The use of online tools by victims of terrorism and victims' networks

Abstract

Terrorism, by many definitions is inherently a mediated phenomenon. As terrorism it exists not just in the violent act, but also in the complex relationship between the act; the message the perpetrators believe they are encoding thereby; and the message, which the recipients actually decode. Being a victim of violence is an immediate, sometimes horrific reality. Being a victim of terrorism requires some social construction: it is a category, which must be activated and mobilised through language. Language does not travel through a vacuum. It is conveyed by speech, print and, in the present day, increasingly by digital media such as those supported by the Internet and the Word Wide Web. In this chapter, we examine how victims of terrorism and those claiming to represent them have made use of online tools in Spanish and English-speaking contexts. Online tools are defined broadly as the different ways that the Internet offers to present the views of organisations or of individual victims; or to facilitate social interactions among communities of victims, or wider communities associated with organisations claiming to represent victims. They are webpages, social networks and different services as video hosting, blogging and online forums.