El insulto político en los foros de los lectores de la prensa digital colombiana.

This article studies the features of the political insult as a recurrent speech act in the forums of Colombian readers of digital press, its articulation with the strategic function of delegitimation of the opponent, proper of the political discourse, and its links with the prevailing authoritarian political culture in the country -as well as its use by users who belong to other political cultures, in contexts of polarization that were a particular feature during the elections of October 30, 2011, in Colombia. The textual corpus included 1,260 reader comments, collected from four columnists forums of eltiempo.com and three columnists from elespectador. com, over a period of six weeks. Four metaphors related to the characterization of the Readers' forum were examined: as cloaca, quadrilateral, rational dialogue or gallery of multiple mirrors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]