Should We Enjoy the Art of Men Whove Been Accused of Sexual Misconduct
Activists participate in the Take Back The Workplace March and #MeToo Survivors March & Rally on Nov. 12, 2017, in Hollywood, Calif. A new survey offers the commencement set of nationwide data on prevalence, showing that the problem is pervasive and women are most often the victims. Sarah Morris/Getty Images hide caption
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Sarah Morris/Getty Images
Activists participate in the Accept Back The Workplace March and #MeToo Survivors March & Rally on Nov. 12, 2017, in Hollywood, Calif. A new survey offers the first set of nationwide data on prevalence, showing that the problem is pervasive and women are about often the victims.
Sarah Morris/Getty Images
Back in October 2017, women took to social media to share their experiences of sexual harassment. The #MeToo movement went viral, spurring a national and global discussion on the effect.
Many women have since come forward with their experiences of being sexually harassed past colleagues and bosses, costing influential men in the entertainment industry and the media — including journalists here at NPR — their jobs.
And nevertheless, there has been little data collected on the national prevalence of sexual harassment, says Michele Decker, managing director of the women's health and rights program at Johns Hopkins Schoolhouse of Public Wellness. As a result, many people take asked, "Where's the prove?" she says.
At present an online survey launched in January by a nonprofit chosen Stop Street Harassment offers some of that missing prove. It institute that 81 percent of women and 43 percentage of men had experienced some form of sexual harassment during their lifetime.
Those numbers are much larger than suggested by other recent polls. Those polls used a more express sample or narrower definitions of harassment, says Anita Raj, managing director of the Center on Gender Equity and Health at the Academy of California, San Diego, who analyzed the results of the new survey.
The new survey, on the other manus, included a larger, more nationally representative sample of men and women ages 18 and to a higher place, says Raj.
The survey besides involved a broader definition of sexual harassment that includes the "continuum of experiences" that women face up, she says.
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That includes exact forms of sexual harassment, similar beingness catcalled or whistled at or getting unwanted comments of a sexual nature. It also includes physical harassment, cyber harassment and sexual assaults.
The results, released in a report Midweek, show that 77 pct of women had experienced verbal sexual harassment, and 51 pct had been sexually touched without their permission. About 41 per centum said they had been sexually harassed online, and 27 percent said they had survived sexual assail.
The report besides looked into locations where people experienced harassment. The majority of women — 66 percent — said they'd been sexually harassed in public spaces. "The public forums are where you run across the more than chronic experiences of sexual harassment," says Raj. These include verbal harassment and concrete harassment, like touching and groping.
However, 38 percent of women said they experienced sexual harassment at the workplace. Thirty-five percent said they had experienced it at their residence. These experiences are more likely to be assaults and the "well-nigh severe forms" of harassment, says Raj.
"The findings show that this is a pervasive problem and permeates all sectors of our lives," says Holly Kearl, the main author of the report. "Most people who said they had experienced sexual harassment experienced it in multiple locations."
"Sexual harassment until more recently has been viewed as part and parcel of what people experienced," says Decker, who wasn't involved in the survey. As a upshot, public health researchers don't monitor it. "It'south often been dismissed, because it's considered not as egregious as sexual set on or rape."
Rape and sexual violence are closely monitored by the U.Southward. Centers for Illness Control and Prevention's National Intimate Partner and Sexual Violence Survey. As a outcome, public health agencies and health workers are more aware of their prevalence and take been able to take steps to help victims and offer programs aimed at preventing sexual violence.
The new report shows that sexual harassment, also, is worth monitoring, says Decker. "Nosotros want to know that we're responding to things that are prevalent and common, and this is showing that sexual harassment is really prevalent."
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One of the most hit findings from the report is that there is a very clear "gender differential," she says. While men experience sexual harassment as well, the prevalence is higher for women, as is the intensity of those experiences. It also shows that men are more than often the perpetrators, she adds.
Kearl says she was surprised at how few of the victims confronted their harasser. Instead, they changed their own lives to avoid harassers and reduce their risks of existence harassed.
"They were changing their routes or routines; they were changing jobs, or moving," says Kearl.
The written report besides shows that most victims endure from feet and low every bit well, just like victims of sexual violence. "It shows how challenging it is to confront someone. You'd rather modify your life than confront the harasser," she says.
Raj says her own teenage daughter'southward feel illustrates this. A couple of years ago, her daughter stopped walking to the public library by herself after she was harassed by a group of boys.
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"She was walking from her high school in a very privileged, affluent area, an area that most people would define as very safe," Raj recalls. "As she was walking alone around 3 o'clock in the afternoon, there was a group of boys that started calling out to her and maxim things similar 'dainty hips.' And it just fabricated her feel and then uncomfortable [that] she didn't walk alone anymore."
Similar Raj'south girl, virtually women (and men) first experience sexual harassment pretty early in life — during preteen or teenage years. "That's really disconcerting," says Raj.
Similarly disconcerting is the fact that virtually victims don't report their experiences, says Decker. "People don't even mention information technology to friends, families." And so, sexual harassment is "thriving on the silence of women," granting impunity to perpetrators, she says.
Some of that has been turned upside down by the #MeToo movement, considering it broke that silence and made information technology more culturally adequate to talk about sexual harassment.
"The next moving ridge of this is to really understand ... what are the barriers to people being able to access reporting procedure?" says Decker. "How can nosotros back up people who want to study this if they so cull?"
Source: https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2018/02/21/587671849/a-new-survey-finds-eighty-percent-of-women-have-experienced-sexual-harassment
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