A Protest Against Workplace Sexual Harassment

Imagine walking down a road at night without the fear of being touched inappropriately or being groped. Imagine living alone in your house, without the constant fear of being harassed by your mailman, houseworker and numerous other people you encounter on daily basis. Imagine commuting to work everyday through public transport without the fear of being stared at or being touched everytime the bus applies an emergency break. Imagine standing at a bus stop, knowing that you won't be troubled by any of the passing men on their bikes, cars, or on foot.

Imagine in your corporate, you don't fear your boss asking you to stay alone with him in his office just because you want a promotion that you deserve. Imagine not being judged by your work, but your beauty and your gender. Imagine being a nurse and not having the fear of visiting the patient alone. Imagine being a student in a university and knowing that you will be graded according to your capabilities without any other factors playing a role. Imagine carpooling with someone without sending your live location to your family and pretending to be on call constance so that the driver knows there's someone looking after you. Imagine not being in a constant stress of being harassed and groped and disturbed just because you exist. Imagine not going through safety guidelines every night just because you want to feel safe, the next morning when you step out of your house.

Easy to imagine right? All the things that I have mentioned are all basic privileges that we have from the start. I don't fear visiting my professor alone in his office. I don't fear looking after a patient without having a backup. I don't fear when I board a train alone. I don't fear when I'm standing at a bus stop, waiting for my vehicle. I am sure thousands of other people here would agree with me. But there's one thing that'd be common between all of us who'd agree with this. Our gender; 99.9% of us would be males.

It's a privilege that we were born with. Whether you know it or not, it's a male privilege that the women of our society have been deprived of from the very start. I hardly remember being fearful while standing alone in the dark. I have never been afraid to go visit my professor alone in his office. Not because I am a muscular guy who'd beat the shit of of anyone but because I know I am safe and that this professor would do no harm to me. Why's that? Because I am a male.

It's high time we change how things have always been and try to provide a better world for the women. I was in an argument with a guy who was constantly stressing over on how not every man is like this. I tried to reason with him and I'll present my argument here as well. I told him; 'Yes, not every man,but just enough men that women don't feel safe around any man.' I tried to give him an example:

Imagine there are 200 snakes approaching your doorstep, out of which 150 are poisonous and want to harm you, whereas 50 of them are very friendly, not poisonous and won't do anything to you. What will you do? Will you welcome them all in your house, and filter the good one out of those 200 or will you shut your door for all of those snakes?'

I'll leave this question for all of you to answer as well. The point of mentioning all these things was to let you all know that it's us who'll have to leave this world better than how we got it.

Last week, a student, my senior, was harassed by a professor. This post is about what we did for that:

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PROTEST AGAINST SEXUAL HARASSMENT IN MY UNIVERSITY

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This had been going on for the past 4-5 months. A professor who'd call his student in his office only to tell the student that she's failed her exam once again. 5 months of constant torture. The student didn't have the guts to tell anyone about this, until finally lat week, this professor called her again in his office only to tell her that she's failed her exam once again.

The student talked back to the professor and told him, this is the best that she could do. There's no more will and motivation left in her and she'll leave the medical field for good. The professor told her, he could pass her, only if she agrees to 'do something.' She was taken aback and asked clearly what does the professor mean? Upon which the professor locked the door, turned off the lights and started groping her. The girl, horrified, shouted and tried to run towards the door. Her shouts were heard by the students outside, who broke in the office and grabbed the proffesor. The professor, at first, was taken to the dean, at which the dean replied that he doesn't have the authority to do anything. Another female teacher stepped up and accused the said professor for harassing her as well upon which she was slapped on her face by the professor in front of everyone.

At this point, the students had seen enough. They grabbed the professor by his shirt and beat the living daylights out of him. He was dragged to the University's main court and was beaten severely by all the students who could get hands on him. The University administration, on the other hand, called police. At that point we thought the police is here to arrest the culprit but no. We were let down once again as the police arrested the students.

The word circulated like wildfire in our university and on Saturday, 24th of September 2022 the students held a mass protest outside the premises of the University and hospital, blocking all access points to the university and demanding justice.

The placards were made, the media was called and the University's admin, the Vice Chancellor and the culprit were called out.

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The protest started at 9 am. All the students skipped their classes and sat in front of the University's main gate. There were constant chanting going on, each chant demanding for justice for the victim. The news channel didn't delay in arriving and covering the whole Protest.

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Like everyone else, I was a part of this protest as well and initiated a lot of chanting. The goal was to bring out the Vice Chancellor of the University and we wanted him to give us all an official statement.

It was not long after, the Additional Inspector General was called by the University's admin. The Additional IG arrived with his team and threatened us all to leave at once or they'll start taking actions against the students.

Imagine, being so ruthless that you intend on beating your future doctors just because you're paid to do that, even when these future doctors, doctors and students only want justice for what one of them had faced.

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Our demands are simple, we want the University to set up an Anti Harassment committee in which there'll always be a student representative working actively, knowing the people who are part of that committee and a proper channel should be formed which should be presented to the students in a transparent way.

Immediately firing the harasser and all the other people who tried to protect him in the oast 5 months.

The most important thing that we demanded was an official statement from the Vice Chancellor of the University (which we haven't gotten yet) the only official statement we received was from a representative.

The students who protested and beat the proffesor will not face any consequences. As they were forced to take the matters into their own hands. The University wasn't helping a bit.

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We set our demands crystal clear and presented them to the representative who conveyed it to the VC. We were still peacefully protesting outside the gates. Meanwhile, important political leaders visited us in this protest and promised us their unconditional support.

It was after 3 hours, the representative returned with the Students Council's President alongside him, assuring us that a committee has been set up and after thorough investigation, the answer would be given in a week. After this, the protest ended and now we wait for the results.

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I feel extremely proud and happy that the victim showed so much courage even when there were thousands of people who were blaming the victim. Why did you go the office? Why didn't you tell anyone before? Why did you do this? Why did you do that? The courage she portrayed is admirable.

The students, who stood up for her, I have to give it to them. The students who showed sheer resilience and resistance, even when they were threatened to be beaten up by the police. Now we wait, we wait for justice to prevail as justice delayed is justic denied.

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WHO IS HUZAIFANAVEED?

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_{huzaifanaveed hails from Pakistan, who is an aspiring dentist, studying in one of the top notch universities of Pakistan, Jinnah Sindh Medical University.}

_{he loves interacting with new people, making new friends and traveling the world, but most importantly he loves to make a change in this world through his actions and his words. He's an entrepreneur and a philanthropist who's been actively working with different Charitable Organizations in Pakistan.}

_{His goal on Hive is similar, ie, to make a difference. He's here to mark his presence and he'll do it through his words. So lets be a part of his journey and show him support through comments, upvotes and reblogs.}

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