“Our attitude towards sexual harassment in all its shapes and ugly colours needs to change.”
Asma Malik
It all started last October when allegations against Harvey Weinstein, an American film producer and former film studio executive, started making headlines. Since then, we have seen an uprising of women in Hollywood going public with their stories of sexual harassment and assault.
Soon after the allegations erupted, women from all over the world began sharing their stories on social media. The hashtag #MeToo became a rallying cry against sexual harassment.
Not long after, a rape and sexual assault complaint was filed against professor Tariq Ramadan, the author of several bestselling books on Islam, including In the Footsteps of the Prophet and The Quest for Meaning.
He is also a professor of Contemporary Islamic Studies at the University of Oxford. Henda Ayari has alleged that professor Ramadan seduced and then sexually assaulted her in Paris during an Islamic conference.
The public’s response towards the accusations against professor Ramadan was mixed between those denouncing his actions, calling out the hypocrisy in his social and religious stance and between those that immediately discredited the accuser, on account of her being a former Salafist who turned “liberal”.
Victims are almost always blamed for the harassment because of the dangerous excuse men, women and society perpetuate that “they brought it on themselves for looking, dressing and behaving inappropriately and provocatively”.
Let me make one thing clear: sexual harassment and assault have nothing to do with the way women dress. (If I could, I would print that in Bold).
The reductive assumption that attackers are motivated by physical desire and exposed skin is simply false. Not only is this scapegoating wrong, it reduces women’s right to safety and respect to the clothing items they wear.
In fact, even women who wear the hijab and are covered in loose and modest clothing are also victims of harassment, assault and rape.
In her study The Sexual Harassment of Uppity Women, Berdahl, of the University of Toronto, concluded that sexual harassment “is driven not out of desire for women who meet feminine ideals, but out of a desire to punish those who violate them”.
In other words, the perpetrator is not motivated by lust, but by the power to control, dominate and subjugate women that violate his ideals.
The notion that a woman invited her perpetrator by dressing immodestly suggests that she “deserves” to be punished for not dressing and acting the way that meets his or society’s ideals. It also allows them to dictate what they deem appropriate or inappropriate based on their own beliefs, and as a result exert the punishment they think these women deserve. As a result, it completely releases the perpetrators from any responsibility for the harm they have inflicted.
Inappropriate behaviour
One main problem with reporting these cases lies in our lack of understanding of what may or may not be considered sexual harassment.
Sexual harassment, according to the United Nations WomenWatch includes “any unwanted sexual advances, unwanted pressure for sexual favours, unwanted deliberate touching, leaning over, cornering, or pinching, unwanted sexual looks or gestures, unwanted letters, calls, jokes, remarks, questions, gestures or materials of a sexual nature. It also includes whistling at someone, cat calling, or any inappropriate innuendos or stories”.
You may think this list is too exhaustive and extreme, but that may be because we have normalised inappropriate behaviour to the point where it is brushed off as light conversation or locker room talk.
Our attitude towards sexual harassment in all its shapes and ugly colours needs to change. It starts with educating ourselves and others about what behaviours are acceptable or unacceptable. Work places need to conduct workshops and provide proper channels to report any inappropriate behaviour from staff members. Al Ameen for example is one of many safe channels by which we can file complaints.
However, most importantly, women need to feel safe and encouraged to be able to voice themselves and come forward against any abuser before we end up with another Harvey Weinstein or Tariq Ramadan.
The public’s response towards the accusations against professor Ramadan was mixed between those denouncing his actions, calling out the hypocrisy in his social and religious stance and between those that immediately discredited the accuser, on account of her being a former Salafist who turned ‘liberal’.
The reductive assumption that attackers are motivated by physical desire and exposed skin is simply false. Not only is this scapegoating wrong, it reduces women’s right to safety and respect to the clothing items they wear.