Fact Checking and Information in the Age of Covid

The Covid-19 pandemic has revealed and accelerated an information crisis as well as a health one. What we discover about Covid 19, how it spreads, to whom and why and how best to mitigate it—all depend on information. The essays in this special section, which this article introduces, explore the importance of information and the fundamental role of fact checkers in understanding how information flows, why mistakes are made, and how to counteract them. Fact checking as an idea and a practice emerged in the early twenty-first century, developed as a positive beacon to counteract a growing sense that information could no longer be trusted. Now, more than a decade after its creation, fact checking sits within a far more complex and chaotic media context, and its expertise and understanding has never been so important. We need to understand what fact checkers do because they are grappling with how to tether us to reality.     

Talent alone does not suffice: erotic capital,media visibility and global popularity among professional male and female tennis players

Following Catherine Hakim’s notion of the increasing significance of ‘erotic capital’ in contemporary society, this paper addresses the effects of erotic capital in the realm of professional sports. Erotic capital may be closely related to popularity and thus represents a key marketing asset, in particular for female athletes facing a predominantly male audience. These ideas are examined here through analysing the media visibility of top tennis players in the German print media, as well as their global popularity (measured by search engine queries). The results provide further evidence of gender discrimination in sport since they show that the popularity of female athletes depends on their physical attractiveness whereas such a relationship does not exist for male athletes. Given gender-discriminatory consumer and print media preferences, female athletes face strong incentives to adapt to a sexualized sports culture that reinforces hegemonic masculinity.     

The feminist frontier: on trans and feminism

Against a back-drop of ongoing hostility between sections of feminism towards trans communities, and particularly feminist antagonism towards trans women, this paper explores the relationship between feminism and transgender. Through the use of original case study material, gathered by virtual methods, the paper explores events that have occurred since the millennium that are used to highlight particular epistemological and political tensions between feminism and trans. Central themes running through the case studies include the constitution of ‘woman’, the policing of feminist identities and spaces, and questions of bodily autonomy. In conclusion, the paper stresses the importance of rejecting trans-exclusionary feminism and of foregrounding the links between feminism and transgender as a key social justice project of our time.     

Sensory speculations:Visual discourse and the vision of visuality

It is now commonplace within the discipline of art history and visual culture to speak to theories of vision and visuality. Recent questions concerning the subject of vision, sexed positionalities and discourses of viewing are indebted to theories of visuality, which now occupy a privileged place within the study of visual culture. Theories of visuality have revealed both the terms of cultural visibilities and significantly the how of what we see. And yet despite this engagement of the opacity and duplicity of the visual, recent work into visuality has been plagued by a re‐occurring myopia regarding the corporeal This oversight within the visibilites of visual discourse is the unchallenged idea of a ‘human vision’ within the social constructivist project. In this article I assess how this universal operates as the matter for theories of visuality and of the ramifications of this for the project of the critique of vision.     

World Leaders' Gatherings: From APEC to G20

正From Beijing to Naypyitaw and then Brisbane,world leaders had a tight schedule from November 7 to 16 that entailed attending several major international conferences in the Asia-Pacific region.On the global stage,Chinese leaders announced the country’s new proposals on international governance.     

暴力犯罪的媒体诱因与对策反思——规避模仿示范效应的新路径

媒体对暴力犯罪的不当报道，会对潜在犯罪者起到模仿示范效应。鉴于新闻传媒客观、如实反映事件的职业伦理，其应当于公众知情权与犯罪预防间寻求平衡。但此种平衡未必尽然体现为“冷处理”式的抑制，必要时，在恪守媒体报道“绝对禁区”的前提下，适度地对特定暴力犯罪予以“热处理”，不仅是无害的，而且，其本身即为规避模仿示范效应的另一种至关重要的途径。     

中国语境下的媒介审判———以程序正义为视角简

媒体介入刑事审判更多地是对审判独立形成了一种干预,社会舆论的日益自由化和一定程度的不可控性,极易引起党政机关领导及国家司法行政机关的关注,转而对法官依照事实和法律独立地形成心证作出裁断产生干扰.但不可否认的是,媒介审判以其刚性的表征客观上也起到了其本质上监督审判运行的作用,对于现阶段完善我国的审判监督机制具有着某种意义上的积极作用.     

试论传媒在中国-东盟自由贸易区建设过程中的角色定位和功能发挥

本文从理论上阐明中国-东盟自由贸易区（CAFTA）建设中充分发挥传媒作用的必要性和重要性，分析了传媒在CAFTA建设中的经济和文化作用，从而丰富和深化对自由贸易区建设产业内涵及动力机制的理解。     

Editor's note

This study applies Elisabeth Noelle‐Neumann's spiral of silence theory to the controversial issue of whether children with AIDS should be allowed to attend public school. The study tests the theory's hypotheses in light of two content analyses of the media's treatment of the issue. The findings offer tentative and qualified support for Noelle‐Neumann's theoretical propositions about the relationship between individuals' perceptions of the issue and the media's tenor of the issue; particularly that of television. The findings suggest the need to address the role of other agents of influence, including reference groups, and to use time‐based data to unravel the causal order of the relationships.     

司法中利益衡量受到的挑战及应对——以利益主体多元化为分析背景

面对中国利益主体多元化趋势，司法中利益衡量受到的挑战主表现在利益衡量标准的模糊、“媒体审判”的干预及法律之外社会中的多元道德观念。文章从明晰利益衡量内涵开始，指出实践中所受到的挑战并提出法律对策。