2014 Archives

Dear SAFRA

Dear SAFRA,

Who is your gym for?

You know the ad we mean. There’s been chatter about it on Facebook and The Online Citizen. We’ve read the debate, and since we keep getting asked, here’s our perspective as a gender equality advocacy group.

This poster hasn’t appeared in a vacuum. It’s part of a culture that ubiquitously encourages everyone to see women as existing to be “checked out” (to use your phrase) in every setting, for the pleasure of heterosexual men, regardless of how we feel about it. Sometimes this “checking out” is the precursor to sexual harassment – unwanted advances, which persist even after women make a lack of interest clear, or touching without consent. In some cases it leads to more serious sexual violence.

And yes, it may be true that some women “check out” men too, if “checking out” means a casual momentary look. But persistent unwanted leering, leading to offensive remarks and/or sexual harassment or even assault is something that women are much more likely to experience from men.

Your ad contributes to this culture. By referring to women as “healthy distractions” for men, it tells men that the women using the gym are objects to be stared at, whether or not the women are okay with it. It tells men that it is legitimate for them to engage in behaviour that might make women feel belittled, uncomfortable or threatened, as a common precursor to non-consensual harassment.

The poster also tells women that SAFRA gyms are not safe places for us to exercise. At these gyms, it says, women should expect to be leered at by men, whether we like it or not. If a woman at your gym feels unsafe or uncomfortable because a man is staring at her, after seeing your ad, will she feel that she can tell him off? If she does, will she expect your staff and management to support her?

You’ve suggested the ad is about “bonding moments” among men. But men don’t need to make women feel threatened and uncomfortable to bond – we think better of men than that. And we’re quite sure that men can appreciate the benefits of exercise and enjoy hanging out with their friends even without women dangled before them as sexual prospects.

Women should have the right to enjoy public spaces without expecting or fearing harassment. We should have the right not to be made uncomfortable by unsolicited advances, and we should be supported in our protests if anyone’s sexual conduct towards us makes us uncomfortable.

You tell us SAFRA believes in equality of the sexes; we hope that, in your future marketing campaigns, we see it.

With regards,

AWARE

Come for our Books, Bakes & Bazaar!

Our annual Book & Bake Sale is on 12 April, and this year, we’ve added a flea market! Come browse through hundreds of pre-loved books, munch on yummy baked goods, and uncover treasures at the flea stalls.

Event details:
Date: 12 April, Saturday
Time: 11am – 5pm
Location: AWARE Centre, 5 Dover Crescent, #01-22

Baked goods

There will be macaroons, brownies, cheesecakes and much more on sale! We even have gluten-free and eggless options. All these treats are baked by our awesome volunteers and will be very reasonably priced!

(We always welcome more cakes, cookies and other yummy bakes. If you can donate baked goods for the sale, please contact Jes at fundraising@aware.org.sg.)

Books

We’ve already collected a wide variety of books, from literary classics and bestsellers to cookbooks! Find someones pre-loved treasures to take home with you. With books going for as little as $1, youre certain to find something to love!

If you have books to give away, please donate them to us for this sale. For every book in good condition that you donate, you will get 1 ‘AWARE dollar’. Collect AWARE dollars and use them to pay for books (up to 30% of the cost of the book). You can drop books at the AWARE Centre until 1 April, Monday-Friday, 11am-5pm.

Flea market

For the first time, our book and bake sale will also have a flea market! Come look for cool secondhand goods to make your own, be it clothes, jewellery or other hidden treasures. The folks from the Really Really Free Market will be there to share things and skills for free!

If you can volunteer to help us for this sale, please let us know through this form.

With so much on sale, who knows what you might find! Do join us at the AWARE Centre on 12 April! All proceeds will go towards the running costs of the AWARE Centre.

NUS Seminar on the harassment bill

The new Protection from Harassment Bill 2014 presented to Parliament on 3 March seeks to present a comprehensive approach to the problem of harassment in its different forms. Are these provisions good enough? Are there gaps which still remain? How do the provisions compare with legislation and developments in other jurisdictions?

On 25 March, Tuesday, come to an NUS Law Seminar examining different aspects of the bill: sexual harassment and employer liability, civil liability, stalking and family violence, and cyber bullying. AWARE’s Executive Director, Corinna Lim, will be speaking about workplace sexual harassment.

Event details:
Date: 25 March (Tuesday)
Time: 4.30pm – 6pm
Location: Lee Sheridan Conference Room, Eu Tong Sen Building, Faculty Of Law, Nus, Bukit Timah Campus (directions)

Click here to register! Registration is free, and closes on 18 March.

Speakers:

Ms Corinna Lim, Executive Director, AWARE

Assistant Professor Goh Yihan, Faculty of Law, National University of Singapore

Associate Professor Chan Wing Cheong, Faculty of Law, National University of Singapore

Associate Professor David Tan, Faculty of Law, National University of Singapore

Chaired by Professor Tan Cheng Han, S.C., Faculty of Law, National University of Singapore

Roundtable: The Harassment Bill: promises and problems

The Protection from Harassment Bill is an exciting step forward for womens rights in Singapore and a major advocacy success for AWARE.

But even as we celebrate the greater protections and remedies it affords, as well as the cultural shift it will hopefully herald, questions remain about the new laws gaps and shortcomings. What legal ambiguities remain in the remedies? How will the Protection Order operate in practice? What can we do to ensure employer responsibility also gets onto the legislative agenda?

Join us at a special roundtable on 1 April to explore these and other questions.

Event details:
Date: 1 April, Tuesday
Time: 7.00 – 9.00 pm
Venue: AWARE Centre

Please click here to register!

Speakers:

Corinna Lim is the Executive Director of AWARE. An experienced lawyer, Corinna has counselled many victims of harassment and stalking through AWARE’s support services, including the Sexual Assault Befrienders Service. Corinna worked closely with the Ministry of Law for the creation of this bill.

Associate Professor Chan Wing Cheong, Faculty of Law, National University of Singapore, is a regular speaker at conferences and forums on criminal law and family law. His research interests lie in criminal and family law, extending to child law, victims of crime and elder law.

Welcome recognition of harassment, but employers should be involved

The proposed anti-harassment legislation announced today reflects the government’s increased awareness that sexual harassment and stalking are serious problems. AWARE regularly assists victims who experience severe harm when their lives are disrupted by such conduct. We welcome the decision to strengthen the civil legal remedies available to them, as well as the explicit recognition that stalking and harassment may include online and/or extra-territorial behaviour.

We particularly welcome the availability of protection orders and expedited protection orders granting victims immediate protection against harassment and stalking. We hope that the procedure for obtaining protection orders will be easily accessible, as victims should not have to spend large sums on legal fees or navigate complex and intimidating bureaucracy. The effectiveness of the protection order regime will also depend on the willingness of the police to take action against breaches.

AWARE is also pleased to note the availability of damages for harassment and stalking. We hope that the courts, in interpreting and applying the law, allow claims for damages for emotional injury, as this is a major component of the harm done by stalking and harassment.

However, we are disappointed by the failure to impose any obligation on employers to address workplace sexual harassment. Our 2008 survey found that workplace sexual harassment affected over 50% of respondents. 79% of victims were women, raising questions about gender equality in Singapore workplaces. The most equitable and effective way to handle cases is employer mediation. However, the proposed law places no obligation on employers to take sexual harassment seriously. They remain free to ignore or dismiss complaints, leaving victims with little choice but to leave their jobs or suffer in silence.

We call upon the government to expand the proposed legislation or amend the Employment Act to legally require employers to take measures to address workplace sexual harassment. The Ministry of Manpower should also mandate and enforce a detailed code of conduct specifically setting out best practice for employers on preventing workplace sexual harassment and processing harassment complaints.

Anyone seeking assistance with stalking and sexual harassment can contact our Sexual Assault Befrienders Service (6779 0282, sabs@aware.org.sg).

Sex crimes are against people, not ‘purity’

By Jolene Tan for the Straits Times

Until recently, Morocco allowed rapists of minors to escape charges by marrying their victims.

Many of us recoil from such laws, because we recognise rape as a crime against a person, whose bodily autonomy has been attacked. We see instinctively that pushing a minor into an ongoing intimate relationship with their assailant causes trauma rather than recovery.

The Moroccan law, which has fortunately been repealed, was rooted in a different view of rape. For some, rape is a crime against the “purity” of the victim, a kind of sexual virtue.

Since this virtue is tied to reserving sexual relations exclusively to married couples, the wrong in rape may also be seen as potentially repaired by marriage.

The idea of the victim as a person with a right to make choices, particularly when it concerns her own body, features only secondarily in this way of thinking, if at all.

Troublingly, in recent cases involving sex crimes, some against minors, statements by the authorities in Singapore have also demonstrated purity-based attitudes.

For instance, in January this year, a case involving the rape of an eight-year-old saw a prosecutor emphasising the “loss” of the victim’s “chastity”. This points to concern with the prior absence of sexual experience rather than the plain fact of a violent assault.

Likewise, a few weeks ago, in pressing for punishment of a man who non-consensually distributed sex videos of his former girlfriend, another prosecutor placed stock on the idea that, “a woman’s reputation, once tarnished, is gone forever and can never be repaired”.

And only a few days ago, a judge sentencing a teacher who sexually abused her pupil described her as having “defiled and corrupted” the boy.

Such statements suggest – possibly unintentionally – that the main damage inflicted by sex crimes is a sort of stain on the victims’ sexual virtue, rather than the physical and emotional harm done to them and the degrading denial of control over their own bodies.

This attitude places a moral quality allegedly connected to sexual inexperience at the centre of the violation. The uncomfortable implication is that the state and society can or should take sexual assaults seriously only when the victims are deemed “pure enough” by some ill-defined moralistic yardstick.

Indeed, in another criminal case this year, a judge cast aspersions on the minor victim, who had made contact with the perpetrators online, and suggested that the law is only “to protect really innocent minors”.

The dehumanising logic of “purity” also explains apathy towards sexual violence committed against sex workers. Because they consent to paid sex while working, they are believed to no longer possess the “purity” that rape laws are thought to protect – even though their experiences of sexual violence are no less severe or harmful.

In our view, the absolute right to refuse unwanted sexual contact – and, in the case of minors, to be protected from adult exploitation – should apply equally to everyone. The authorities should not be in the business of judging some victims as “good”, thus deserving protection, and others as “bad” – a process that itself can worsen victims’ trauma.

Encouraging a view of victims as irreparably damaged or otherwise diminished by rape, rather than harmed, may also be harmful to their recovery.

Fortunately, as a prosecutor reminded the judge in the case involving online contact, it is “established law” that the sexual experience of the victim is “irrelevant” to sentencing.

The law also took a welcome step forward with the repeal in 2011 of Section 157(d) of the Evidence Act, under which victims of sexual assault could be discredited based on their sexual histories. Removing this provision was in line with a legal ethos that aspires to fully and equally protect all people from violence and violation, without reference to moralistic judgments on their private lives.

We call upon everyone in society, especially those concerned with the making and enforcement of criminal law, to embrace and uphold a more people-centred justice system. We ought to focus on protecting the welfare of human beings rather than theoretical ideas about “purity” and sexual virtue.

The writer is the programmes and communications senior manager of Aware, a gender equality advocacy group.

This opinion piece was published in the Straits Times on 22 February 2014.

Budget: New directions welcome, but questions remain

On 29 January, AWARE submitted its fourth annual set of recommendations for the national budget, emphasising the issues of: 1) poverty and income inequality, 2) support for caregivers, 3) healthcare financing in Singapore, and 4) transparency and inclusiveness in the budget process.

With the announcement of the Budget today, we welcome the government’s recognition that many in Singapore face severe difficulty making ends meet, especially in relation to healthcare costs. We were heartened to see Minster Shanmugaratnam’s speech foreground income inequality and lack of social mobility, and to emphasise that we must “avoid permanent tiers” in society. The Minister’s remarks about the need to change workplace cultures and social norms to empower employees were also very timely.

At the same time, we continue to have questions and concerns about how these important issues will be addressed. Our comments on the Budget announcement fall under five main headings:

Support for caregivers and caregiving

In our pre-Budget recommendations, AWARE called for caregiving to be recognised as a public good. The provision of financial benefits to caregivers for elderly and disabled dependents appears to be a step in this direction. However, the use of income tax relief to compensate caregivers is regressive, as only those with higher incomes are subject to income tax and therefore in a position to benefit. Many caregivers may not be in formal employment at all, especially stay-at-home mothers, and thus will derive no advantage from this. We call upon the state to reward caregiving through direct contributions, not tax relief, for instance through payments into CPF.

If the government wishes to support shifts in workplace culture to improve productivity, it would do well to prioritise the issue of combining workforce participation with caregiving, which disproportionately disadvantages women in Singapore. The Minister enumerated generous subsidies available to companies looking to upgrade their ICT infrastructure, but mentioned no similar support for encouraging flexible work or otherwise transforming employment to facilitate caregiving. For instance, if SMEs are to be housed together to benefit from sharing facilities, the government could consider funding the inclusion of workplace crèches at these facilities.

Distribution of risk and burden of healthcare financing

AWARE has previously highlighted the particular burden that healthcare costs place upon older women. We are therefore heartened to note that the Pioneer Generation Package will help to alleviate some of the difficulties faced by this demographic. Moreover, we are pleased to learn that Medishield Life will cover pre-existing conditions – a step forward from their previous exclusion. However, because the Pioneer Generation is expressly positioned as a “unique”, one-off measure, it raises concerns about whether there will be sustainable provision for the needs of subsequent generations.

We had hoped to hear more explicit consideration of how the risk and burden of healthcare financing will be shared as between individuals and their families on the one hand, and the state on the other, in relation to the whole population and not only those included within the Pioneer Generation. We welcome the government’s statement that subsidies will be available on premiums in the future and eagerly await further details.

We also note that the Pioneer Generation Package, unlike many other forms of state support, is not means tested by family. We are interested to see if this heralds further departures from the means-testing model used by the Ministry of Health.

The role of employment in social support

The Minister described jobs as the most important safety net and emphasised the “upgrading” of workers, with the generous boost given to the Lifelong Learning Endowment Fund. Both job creation and the opportunities for workers to acquire skills are vital.

AWARE recommends that social support be decoupled from employment, employability or skill level, as there may be many members of society who are not in a position to obtain formal or skilled employment, whose basic needs in everyday life must also be met. We also note the Minister’s enthusiasm for various cost-cutting measures by employers which involve lowering labour costs through automation, and have some concern about the resulting impact on the workers who are affected by these measures.

Social mobility and disadvantages experienced by children

We welcome the Minister’s proclamation that children should not inherit disadvantage, and welcome the statement of greater government support for more affordable kindergarten places and the provision of education to a tertiary level. However, as we noted in our pre-Budget recommendations, there are numerous ways in which current policies penalise children based on the employment, family structures or other choices of their parents. For instance, access to public housing, maternity leave entitlements and childcare entitlements are tied to the marital status of parents, with negative consequences for social equality as between children of different parents.

Transparency in the Budget process

In his speech, the Minister discussed many forthcoming initiatives and alluded, with varying levels of detail, to measures from previous years. In keeping with our earlier calls for greater transparency in the Budget process, we urge the government to introduce a system of consistently, publicly and comprehensively reporting on the utilisation and efficacy of the government initiatives discussed in each Budget.

You can read AWARE’s recommendations for the Budget 2014 here.

AWARE’s statement on the public order bill

AWARE is gravely concerned by the proposed introduction of expanded police powers by the Public Order (Additional Temporary Provisions) Bill (the Bill). We call upon the government to withdraw the Bill and, failing that, Members of Parliament to reject the Bill.

The Bill proposes to grant extensive powers to the police and auxiliary police, curtailing the rights and liberties of civilians. In particular:

The legislation targets a specific area predominantly frequented by and associated with a particular racial group, and therefore has a strongly racially differentiated impact. Moreover, the migrant workers especially affected by these restrictions are a marginalised group in Singapore, whose rights, welfare and social status are significantly compromised compared to those of citizens, residents and other classes of workers.

The legislation grants the police and auxiliary police extensive powers to stop, search and question civilians in an extremely intrusive manner, which compromises not just the freedom of movement but also, in the case of the proposed strip search powers, the right to bodily autonomy. The exercise of these powers is based on a wide grant of discretion. They can be invoked as long as the officer reasonably considers it necessary, an inadequately loose standard to meet for actions that so substantially affect human dignity.

Any legislative measure of this nature requires an extraordinary justification. It could only be acceptable if introduced as the result of extensive and impartial investigation which demonstrated its necessity in order to avert an immediate and severe threat to human life or well-being. Even in such as case, these powers could only be condoned after consideration of alternatives of a less potentially discriminatory and intrusive nature. None of these preconditions has been met in this case.

Ms Lynn Lee, Mr Andrew Loh, Ms Shelley Thio, Dr Vincent Wijeysingha and Ms Rachel Zeng (together, the authors) have written a Briefing Paper on the Bill, dated 10 February 2014 (the Briefing Paper). We agree with the authors that this Bill will weaken the stature of the Committee of Inquiry (the CoI) which is to investigate the causes and nature of the events of 8 December 2013. The CoI should be given a chance to fulfil its mission thoroughly and impartially, without the influence of the assumptions underlying this precipitate legislation.

Blaze a trail this International Women’s Day

What makes you angry? What gives you hope? On International Womens Day (8 March), join AWARE and the We Can! campaign at Hong Lim Park to explore these questions at All Fired Up!

This electrifying day of celebration will bring together people of all ages, genders and walks of life to share the struggles and successes of the womens movement in Singapore.

Date: 8 March (Saturday)
Time: 4pm – 8pm
Location: Hong Lim Park
Click here to register!

Stand in solidarity with inspiring slogans and songs, or explore urgent social issues at booths set up by civil society groups. Go wild with our themed graffiti wall, and pass on the flame of hope at our candlelight vigil for the past, present and future of the womens movement. Art, music, poetry and speeches: All Fired Up! has something for everyone.

Programme highlights:

Workshop: celebration toolkit (4 – 5.30pm)

Whats a party without props? Join us for an afternoon of placard- and banner-making to set your message ablaze. Well work together to craft slogans and chants for the evenings festivities.

Bellyful from EtiquetteSG (4 – 6pm)

Celebrate the fire in your belly! Artist and writer Dana Lam, with support from EtiquetteSG, will create plaster casts of bellies big and small of any age, colour and gender. We hope to have enough belly casts to cover the lawn for the candlelight vigil.

Women Blazing a Trail (5.30 – 7.30pm)

What makes you angry? What gives you hope? Women and their allies step up to answer these questions with honesty and verve, through speech and poetry – with slogans and chants to get everyone all fired up!

Some speaking slots are open. If you have a tale of anger and hope that youd like to share, please contact Sumedha at sumedha@aware.org.sg by 28 February.

Candlelight vigil for the womens movement: past, present and future (7.30 – 8pm)

A show of unity to celebrate our past successes and get us geared up for the challenges of the future. Old and young will stand together and share in the light of hope.

Please register for this event here. If you would like to set up a booth for your organisation at All Fired Up!, contact Sahar at sahar@aware.org.sg.

Note: We welcome people of all nationalities to join us. However, there may be legal limitations on participation for non-Singaporeans in some activities (e.g. slogans). We apologise for these restrictions, which are not of our choosing. Please do come and take part in everything else.

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This event is kindly supported by the High Commission of Canada.

WOMEN'S HELPLINE

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SEXUAL ASSAULT CARE CENTRE

6779 0282

General enquiries

6779 7137

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Year: 2014