“The hands crept off my side slowly and meticulously. I held my breath, waiting for someone to say something. The hands on my side squeezed, visibly making an intent on my clothes. I slowly moved back up into a standing position, but the hands never left my side. I wanted to escape, for someone to say something, for this to stop.
‘I would come to work every day if I got to be in her presence, right John?’ his voice sent shivers down my spine.
All that wishing was for nothing. No one said anything even when he left, and I was blamed for this event.”
This story may be a common story that you have heard on TikTok, Instagram, or even by your friends directly. In all cases, these stories are disgusting, and justice needs to happen for all of the victims.
SOUND THE ALARM!! UNFAIR STIGMA IS PRESENT.
Sexual harassment is a huge social issue that affects all people. The way sexual harassment is portrayed in news media makes it harder for victims to get justice. The biased coverage lets offenders off the hook and also puts an unfair stigma on the victims.
The lack of accountability for perpetrators often leads to victim-blaming and minimizes real justice.
The media plays a huge role in persuading how people think about these cases, which often show a bias towards either victims or offenders.
This can create an unfair stigma for the victims and lets the offenders go unpunished!!
The Media is Gaslighting Us.
Let's look at what the #MeToo Movement has to say about all of this.
They looked at how people might empathy predict belittlement of victims and perpetrators. It was found that people who have less empathy towards either the accuser or accused are more likely to criticize them. That is crazy!
This finding shows that there is less emotional understanding for the person claiming harassment, and they are more likely to dismiss the accusations.
In contrast, if they lack empathy for the person being accused. They are more likely to criticize the victim (Ashdown, 2023, pgs. 575-576). This research suggests that there is emotional protection that people make when dealing with claims of sexual harassment or negative views.
Now, imagine you see a media center post an article about a famous actor or actress sexually harassing multiple people. This famous person gives the media center lots and lots of revenue, so they say this actor or actress is a "great person" or "this is only an accusation." Do you think they are telling the whole truth? NO!
This makes people feel more empathetic for the accused rather than the accuser. The media twists words around to make the victims look bad, which backlashes them instead of the offender.
On top of how news media portrays a fake narrative for sexual harassment cases, victim blaming occurs in sexual portrayals of women victims.
Research was done to show how sexualization and victim-blaming correlate with one another. Spaccatini et al. state that victims who are portrayed as more attractive (sexualized victims) are blamed more than victims who are more non-sexualized (2023, pgs. 811-814).
People are more likely to hold sexualized women responsible for the harassment they experience because they are more inviting to the perpetrator. And you thought it couldn't get worse.
Light at the End of the Tunnel?? Maybe??
Recently, the media coverage has changed in recent years to reduce victim-blaming and avoid harmful stereotypes.
News media shifted and addressed the dynamics of sexual harassment rather than blaming or defending. Fewer and fewer sexual harassment cases have been reported, and this could be due to the awareness news media has of sexual harassment through the lack of stereotypes and harmful articles.
Ever since the #MeToo Movement was created in 2018, sexual harassment has stayed the same. A survey done by #MeToo Movement 2024 states that roughly 1 in 4 U.S. adults (26%), or more than 68 million people, experienced sexual harassment or assault in the past year alone, with significantly higher rates for women (32%) compared to men (15%), (Plaisance, 2024).
But is this the whole truth? No.
Even though sexual harassment hasn’t increased, and it is possibly from the positive awareness from news media, the minimization of victim-blaming hasn’t decreased.
The roles of news media promote victim-blaming tendencies, and it probably won't change anytime soon.
More victim-blaming language is used in reports of acquaintance rape than stranger rape. High victim-blaming news articles create greater victim-blaming on the viewers, as well as exposure to high-blaming articles creates a higher victim-blaming in unrelated cases of sexual harassment (Gravelin, 2024).
The news media makes the victims and offenders a big spectacle, especially in high-profile cases.
There is a tendency to question the victim’s motives on why they haven’t spoken up sooner rather than focusing on the behavior of the perpetrator. As if they haven't gone through a life-altering event.
This makes the accusation of the victims to the perpetrator less legitimate.
Overall, reported sexual harassment has plateaued, while news media coverage of victim-blaming cases related to sexual harassment hasn’t changed. This proves that no matter the levels of reported sexual harassment cases, news media coverage changes the culture of victimization.
Shifting the Focus
News media coverage cannot be stopped—that is a fact. However, the societal attitude towards victims and perpetrators can be changed. Rather than victim-blaming, look at the facts at hand with the case. The damage that is done from these false narratives can affect the victims or even the perpetrators.
The facts do not lie when it comes to how much news media influences the ongoing issues, undermining the accountability of offenders and stigmatizing survivors rather than promoting a systemic change.
News media just want views and attention, no matter how false their information is.
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