“This is our tradition”: why harassment is not a crime in Russia

In many foreign countries, sexual harassment is punishable by law. In the UN, they do not understand direct sexual violence, but its “softer” forms, including gestures and hints.

In the United States, there is a so-called restraining order: with its help, the victim of harassment can limit contact with the one who committed it, and the aggressor will have to pay a fine of several thousand dollars. Argentina and France introduced fines for harassment (including verbal) in public places. In Germany, in 2016, the concept of sexual harassment was introduced into the legislation – for it they can even be imprisoned for up to two years.

In Russia, however, things are quite different. In 2019, the International Labor Organization (ILO) conference in Geneva adopted the Convention on the Elimination of Violence and Harassment in the World of Work. They did not take it unanimously: initially, the Russian government was going to vote against it, but after seeing the reaction of representatives of other states, it decided to abstain. They justified this by the fact that “during the development of the document, the position of Russia was not taken into account to a sufficient extent.”

No laws by which those who commit harassment, you can be held accountable, we also do not. In 2014, such a bill was considered by the State Duma: the perpetrators were proposed to be punished with a fine of up to 50 thousand rubles or correctional labor. But the deputies did not support the initiative: in their opinion, the wording in the bill was too vague.

Moreover, in Russian society for a long time it was not customary even to condemn harassment, they were perceived as harmless flirting (we have already told you how to distinguish between them). Now the trend is changing, but we are still far from the introduction of legal sanctions for this type of violence. Why it happens?

“What was acceptable ten years ago is now not so”

Veronika Kostenko – Dean of the Faculty of Sociology at the European University at St. Petersburg

“The USSR was formally one of the most progressive countries in terms of gender, but gender equality in it was hypocritical. Women had a double burden, after all, after a full-fledged work shift, they took on all household chores and childcare. With rare exceptions, only men were appointed to high posts, women “knew their place” and did not become leaders.

The issue of harassment was also acute, but rarely problematized. Sometimes very famous women, for example, actresses, could declare the inadmissibility of such behavior, but this is rather an exception. In the Soviet Union, harassment was very common: in a mixed or predominantly male team, most women faced it in one way or another.

However, there was no opportunity to complain, no culture of asserting one’s rights, no special language for this. And when there are no words in the language to denote a phenomenon, it seems to become “invisible” to society.

You must understand that sexual harassment is a generational issue. The authors of attacks all over the world are mostly not very young men. For adult women, such behavior is often perceived as a habitual evil, and by some is even interpreted as a sign of attention.

For some women of those generations, courtship at work, compliments, romance was a game that allowed them to feel visible due to external attractiveness and was not condemned.

But younger women are more sensitive and intolerant of such behavior. Many of them were brought up in the spirit of gender equality, they received a good education, they feel like professionals and are not ready to tolerate such an attitude.

Movements like #MeToo have forced many women to look at their experiences through a different lens. And if earlier they did not reflect on what happened to them, now they realized that some situations were in fact an act of violence.

A special terminology appeared, women began to learn to recognize, among other things, microaggression. Indeed, in fact, discrimination and harassment often take the form of hints, jokes – for example, about “stupid blondes” (and a joke is an important way to maintain norms). It is important to understand that harassment is not about sex, but about the demonstration of power, hierarchy.

Interestingly, young men also become actors in this game. Many of them no longer support harassment, such behavior becomes indecent, a marker of inertia, conservatism, retrograde. This change is radical and happening very quickly, before the eyes of one generation. What was acceptable ten years ago is now not: and many representatives of the older generation have a desire to return “as it was”.

In modern Russian society, we see strong resistance to the introduction of new rules governing this area, which may be related to late Soviet history. When people had no choice in almost anything, they still had the possibility of sexual freedom.

It was the last stronghold of their independence from the state, so now for many the introduction of special documents against harassment perceived as an analogue of the Soviet party meetings. Of course, rapid changes in morals are always difficult for a part of society, but it is quite obvious that it will be necessary to rebuild.

So far, most women in this situation still do not understand how to act, and it is difficult to seek help. In addition, if we become witnesses of harassment, most often we also do not know what can be done, how to help and respond correctly.

That is why L’Oreal Paris has developed a special stand up platformto tell you how to act if you are a victim or witness of harassment. In short, you need to follow the 5D rule: Disorient, Demonstrate support, Delegate, Document, Act. You can also take a short online trainingfor more details.