Far-right hate speech and misinformation has spread like wildfire on social media since 2015, growing exponentially with each election cycle. The Reclaim Project is dedicated to fostering democratic dialogue and presenting an alternative to hateful spaces online that promote mis- and dis-information. The Reclaim Project will merge creative media production with scholarly research on misinformation, develop strategies and templates for the circulation of this content, and connect with a variety of partners. The goal is to counter misinformation by creating an alternative, an online space and community that resonates with young and vulnerable men who may be on the cusp of radicalization. We seek to prevent them- and anyone else- from falling down the rabbit hole.
Students in this Collaboratory formed four teams encompassing research, design, and media production, and partnerships strategy to foster the goal of the Reclaim project, countering right-wing misinformation and hate speech online. They began with research and analysis of the problem-space, providing critical insight into existing studies on how and why hate speech spreads so successfully on social media. Building on that, they aggregated past examples of successful social media campaigns that shared a similar mission with Reclaim, and created a catalog of potential collaborators who could amplify and spread the work of Reclaim even further. The next step involved students creating a website and presentation materials that could be used to foster such partnerships. Over the course of the 2023-24 school year, the team conceptualized and produced original media, honing on the issue of masculinity. This content is intended for Reclaim social media accounts that will be activated once students from the 2024-25 cohort take over. Our focus for the upcoming academic year will be media production and rollout. Students will form teams dedicated to creating different kinds of social media content, with one team remaining solely focused on research about masculinity.