformation and hateful comments. She has written seven books, most recently *Feindbild Frau* (Women as the Enemy), which describes digital violence against female politicians and what we can all do to combat online hate. This was preceded by “Wider die Verrohung” (“Against Brutalization”), which offers tips on how to promote a factual, democratic debate. Her 2026 published book “Hass im Netz” (“Hate Online”) was awarded the Bruno Kreisky Special Prize for Political Books. In 2017, she published “Lies on the Internet: How Fake News, Populists, and Unregulated Technology Manipulate Us.”Since May 2024, she has been writing a regular column for the daily newspaper “Der Standard.”
Fiorentina Azizi-Hacker is a lawyer and has headed the ZARA counseling centers !GegenRassismus and #GegenHassimNetz since October 2021. She is a member of the independent advisory board of the Investigation and Complaints Office for Allegations of Abuse by Police Officers and of the Human Rights Advisory Board established by the Ombudsman’s Office. Prior to that, she worked for numerous national and international organizations in the areas of human rights protection, judicial reform, and the rule of law.
