Sexual harassment is described as any form of unwanted sexual behavior, sexual acts, or sexual discrimination that affects all kinds of people, male or female and it is against the law when harassers violate humans whole being and their rights. Others think that males cause sexual harassment but what they don’t know is that females can also be the cause of the harassment. There are lots of happenings where a male is sexually harassing a female, a female sexually harassing a male, or people harassing other people of the same gender. Sexual harassment, as we have said is caused by all kinds of people and sexual harassment can affect people in lots of different ways. Sexual harassment is very evident in today’s world wherein it can occur in many different settings such as our homes, school, workplace, public places and etc.
There is no realistic start date for the practice of sexual harassment - it forlornly stretches back as far as recorded history. One of its early and dreary examples were the sexual assaults made by the owners on their African American slave. Sexual discrimination has only been made illegal since the 1964 Civil Rights Act. But even after this, the first case was only brought during the 1970s and the issue was only considered by the Supreme Court during the 1980s. Despite these laws, harassment was still visible to this day. It can happen anytime and anywhere you go, even inside the school premises, workplace, home, and even in the churches either of gender.
Sexual harassment comes in a myriad of examples ranging from abuse, maliciousness, and the uncontrollable desire of a person to violate and conduct sexual misconduct towards an individual. It is not just a simple catcall or a slightly inappropriate gesture rather, it is a huge problem that many people, especially women suffer around the world. For instance, the common victims as of today include children, adolescents, and adults. These can be felt, seen, and experienced both privately and publicly. In addition, the effects it may bring can cause severe trauma and stress for it chooses no perpetrator, rather it is present everywhere. Researchers state that sexual harassment causes emotional instability, for it brings about the violation pertaining to one's sexuality, personality, and upbringing. According to an article written by Rachael Rettner, Senior Writer on livescience.com, there are six ways sexual harassment can damage a woman’s health. First is by causing Post-traumatic Stress Disorder or PTSD; rape and other sexual assaults are major triggers of this problem which greatly diminishes a person’s way of thinking. Second is heightened blood pressure; experiencing sexual harassment is very stressful. This added stress can cause a victim’s blood pressure to rise, which could later cause various cardiovascular diseases, as stated by the results of a survey in a 2008 study. Third is depression; constant experiences of sexual harassment and developing depression. Depression can trigger the next ways which the fourth one is sleep problems; by experiencing frequent harassment and developing depression, the victim may also suffer sleeping problems. This can be very detrimental to a person’s health as we all know sleep is an essential part of our health. Fifth is physical pain; with all that stress, emotional pain, and instability someone has been keeping inside from the constant experiences, those manifest into physical pain such as neck pain, bone, and other muscle pain. And lastly, suicide; a lot of people, particularly women had attempted suicide for reasons involving sexual harassment. Sexual harassment can make victims think they are useless which inevitably results in suicidal attempts. Sadly, those who are perpetrated still experience worst cases up to this day, for people who first witnessed such, were violated by relatives, people who share the common blood, and the like.
These days or even way back before, being sexually harassed has made a major and biggest impact on people’s mindsets, sometimes just simply tapping someone else’s shoulder could be a trigger to someone because we do not know if they’ve been harassed before or not. It can be carried out by an individual or group of individuals. What more if it is sexual harassment? Where else could it lead us if the action of harassing someone still lives up today? How could we fight back for our own dignity if it is being taken down by someone else just because they don’t know what is right from wrong? Above all, based on case to case basis, women are much more likely to be victims of sexual harassment precisely because they don’t have that much courage and they lack the strength to do such things, but we can’t just point out which gender has more amount of population who harasses the other gender. Nevertheless, based on vox.com, they’ve gathered data that used a nationally representative sample of about 2,000 adults, 81 percent of women and 43 percent of men say they have experienced some form of sexual harassment or assault in their lives. People with disabilities were more likely to report experiencing harassment and assault than others, and gay and bisexual men were more likely to report these experiences than straight men. In addition, the existence of sexual harassment is commonly mistaken for what women wear. Catcalling, whistling, or any other type of verbal assault is already considered sexual harassment. These kinds of practices should not be tolerated and deserve to be taken action. It is because these so-called “little things” they do, could lead them to do much worse things like physical abuse and rape. Basically, the act of sexually harassing someone else still lives and exists up to this day just simply because the people who do this aren’t aware of the difference between what is right and wrong. These people need to be disciplined and educated so that they could realize that what they are doing is ruining the lives of a lot of people, especially those who have big dreams that they want to achieve someday. If only this kind of atrocity didn’t happen to them.
As sexual harassment have so many negative effects, it is most important for us to prepare so that we could prevent it from happening. As said by americananthro.org, what we can do in advance to prevent it is by making ourselves knowledgeable about the sexual harassment policy, the process for implementing this policy, and the individuals responsible for doing so at your institution. As part of your official responsibility, we are bound by law to know what constitutes sexual harassment at your institution; what classes of people are covered by your institution's sexual harassment code; and if given patterns of behavior or classes of people are not covered by the sexual harassment code, what policy does pertain to them. We should also learn to recognize the patterns of sexual harassment we could encounter. A harasser is often adroit at protecting himself from public disclosure, going only so far and no farther, discouraging complaints from those he harasses by implicit or explicit threat or reward, and relying on the silent complicity of his colleagues, who all know about his behavior but accept it. And lastly, it is important to take preventive action against sexual harassment in our department.