The Observant, the independent Maastricht University magazine -the Maastricht Resource, so to speak, was taken offline for several days in January as the result of an attack by activists who accused the magazine of using ‘transphobic’ language.
Observant took the issue to the police, showing them an anonymous email message claiming responsibility for the cyberattack. The police investigation has since been terminated, the magazine reports today. Who is responsible for the attack remains unknown. In their email, the anonymous activists accuse Observant of ‘false journalism and hate speech’. They see increasing incidents of racism and transphobia on the site, they claim. Moreover, they threaten to take down the site again if anything with which they disagree is published.
Transphobia
Observant was accused of transphobia by the student group Feminists of Maastricht (FOM) prior to the attack. The protesters feel that the magazine should have used the term ‘people’ who menstruate rather than ‘women’ who menstruate in an article on free tampons and sanitary towels on the campus.
If the article was not rectified, the group threatened to ‘mobilise’ their community. Could the cyberattack result from this threat? ‘We have no way of knowing’, Observant writes. FOM declines to comment. President of the Maastricht University executive board, Rianne Letschert, calls the cyber attack ‘shocking’. It goes against freedom of expression, she states. ‘If you have a difference of opinion, you respectfully debate.’ She hopes that ‘Organisations affiliated to UM never stoop to this level’.
