How Funders can Support Researchers

A Growing Number of Researchers are Facing Intimidation and Harassment. They Need Your Support.

Researchers working to shed light on some of democracy’s most pressing challenges are frequently at risk for online and offline attacks and harassment, well-organized trolling campaigns, and intimidation that aims to discredit, delay, or end their work altogether. 

For researchers, coordinated intimidation and harassment is an occupational hazard. It is the important work that they do—the research they conduct—that places them at risk.

These attacks exert professional and personal costs–throwing the researchers, their families, teams, and institutions into crisis. They may endure a barrage of emotional abuse, explicit threats, the release of private information and photographs, and an onslaught of abusive emails, comments, and messages spreading libelous claims about their work and their personal character. Such attacks often move offline, in the form of frivolous lawsuits, onerous “inquiries” from politicians and activists, and serious physical threats.

Facing any of these tactics can feel profoundly isolating. Friends and family often struggle to understand what the researchers are facing. (“Just ignore the trolls!”) Fearing that they might come under attack, too, colleagues, community partners, and collaborators tend to distance themselves. And institutions often focus on protecting their own image, rather than standing up for and supporting their employees.