World Athletics: ‘Disturbing’ level of abuse on social media

By EDDIE PELLS
AP National Writer

Nearly three out of every 20 track and field athletes whose social media feeds were monitored in a study at the Tokyo Olympics were subject to abusive posts, and women were targeted in more than 85% of those posts. That’s according to results released Thursday by the sport’s global regulator. World Athletics released observations culled from more than 240,000 Twitter posts related to 161 athletes who competed in Tokyo earlier this year. Of those, 132 were found to be abusive and 65% of those were “gravely abusive,” according to standards set in the study. Twenty-three of the 161 athletes whose accounts were monitored were targets of the abuse, and 16 of those 23 were women.