Queer Cyprus Association

Diversity of Colours Project

Annual Media Monitoring Report

June 2019 – May 2020

It is important for persons of all sexual orientations, gender identities and gender expressions including lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans, intersex and beyond to have equal access to human rights. The press plays an important role while struggling for LGBTI+ creating social awareness, forming public opinion, and making authorities take action to end discrimination in order to ensure a fair and equal world for everyone. As Queer Cyprus Association, we have succeeded in raising the awareness of press employees on LGBTI+ issues with the Unspoken Project implemented with CCMC and Thomson Foundation. Roundtable meetings were held with editors and trainings were given to journalists. In addition, at the end of the project, we published a two-year (2015-2017) Media Monitoring Report and LGBTI Focused News Writing Guide for Media Workers. Social awareness and transformation are time-consuming processes, but we can see that the language of the press has transformed and LGBTI+ inclusive news is increasing in return for our efforts on this long journey.

As part of the Diversity of Colours Project that we started in December 2018, we monitored 2 print and 3 online newspapers for a year since 12 June 2019 and we are proud to share the results with you. We would like to thank Ziba Sertbay, who contributed greatly by reading newspapers on a daily basis, organizing and compiling monthly reports and forming the annual report you hold today, and Faika Deniz Paşa and Yetin Arslan who contributed to the more comprehensive and in-depth analysis of the data. We believe in the transformative power of the press, and while preparing these reports, we question not only the current situation, but also how to do more inclusive and human rights-sensitive reporting. We would like to remind you that even a single negative news article can cause permanent damage to LGBTI+ people and lead to violations of rights in many areas. I hope you have a fun and instructive reading.

To download the report please click here: [QCA-DoC] Media Monitoring Report – ENG