Sexual harassment is the norm at university. Singapore student Monica Baey has sent us a wake-up call
- A student filmed while taking a shower on an NUS campus has exposed a problem that, thanks partly to social media, can no longer be swept under the carpet
Recognising this more than a year before the case featuring Baey, between January and May 2018 the Centre for Culture-centred Approach to Research and Evaluation (CARE), then housed at the National University of Singapore, worked on building a framework to address sexual harassment. Here are some of the things we learned:
First, sexual harassment is a cultural problem. It is often normalised in university systems, frameworks, and processes. The normative rules and roles within universities legitimise sexual harassment. From “checking out” people visually, to sexually loaded comments, to propositioning and more egregious forms of harassment such as inappropriate touching and sexual violence, sexual harassment often reflects the culture within the organisation. Normative ideas such as “boys will be boys” work to legitimise sexual harassment.
Second, cultures of sexual harassment are embedded in how universities are organised, the ways in which expectations are set up, and the frameworks for addressing misconduct. When universities lack explicit resources, frameworks, and pathways for addressing sexual harassment, the problem perpetuates itself in various layers of the organisation, in various forms, and often without consequences.