Sexual harassment
> WOMEN WHO REPORTED IT
them feeling paralysed, humiliated, embarrassed, angry, frustrated,” says Meera.
“Social media is a way of finding support from others who may have encountered harassment from the same person.
“Similarly, when victims in the legal profession turned to social media recently to voice out against sexual harassment, the Bar Council was forced to take a firm stand against sexual harassment,” she adds.
In mid-june, the Malaysian Bar Council issued a statement calling for the implementation of the sexual harassment bill, and amendment of section 509 of the Penal Code to include sexual harassment.
The Council also included sexual harassment as a defined “misconduct” in its proposed Legal Profession Bill, which it hopes to get tabled and passed in Parliament this year.
It has also pledged to formulate a model Sexual Harassment Policy for law firms that will require employers to execute a workplace pledge against sexual harassment, making available walk-in centres for victims to lodge complaints, taking steps to protect victims from dismissal, and holding seminars and training to raise awareness among Members of the Bar and students.
In the National University of Singapore (NUS), survivors of sexual
Sisters in Islam executive director Rozana Isa harassment voiced out their traumatic experiences on social media and as a result, universities (in Singapore) changed their policy and instituted a zero tolerance policy on sexual harassment. They also set up a unit to support sexual harassment victims.
There is little doubt that social media has the potential to amplify one’s message and bring about change quickly.
But Meera cautions that there are also risks of seeking redress on social media.
“Victims’ lives may be examined, even by strangers who don’t know anything about the incident. Victims open themselves up to negative comments, verbal or social threats, and blame.
Also, once it is posted on social media, it can be shared or screenshot and forwarded onto other platforms and go viral,” she says.
And, if the perpetrator is a known person, there is also the threat of defamation since he could file a suit against the victim and claim the incident never happened.
Recently, a young woman - who had encountered sexual harassment - filed a police report and then appealed on Twitter that anyone else who had been victimised by the perpetrator, to also lodge a police report.
Besides speaking up on social media, she also went through formal channels to seek justice.
Sexual harassment is particularly challenging for Muslim women because Syariah law does not address the issue or provide protection against it.