Survey Says: 
Five Out Of 10 Women Unaware 
That They Are Violated  

Five out of 10 women living in Metro Manila have experienced sexual harassment but many of them do not consider it a violation of their rights. This is the result of a recent survey conducted by the Center for Women’s Resources (CWR), a research and education institution for women.

BY BULATLAT.COM

CWR surveyed 1,000 women from randomly selected communities, schools and offices in Metro Manila. The survey, said CWR, shows that the most common form of violence committed against women (VAW) is sexual harassment.

Respondents from the labor, public and academic sectors indicated that forms of sexual harassment like whistling, sexually-connotative jokes and malicious stares are rampant in their workplace while those in the communities ranked sex trafficking, prostitution and malicious jokes and stares as the most common. 

“But while women are aware of the grave forms of violence committed against them, it is surprising to find that few of them perceive sexual harassment as a form of violence,” explained Gertrudes Ranjo-Libang, CWR executive director.

Libang noted that 89% of the respondents consider rape, wife or partner battering, incest, and sex trafficking, which are actually the grave forms of VAW, as the only forms of VAW.  On the other hand, many respondents who experienced sexual harassment do not see their experience as a form of VAW.

“But their answers also show that this is the most pervasive and most common experience by the respondents themselves,” said Libang.

Libang attributed this finding to two factors: “Firstly, women have already been desensitized by the prevalence of sexually offensive acts that many of them are no longer aware that their rights as women are already being violated. So many women treat sexual harassment in particular as mundane or part of the Filipino macho culture. There are even those who stated that women who define sexual harassment as VAW are just suplada (snobbish), malicious, and narrow-minded”.

The second factor, she said, is the slow response of the police and government to VAW cases.

Survey figures show that 35% of those who experienced or know of women who underwent sexual assaults turn to their friends for solace and advice, while 31% seek help from their families. Only 16% turn to barangay officials for help while an even smaller percentage -- 13% -- go to the police.

“Women find it a tedious process fighting for their rights,” stated Libang.

“There are various loopholes in our legal system that no less than President Arroyo has pointed out when her own daughter filed a case against her harasser and had to wait for two years before getting a verdict,” Libang remarked, referring to the harassment case filed by the president’s daughter Luli Arroyo in 1996.

The survey was conducted from Sept. 16 to Oct. 12 this year. The complete study will be published early next year. Bulatlat.com 

We want to know what you think of this article.