The purpose of this study is to clarify whether there are rape myths in Swedish news media’s reports of rapes. The news media chosen to be analyzed are Aftonbladet and Dagens Nyheter (DN), which are two of Sweden’s biggest newspapers. The articles are selected from Mediearkivet, the keywords used to find relevant newspaper articles are rape and sexual crimes. We have used a qualitative text analysis based on critical discourse analysis. The results are presented using the concept of Christie’s Ideal Victim and rape myths combined. The concept of ideal victim means that certain victims meet criteria that justify them as victims. Rape myths are stereotypes about victims, rapists and rapes. It is considered important to investigate whether it appears in Swedish newspapers due to the power of the news media's influence on public perceptions and the lack of research on Swedish newspapers. The newspaper articles have been analyzed using an analysis scheme based on previous research and the current theories. The results of the study shows that the prevalence of rape myths in the news media differs depending on the characteristics of the victim. / Studiens syfte var att undersöka om svenska nyhetsmedier är med och bidrar till ett reproducerande av våldtäktsmyter genom sitt sätt att skriva och på grund av deras makt i samhället. För att besvara syftet har en kvalitativ textanalys genomförts med utgångspunkt i kritisk diskursanalys. Vårt empiriska material är tidningsartiklar som handlar om våldtäkter, offer och gärningsmän. Resultaten presenteras med hjälp av Christies begrepp idealoffer, vilket är en teori som innebär att det finns vissa kriterier som kännetecknar ett idealt offer, och begreppet våldtäktsmyter som innebär stereotyper om våldtäktsoffer, våldtäktsmän och våldtäkter, dessa begrepp kombineras i en kritisk diskursanalys. På grund av nyhetsmedias makt att kunna påverka allmänhetens uppfattningar samt bristen av svensk forskning på området, ansågs det högst relevant och viktigt att undersöka förekomsten av våldtäktsmyter i svensk nyhetsmedia. Sökorden som använts för att få fram relevanta tidningsartiklar att granska är våldtäkter och sexualbrott, som sökts på i Mediearkivet. De har sedan analyserats med hjälp av ett analysschema baserat på tidigare forskning samt de aktuella teorierna. Studiens resultat visar att förekomsten av våldtäktsmyter i nyhetsmedia skiljer sig åt beroende på vilken typ av offer det handlar om.

The aim of the study was to examine the news coverage surrounding Stockholm City Theatre’s former CEO Benny Fredriksson during the metoo-movement, from the time of the accusations against him until a time after his death. The questions examined were: How is Benny Fredriksson represented at the time of the publishing of the accusations and at the time of his death? How are the anonymous witnesses and the journalism represented? How does the representation of victims and perpetrators change after the death of Benny Fredriksson? What are the differences and similarities in the reporting of Aftonbladet and Dagens Nyheter? To analyze this, we made a discourse analysis of 12 articles from Aftonbladet and 13 articles from Dagens Nyheter. The results showed that the roles of all the characters change during the coverage. At the time of the publishing of the accusations, Benny Fredriksson is represented as an evil dictator that harasses his employees at Stockholm City Theatre. After his death, Benny Fredriksson is represented as a victim of circumstances, helpless and full of anxiety. At first, the witnesses are represented as scared, helpless victims. At the end of the coverage the representation has changed, and the victims are instead represented as perpetrators that are accused of lying. The journalism goes from being represented as investigative journalism to being represented as a media hunt that killed Benny Fredriksson. Overall, Aftonbladet is more defending of the witnesses and the journalism while Dagens Nyheter is more defending of Benny Fredriksson. The study shows that a death can affect the news coverage and consequently how the characters are represented.