Leaders vow zero tolerance of misogyny on campaign trail
Amid mounting outrage at the vitriol and threats directed at women politicians and campaigners, Scotland’s political leaders yesterday pledged zero tolerance of misogynistic abuse in the forthcoming Holyrood election.
Nicola Sturgeon First Minister and SNP leader
Women in politics and public life in general have, for far too long, been subjected to horrendous levels of misogyny and gender-based abuse. That is appalling and it needs to stop. While progress has been made in terms of ensuring more women are able to participate in frontline politics, too often we see that ugly, sexist attitudes still linger and have not been left entirely in the past, where they belong. The SNP is utterly committed to supporting all moves to end gender-based discrimination, and I am happy to endorse a zero-tolerance policy in the coming Holyrood election.
It saddens but doesn’t surprise me to hear that yet another woman MP has suffered harassment and intimidation from a man.
It underlines that this is still a growing problem. However, it also stiffens our resolve that it has to be stopped and that this is a responsibility we all should share.
Research shows that women in public life – whether that be politics, entertainment, business or anything else – receive between two and three times as much abuse in person and online than male counterparts.
The fact that Lisa Cameron, who is a former clinical psychologist and has professional knowledge in this area, was frightened enough to involve the police shows that anyone can be traumatised by this sort of abuse.
We now have a situation where high-profile politicians such as Nicky Morgan and Diane Abbott have felt compelled to speak out about the distressing levels of abuse they have received on social media and elsewhere.
Some women MPS have also had to have panic alarms installed at their homes because they are so concerned about these threats, particularly since the murder of Jo Cox. This is a completely unacceptable state of affairs.
One of the reasons that we started our campaign is that more women are needed in parliament and the prospect of receiving hateful abuse was discouraging some from entering politics altogether. 50:50 is here to help women get selected.
Having more women in politics would be better for everyone. We need to support them so that they can stand up and participate in public life without feeling that they could be putting themselves in danger from stalkers and abusers – not all of whom are men.
We provide camaraderie and a support system for women because there are still old boy networks where men of influence can help and advise men of lesser influence, and there was nothing similar around for women.
However, we still need more male allies and we also have to take a zero-tolerance approach towards hate speech directed at women, and for social media networks to take this more seriously and act swiftly to remove it from their sites.