Handling sexual harassment in the face of sex-ed ban - Part 3

Only a few months ago, Prosperous Justice Party (PKS) lawmaker Almuzzammil Yusuf threw an accusation that Universitas Indonesia is encouraging freshmen to indulge in free sex. The accusation originated from the material about sexual violence in this year’s freshmen orientation programme, which highlighted sexual consent.

Almuzzammil is not the only one with that perspective of sex education. A few days ago, someone tweeted diagrams of sexual organs drawn by junior high students and accused them of being raunchy. In a society that is so paranoid of sex education, what can we do to prevent sexual violence?

Sexual violence is so prevalent in our everyday life that some of us might have grown desensitized to it. For women, it seems that being present in a public space is already considered an invitation for unwanted advances in all forms. Being outside, we get catcalled on a daily basis. Even the digital space is not all that safe.

As a marketing officer for Nipplets, Catherine has to be at the frontline to receive countless unwanted dick pics sent to Nipplets’ Instagram page @nipplets_official. It was very upsetting, but Cath then educated herself and raised awareness among others to make it clear that it is not okay to send such pics. It is Nipplets team’s priority to create a safe space for everyone, so they would go as far as blocking the sources of annoyance.

As this experience came hand-in-hand with her job, Cath would also like to share some tips on how to handle that kind of situation for social media handlers. “With power as big as social media influencers/handlers, they can raise awareness of how bad it really is and start educating people, especially the perpetrators,” she said.

This raises the question: why do people send unwanted dick pics so easily?

In the second part of the series, Dr. Elizabeth Kristi Poerwandari M.Hum, a professor at the Faculty of Psychology, Universitas Indonesia, told TFR that people sent unwanted dick pics mostly due to sex-driven thoughts, the drive to dominate, as well as “the presumption that women would appreciate it.” A research run by her pupils found that these drives are not exactly gendered, because some women do that too.

Behaviours generated from the internet culture might also be a major cause. “[It] Leads internet users to treat others as an instrument,” Dr. Kristi mused. There is a distortion in human connections made in the digital space that we are already so used to be in. At the extremes, “It puts people into inhumane and unhealthy situations; that’s also why the prevalence of mental illness is pretty high.”

From this perspective, there seems to be a lack of empathy among people when it comes to sexual matters. Sex education is needed in order to create safe spaces for everyone, but there’s a clear reason why keeping people, especially women, in domestic spaces is a more preferred method than actually learning something: it’s all in the name.

Perhaps the word ‘sex’ on sex education needs adjustment as well. As English is not our first language, the majority of Indonesians associate sex with sexual activity in bed although sex has dual meaning.

Sex refers to biological differences between men and women, or in short, genitals. Unfortunately, the other meaning is more popular.

Fundamentally, sex education covers everything that has to do with human sexuality, such as emotional relationship and responsibilities, human sexual anatomy, sexual activity, sexual reproduction, age of consent, reproductive health, reproductive rights, safe sex, birth control, as well as sexual abstinence. Discussion about sexual consent is inevitable since sexual consent is the key to healthy sexual and emotional relationship.

Unicef, for instance, launched the Better Reproductive Health and Rights for All in Indonesia or BERANI programme in partnership with the Canadian government and Indonesia’s National Development Planning Board. The Indonesian Child Protection Commission in 2018 was pushing for reproductive health education for Indonesian students from the elementary to the high school levels. While the name of the programme is different, the content is sex education.

In work settings, eradicating sexual harassment can start from corporate policy. Alvin Tanthio, human resources professional at a global FMCG company, said, “We have a department called ethics and compliance that handles sexual harassment and assault cases. Usually, when something like that happened, the culprit will be called in for a ‘trial,’ but we need the victims to report.”

He didn’t deny the fact that there are workers who would be at risk if they reported what they experienced to the management. “Especially if the company is a family business or the culprit is close to the owner. That’s a hassle.”

Unfortunately, for small businesses or independent brands, establishing a system that handles sexual harassment is not always or not yet the priority. Small businesses tend to start from a small team, so they don’t usually have a human resources unit or even consider the possibility of such a thing to happen in a tightly-knitted team.

The owner of a cat cafe in Kemang confided to us that years ago after they terminated the manager of their store due to an internal issue, the assistant manager came forward and said that the manager had been sexually harassing her in the first year of the business.

The harassment affected the assistant manager so much at that time that she was too afraid even just to drive herself home every day. However, she was too scared to report as the manager was the person she reported to all the time back then.

According to a senior in the advertising industry, Poppy Dihardjo, not all companies have the policy to deal with sexual violence in the workplace, no matter the size of the business. For this kind of situation, she and her team usually suggested a thorough investigation on the alleged perpetrator. “Usually, if they have the guts to do it to their colleagues, it wouldn’t be the first time that they did it.”

This is also why Poppy started a movement she called No Recruit List. She noticed high number of sexual violence cases among university students when she was observing them and wondered whether they were not worried that their future employers would find out about their inclinations when they run a background check? And then she realised that she has the influence to make that kind of change in the industry.

Again, the road is long and rough. Not all human resources professionals are prepared to deal with sexual violence cases at work even though it is part of their job. “Employees are assets for the company, but they can be liabilities when they turn out to be perpetrators,” she explained. That is why No Recruit List positioned themselves as a partner for the companies to assist them in screening their future assets.

In the end, what can we do to survive and strive in an environment that basically enables sexual violence? “We take the stance to not only speak up for ourselves, but also for others,” Dr. Kristi summed up. Poppy also underlined the importance of building networks with other women to gather support and advocate the issues of sexual violence around us, together.

In this kind of climate, we would fare better together. When we see somebody falling victim to harassment, we step up and speak up for them. Rising solidarity might not cease the attacks, but it would be a reminder for each of us that we are not alone. This sort of support might not only protect others, but also encourage the victims to rise and take the steps that they need.

Correction: The article previously mentioned Poppy Dihardjo started No Recruit List when she was a university student. That statement was mistaken. Poppy Dihardjo started No Recruit List while she was observing university students.

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