Anita Hill, an American lawyer, who became known nationally in 1991 after she accused U.S. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas of sexual harassment during his Senate confirmation, is offering important resources to put an end to the abuse suffered in Hollywood, as part of her fight against the matter.
A survey of almost 10,000 workers in the entertainment industry was released by Kathleen Kennedy, Nina Shaw, and Hill, the founders and leaders of The Hollywood Commission on Eliminating Sexual Harassment and Advancing Equality.
“The survey shows that things have changed, even in the last year, there has been [an] improvement, but not enough,” Hill says. “We need to build those changes and the changing ways of thinking into our structures and into our cultures in our workplaces, and that just takes time. It takes a lot of concerted effort, and that’s what we’re doing.”
Additionally, a new platform is currently being developed by the commission to assist in identifying repeat offenders of sexual harassment. She and the founders of the commission are hoping that it could be a “game-changer” and be adopted by major studios and companies across the industry. It will gather complaints and information that the offenders can be located through “matching technology in the system.”
“The person identifies who they say has been victimizing them, and then it goes into an account, and if there is a match, there will be a trigger, so hopefully that will help us identify serial abusers,” Hill explains. “Some of them might not rise to the level of a harassment complaint, but they may be behaviors that the research tells us can lead to harassment or sexual assault if they’re not addressed.”
She stated that she has faith that their partners who will be adopting the system will take it seriously, and “do what they do.”
While the stories of harassment in Hollywood have assisted in starting a conversation on the matter, Hill said that it is now time for the industry to take the necessary steps to see real change occur.
“The industry needs the numbers. Everybody needs to know exactly what is going on,” Hill told Variety. “The more information we can provide, the better we will be able to come up with solutions together. People in power have the ability to make a change. We’ve already noticed some change, but this information allows us to really focus on where are the most important areas of concern and what kind of structures need to be put in place to deal with this idea of the lack of accountability in the industry.”
The survey, which was conducted online between November 2019 and February 2020 by both sexes, found that people of color and younger adults were amongst the more vulnerable employees in the industry. It also revealed that regarding accountability, 45% of men believe that a person in power would be held responsible, while only 28% of women held a similar belief.⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀
“What we learned from the men about accountability is that in just about every category of men, fewer than 50% believe that people in authority or people who are powerful in the industry will be found accountable if they are found to be harassed. With women, biracial women are the most pessimistic about the accountability of people who are harassing,” Hills explains. “I think all of those are interesting numbers, but what it says in total is that overall, in the industry, workers have a very different view of accountability.”
According to the study, the main offenders in Hollywood hold positions of power, meaning that they can impact who gets hired (55%), who can keep their job (59%), and have the ability to ruin the reputation of the individuals who file complains about harassment (59%).
Getting the individuals who have been harassed to report it has been one of the biggest hurdles in the industry with only 9% reporting it to Human Resources and 4% reporting it to the legal department at their employment out of the 23% of sexual abuse victims that share their trauma with a supervisor, the study added.
“Enough people feel that not enough is going to happen if you do something bad, and that includes people who are inclined to do something bad, as well as people who are trying to stop people from doing things that are bad,” Hill continued.
Since taking a stand against her alleged abuser, Hill believes that the views on sexual abuse in the industry are beginning to see change, but not at the rate that she had hoped.
“I’m always hopeful, and I know things have changed — but I am absolutely sure that not enough has changed,” Hill said.
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