Why didn't you report the sexual harassment?

 This victim blaming statement signals a survivor’s victimhood stems from wrong choices they made. It reminds me of a common poster in education that is meant to inspire students to take charge of their lives. It sounds like this: I am a product of my choices, not a victim of my circumstances.” Put in a sexual harassment context, this victim blaming statement sounds like this. “Well what did you think was going to happen? You failed to report it.” Or “You really thought your company was going to give you a fair trial?” All these statements ignore the complexity of life as a human being. When determining how to respond to sexual harassment, survivors consider a wide variety of legal, professional, personal, cultural, and social questions. 

Legal questions sexual harassment survivors face are: Do I have emails saved and organized from before, during, and after the harassment began? What documentation do I have that I endured retaliation? Do I have a lawyer? If not, where am I going to go to find one? Do I have time and the money to find one? Is my perpetrator part of the union? Does my company lack a lawyer who is presently (has been previously) helping them strategize their defense? Can I handle having my integrity demonized and my account minimized by their legal team? Do I have mental clarity when I have to present publicly my thoughts, feelings, and beliefs? Has legal counsel told me I have a strong case? How long will this legal process take? Am I willing to wait that many years for justice? Are there other avenues of justice I could accept in place of a legal trial?

Professional questions the sexual harassment survivor faces are: Will my boss handle this appropriately? Will they take it seriously? Will they impartially and thoroughly investigate it?  Will my perpetrator and their allies retaliate against me? Will the company protect me from any retaliation? Does my company have clear policies with sensitivity training for administrators? Will they retaliate against me even after my 180 days expire?  Will I be able to perform my work obligations still? Will I have to accept a new position that is outside of my passions and interests? Can I endure interacting with my perpetrator and their allies, especially after I reported their discriminatory act and it was mishandled? Will I be able to find a job if I leave this company? Do I want to relocate? Do I want to climb the cooperate ladder again?  Will I get paid the same wage at my new company? What about my health benefits? 

Psychological questions the sexual harassment survivor faces are: Do I handle conflict well? Do I have healthy coping mechanisms when I encounter stress and pain? Will I be able to concentrate at work even though I could not sleep last night? Will I be able to manage the overwhelming fear and anxiety I may have? Can I afford therapy? Where would I go for therapy? Do I have time for therapy?  How strong is my support system among family and friends? Will I be able to handle the isolation that comes from honoring my company’s non-disclosure statement (clauses that require I keep information related to my employment confidential)? Can I endure my company’s ability to mob and gas light me as well as other employees in order to win their case? Will I be able to work for my company after they mishandle my report? Can I work for a company that I discover is self-motivated and immoral? 

Personal questions the sexual harassment survivor faces are: What ugly details could come out about my childhood or my family of origin? What embarrassing personal information can be found in my health records and therapy notes? How could my bank statement be misused to cast doubt on my motives? Will my self-employed family member lose their business if clients do not support my case? Does my partner support me? How do they want me to respond to the harassment? Will my children have to change schools because of this? Do I want to ignore my children’s needs so I can fight for justice? Do I want to pause my personal goals to deal with this? Can I take care of my aging grandparents as I begin a new career or manage a legal battle? What about my home? Am I okay losing what we built together? 

Cultural questions the sexual harassment survivor faces are: How much education do I have about victim blaming statements? Am I able mentally and emotionally to mute the victim blaming statements I hear at work, from friends and family, or while watching television? What about the victim blaming statements I heard while I was a child? What does my ethnic background believe about gender equity? Can I endure the backlash that comes from breaking cultural norms related to gender equality, providing for one’s family, and challenging authority?  What do my religious beliefs teach about responding to injustice? What do I believe about forgiveness, justice, loyalty, and obedience?  Can I accept that good people experience evil and injustice despite fervent prayers of deliverance? Do I want to challenge my culture’s assumptions about gender equity and equality? 

Social questions the sexual harassment survivor faces are: What will my friends think? Will they believe me? Will our friendship survive if they doubt my narrative or disagree with my response to the harassment? Am I okay if these relationships change or disappear? Will they have the time and energy to support me through this? What will my religious friends think? What will my community think? Will they rally around me or my company? Will they instead respond with indifference? Will they retaliate against me and my family? Will they blame me if our city’s population growth and consequent economic boom comes to a standstill? What level of privacy will I have in the short-term and in the long-term? Am I willing to keep a low profile socially while my case goes to trial? Can I accept my social life will never be the same after this? 

Only the survivor can answer these legal, professional, personal, financial, and social questions.  No one else knows the intimate details about what they think, feel, believe, or desire. No one else knows their entire past work experiences. No one else knows what they are willing to risk and what they are unwilling to sacrifice. As a result, only they can weigh the pros and cons. Not surprisingly, many determine fighting sexual harassment is not a simple choice like they once thought. 

Not every sexual harassment survivors will report their sex discrimination. Once survivors encounter sex discrimination, their evaluation for what to do becomes personal, customized to their own unique personalities, histories, goals, worldview, and circumstances. They do not just evaluate their harassment from a legal perspective. Their professional, social, personal, and cultural factors influence their decision making. The determination of whether they should report becomes a sort of “life or death” scenario where the survivor considers how bad the harassment is (i.e. what they are willing to tolerate and what they are not willing to tolerate) and how much they are willing to sacrifice to stop it (i.e. risk losing perceived aspects of their professional, social, personal, and cultural lives). Some may not feel safe reporting their harassment. Others may and decide to report their discrimination. Some employees may tolerate what they view as “common” or widespread sexual misbehavior. Others do not and report what is, according to the law, illegal behavior. Weighing these factors is extremely personal and, in a historically individualistic culture, is not usually one that considers how the discrimination impacts the entire workforce or collective community. 

Should the survivor report their harassment? Absolutely. They are fighting a wild beast that will roar its ugly head again, and this time, their injury may be worse. Their predator’s next target may be someone else in their herd too. Do they have the moral responsibility to report it? Yes. Americans in and outside the company need them to stop a dangerous predator. Should they be condemned for not doing so. No. Their decision was based on the perception that their company, community, and culture would mishandle their report. We as a collective society made them feel unsafe. We as a collective community are responsible for their inappropriate response. 

This explains why a company’s training practices are so vital to stopping sexual harassment. Every employee needs to know they will not be victim blamed or minimized if they come forward. Every employee needs to have the same frame of mind about what is appropriate conduct and what is not. Every employee needs to feel safe in their workplace. If they have had a negative encounter with administration in the past and nothing was done to restore that trust, they may tolerate what they perceive as just “low level” sexual misconduct. 

That being said, companies need to have a method to support survivors who choose not to report. Companies cannot control the personal lives of every employee. Some employees may be uncomfortable reporting sex discrimination despite working in a company that has effective leadership and clear policies in place. In these situations, companies need a way to ensure sex discrimination is not tolerated within their business.  

It is for this reason that I am suggesting all businesses adopt a bystander reporting policy. Any employee who encounters, observes, or hears secondhand information about sexual harassment can choose to report it.  An example illustrates why this strict policy is a best business practice:

Imagine that three colleagues are working on a project together when one employee, the sexual predator, tells the female colleague in the room that he would love to touch her breasts and kiss her lips. The third colleague in the room hears the predator’s remarks and after the meeting, goes to the woman and asks her if she is okay. She says she is and that this was not the first time he aid that to her.  She also dismisses the comment with a “boys will be boys” remark. The third colleague now finds himself in his own moral dilemma. He knows what he observed was inappropriate. He knows it violated company policy. He thinks it fits the definition of sexual harassment the company taught on at its annual policy review meeting. Yet she seems okay with it. She seemed like she was not going to report it. Can he report it without her consent? Will he somehow break her privacy if he goes and reports it? Company training matters here. If this employee not been told what to do in this situation ahead of time, he is left navigating it on his own. He suddenly has to determine if he feels safe going to administration with his concern. Suddenly he has to evaluate if he is willing to lose his network relationship with the female colleague. Now he starts evaluating his responses to sexual harassment according to his own unique, personal circumstances. There is no legal clarity about reporting it. And why jeopardize his personal, social, context if she is okay with it? Now he decides it is not his problem and chooses not to report it. 

Sexual harassment is every American’s problem.  Collective culture messages determines who or what is to blame for sexual harassment. The collective community sets the group norm for what is and is not “offensive” sexual behavior and for when it is and is not appropriate to whistle blow. Americans must accept that each survivor approaches sexual harassment in very unique, contextualized manner. For this reason, legislators must shift the reporting responsibility from the individual survivor to the collective community. Employees and customers need to be told that anyone who experiences, observes, or hears about sexual harassment can report sex discrimination. They need to know legally that doing so does not violate a survivor’s right to privacy. Without this group norm, our collective community will never reduce the number of unreported sexual harassment cases, and in the end, the collective will suffer.