My Final Year Project (FYP) represented two modules in my last year in my undergraduate studies. Throughout my time studying New Media, I fond myself developing a strong interest in the topics of cyber-bullying and trolling, where users online deliberately entice an intense, emotional reaction from someone. I had completed my co-operative placement in Hate and Hostility Research Group in UL where I researched online hate speech and the impact it has on individuals. I asked the co-Director of HHRG to supervise my research project and I began to explore if online hate-speech plays a role in real-world hate crimes.

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I found a deep passion and enthusiasm for researching online hate-speech through this project. The more I investigated, the more I found there was not a lot of academic literature on this topic. I saw this as an opportunity for my research project to add to a field of study which was new. I wanted to be able to show patterns through my findings which may help policy makers and law enforcement protect victims of future hate-crimes.

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My project presented a case study of the Christchurch Mosque Shootings of 2017, where 51 people were killed. The offender posted a manifesto containing his motivations for the shootings on the imageboard website 8chan and he also live-streamed a video of the attack on Facebook for an audience of online users. Though my undergraduate studies revolved around New Media and English, I took a Sociological approach to analyse my findings. I applied McDevitt’s theory of the Typology of Hate Crime Offenders to the shooter in this case, finding that his prevalence on hate-sites and imageboards made it more complex to categorise. Completing this research project inspired me to continue my studies in this field, as I have been accepted in a MA programme for Law, Human Rights and Criminal Justice.