EDMONTON – From an inappropriate comment or touch, to rape – sexual harassment is a problem that affects people around the world on a daily basis. It’s also a problem that became particularly prevalent in Egypt, especially during the country’s 2011 revolution. Rebecca Chiao felt police and government were not helping, so she and her friends decided to take matters into their own hands; launching a social media initiative called HarassMap.
“We wanted to take action ourselves, and to give all the people around us a way to do something, and to stop being frustrated…and take it out into the streets, and try to make positive change in our society,” explains Chiao, who was in Edmonton on Wednesday for the University of Alberta’s International Week.
Those who have experienced sexual harassment are able to report it online or through a text message. That information is then reviewed and plotted on the HarassMap, while the person who reported it is sent resources like instructions on how to file a police report, access help from NGOs, or self-defence classes.
“We felt it would be an important way to allow people to speak out, break the silence, provide a safe space for victims and mark this violation as a crime,” says Chiao.
She and the other co-founder of HarassMap had to overcome a number of obstacles, though, including people being shy or afraid to talk about sexual harassment.
“People used to say ‘why are you wasting your time? You’re only one person. Let the police and government deal with this,'” she says. “People aren’t saying that anymore. They’re saying ‘I want to do something.'”
HarassMap is now getting hundreds of volunteers, half of whom are men, and is also inspiring many people to start their own initiatives.
The co-founders, who previously had to finance HarassMap themselves and juggle managing it with their jobs, are now able to focus on it full-time after partnering with the International Development Research Centre six months ago.
They’ve also been able to break down not just other people’s stereotypes surrounding sexual harassment – such as ‘it’s exaggerated’, ‘she was asking for it’ – but also, some of their own. For instance, it’s a common notion that it’s just women who are harassed. In fact, it’s happening to men and boys as well. So those being behind HarassMap are going to start working in schools to address the issue.
But most importantly, they have been taking their work offline, onto the streets, in order to change how sexual harassment is dealt with in the community
Chiao says at the beginning, volunteers who were going to talk to residents in their neighbourhoods were able to convince about 8 out of 10 people to stand up against harassers.
“Now we find the whole community starts coming down and spontaneously joining the effort.”
The initiative is also spreading to other countries. 18 countries, including Canada have expressed interest in tailoring HarassMap to their unique needs. In Canada, the tool will likely focus on workplace harassment.
HarassMap is based on another application called Ushahidhi, created by two developers in Kenya. During the post-election violence in 2009, they felt there needed to be a way to report violence, and created this application to allow people to report problems. Since then, a number of other spin-offs, including HarassMap, have been created.
You can watch Chiao’s interview on the Global Edmonton Morning News below:
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