Wake-up call for social justice sector
It’s time to look inward and admit that not all of us who fight the good fight are squeaky clean
As the local director of a funding organisation, a human rights attorney and a South African woman, I am glad this country is now having a serious conversation about sexual harassment and violence against women in our workplaces. It is long overdue — particularly among social justice organisations.
But I’m worried that we are not interrogating this complex subject as we should. Our attention is drawn to specific cases and specific organisations but perhaps we should be interrogating the larger narratives we tell ourselves and the way in which we silence the violence and trauma associated with sexual harassment in the workplace.
If we think of these cases as isolated incidents that won’t happen in our own organisations, we are missing a critical moment to examine our own practices and the values we espouse as institutions devoted to the fight for social justice and human dignity.
Many of us who join the social sector hold it in high regard — even above reproach — and we enter this work to fight the good fight. So, when our heroes end up exploiting and harming us, we quietly pretend it never happened and we keep silent.
This is like keeping abuse in the family quiet for fear of bringing shame. Or perhaps, more perilously, we are in denial about violence and abuse within our sacred social justice spaces. Yet we know that power and patriarchy come together in workplaces of all kinds — from movie mogul’s Harvey Weinstein’s company to the domestic aide working for a “madam and baas” in Sandton, from the rural farmworker who submits for fear of reduced wages to corporate corridors where senior executives coerce junior employees.
It’s simply not safe for women anywhere and that includes the social justice sector, with all its values and aspirations.It’s time we dispelled the myth that social justice organisations are squeaky clean and have no racism, no sexism, no homophobia.
For too long, South African women have been silent in the name of the greater struggle against racism and have not wanted to point fingers at men who have fought alongside us. This has to stop — and we need to protect the brave women who do come forward without labelling them as vindictive or liars.
It’s time to speak about just how hard it is to overthrow systems of patriarchy and how they infiltrate the way we work, live and love. It’s time to think about how we transform institutions in terms of not only more black women leaders but also how we transform masculinist patriarchal cultures. We all need to do better, including social justice donors such as my own organisation.
So, let me call out what needs to be actively asserted and owned:
• The fact that you are a brilliant legal mind does not mean that you are not capable of being a predator or a sexual harasser;
• Your brilliance at activism, movement building and community organising does not insulate you from being sexist, racist or violent;
• Your anti-apartheid credentials do not automatically mean that you are not capable of rape; and
• The fact that you personally know someone as being on the right side of social justice does not mean that women who make allegations against that person are liars.
Many years ago, when I trained as a Rape Crisis counsellor, we were asked to close our eyes and picture a rapist. The facilitator took us through the story of the woman — going for drinks after work, laughing too loudly with her assailant, dancing with him, leaving the bar with him and then coming forward the next day after being violently raped and beaten. The facilitator asked whether we would blame the woman or believe her. We all believed her, because we knew the story very well. But then we were asked to imagine the rapist as a man we loved and admired — a father, a brother, a best friend or someone famous. Now, how did we assess the woman?
Here’s the point: powerful, smart, good-looking, charismatic men do rape, harass and exploit women. It happens in the corridors of power in governments, corporations, universities and religious institutions and, yes, it happens in our social justice institutions too. So, let’s not get defensive but rather spend more time interrogating how we really transform organisations in our quest for a just and fair society.
Here are some suggestions: • Social justice organisations should develop a common set of principles and values to hold ourselves as a sector to account in cases of sexual harassment, racism and homophobia;
• We should document and share good practices for handling cases of sexual harassment and speak more openly about the challenges faced when implementing policy; and
• We should workshop how best donors can support a transformative agenda in this space that is less reactive, and geared toward addressing systemic and structural challenges.
Sexual harassment scandals should be a loud wake-up call for all of us to dig deep and interrogate our “holier than thou” approach to sexism and racism within our own institutions, to move out of denial and into the realm of accountability.
Maybe then we will be able to get on with working to dismantle prejudice, inequality and patriarchy, one brick at a time.