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Calls for criminalization of sexual harassment in Jordan
18-12-2017
Al Hayat newspaper highlighted today the efforts by Women’s Solidarity Association of Jordan Institute through explicitly demanding the criminalization of sexual harassment in the penal code. The Association also appealed to civil society organizations and women and children rights advocates to adopt a clear strategy with specific sets of goals and actions to counter harassment, and also for the media to expose acts of sexual harassment and the risks they pose. A study by Mahmoud al Jundi published in 2014 by the Center for Peace and Conflict Studies and entitled, ‘Sexual harassment, a crime with no evidence’, concluded that 53% of Jordanian women have been sexually harassed. The study indicated that one of the most common forms of harassment is verbal harassment, followed by unwelcome touching or physical contact, unwanted sexual looks or gestures and finally, harassment through resorting to different forms of communication. Al Hayat newspaper mentioned another study portraying sexual harassment at the workplace conducted in 2013 by a research team from the Hashemite University in cooperation with the Canadian International Development Agency, CIDA’s Equal Opportunity Initiatives Program. The study has shown that 14% of Jordan’s working women are verbally harassed, 0.7% are harassed by physical touching and 8% are subjected to verbal abuse. On the subject, the Women’s Solidarity Association pressed the need to change the societal perception of sexual harassment victims whereby the focus would become on sexual harassers and abusers rather than on their victims. “This male chauvinist condemnation”, the association maintained, “prevents victims from reporting incidents and breaking the culture of silence and passivity around sexual assault which encourages sexual predators to repeat their offenses”. (For full article in Arabic, check: http://bit.ly/2ySICTu). (Al Hayat, December 18, 2017)
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