When I was a little girl in France I was told to get informed, seek information, follow what was going on in the world. I remember our teacher from primary school recommending us not to go to bed before the end of the news segment on TV. Later on, in high school, our teachers told us to read different media, from different perspectives in order to better form our own opinion. We were taught to question the info we receive, to ask ourselves whether a media was serious or not, was trying to convince us, manipulate us or was positioned.
I loved to read newspapers from different sides and it was very interesting to see the difference. Sometimes, the same news appeared to be completely distinct from one newspapers to another. Sometimes, from one journalist to another. Especially about political issues. That was sometimes quite funny, but sometimes very disturbing.
But there is one topic, only one, I could never really find any difference in the way it was reported: violence against women, including sexual violence (sexual violence towards children and men as well).
I remember reading headlines such as “ Tragedy of love” or “Family tragedy” for cases of domestic violence and murder intra-family. I remember reading the word “seducer” to describe an alleged rapist, “a tentative to hit on” to qualify a deadly aggression. I remember how the facts were often sugarcoated by the use of euphemisms like non consensual sex or imposed sexual relation instead of using the word rape. I remember reading many details of the alleged victim’s sexual life (while I am sure I have never ever read any details about how much donation an alleged victim of robbery might have given to a charity organization). I remember reading horrific details about an aggression. Well, everything I was reading seemed to be written either to horrify the reader and to warn the victims: “You will never recover from that” or to sugarcoat the brutality and seriousness of a crime and put the suspicions on the victims.
The words we use are very important. They define a situation. They define a reality.
We all agree here that calling any catcall or fact of harassment as a “compliment” is very upsetting. The aim of a compliment is to make the person feel happy and confident. I love compliments actually. I love people making me feel good and worthy. Curiously, I never felt comfortable with catcalls or so called compliments that make me feel like a piece of fresh meat. But in many case, when you report it, one of the most common answer you get is, “But that was a compliment! Just take it as it is!”
Harassment vs compliment, seducer vs rapist, tragedy of love vs murder.
Then, how can someone report an aggression when the first words that pop up in her/his mind are the words read and heard in the media? Can someone go the police saying, “Good morning. I met a seducer who started to compliment me before to impose me a sexual relation.” ?
The impact can be huge for the victim. It is like living in two different worlds, two different realities.
When I learned about a new project launched in Barcelona about how the media cover cases of sexual violence and how people who experienced this kind of violence react to their coverage, I was very interested in it. I read daily news and various French, UK, US and Spanish media and it is very interesting to compare them and see their differences and similarities. So far, I have never read about an imposed sexual relation in Spanish media for instance (I might have missed it, I can’t read everything but it is a relief yet) but I have read about some assault details. The project is organized by Aadas and Master Gender and communication with the collaboration of Barcelona city council and support of the Generalitat with the aim then to be presented during the 25th November International Day of Violence Against Women program.
It consisted first in reading articles from local newspapers both in Spanish and Catalan and explaining what could be triggering, disturbing and how it could be written instead. The aim is to rise awareness of this important issue as media are the ones that first inform us about a case and the words they choose, the way they relate the news influence us. The group of volunteers, all women between 18 and 60 years old, met in July to read a selection of news and take part in the project. All of them suffered sexual violence and accepted to voluntarily read very upsetting and highly triggering news.
The results are not really surprising: all of them felt upset and outraged, 72% felt misunderstood, 93% think these facts of violence are not covered with the seriousness and rigor that should be required. Few of them, only 2, felt strong from reading the news. But this state of strength should not be misunderstood: they felt strong to be part of the project and read such triggering material.
It was clear that a lot of articles were written by journalist who didn’t know anything about the reality of sexual violence, about all of the consequences and sequels it can have. Could we imagine an article about the last basketball competition written by someone who did not know how many players are required to play? So why is it okay to write about sexual violence without having the most basic knowledge about it?
The results were publicly presented the 22nd of November and the project received an Honorary distinction at the 9th Price of 25 November from the city council. This specific Price is very important for the future of the project. One next step would be to organize meetings between the journalists who wrote the incriminated articles and the organizers of the project and women who took part in it.
We believe in a better understanding of the issue by listening to the ones who suffered from it and the ones who work and help them. This would change a lot of the general perception of sexual violence in our society.
Alice likes researching, analyzing and writing about Women’s Rights, gender bias, and intersectionalism with a special focus on sexual violence, rape, rape culture, the impact of street harassment and how the media deals with these issues. She is currently working on a new project focused on how some media participate in the revictimization of victims. Follow her and her projects on her Facebook page and via Twitter @Alyselily.
