The Success of the MeToo Movement

MeToo Movement Student Name Institution Course Date MeToo Movement Social media has revolutionized the way we communicate and has become a new tool in the way people address societal issues. The war on sexual abuse and harassment especially in workplace is one of the recent societal issue that has tapped into the power of societal media using the MeToo hashtag and it has yielded impressive results. The tweet was initially intended to see the magnitude of sexual harassment in the workplace when she sent it out but the power of cyberactivism snowballed to a global movement. Cyberactivism is a new kind of activism using social media tools and applications CITATION Rod14 \l 1033 (Sandoval-Almazan & Gil-Garcia, 2014). It is organic and decentralized and no particular leadership structure as with traditional media which can influence its growth and objective. According to CITATION Dun13 \l 1033 (Dunaway, 2013), the tone of campaign news stories in traditional media is determined in part by profit-making incentives and hence greatly influences how such a movement grows. Movements such as MeToo are not affected by such issues. The movement grew and evolved in a year whilst leading to many successful prosecution and conviction of hundreds of high-profile leaders in various industries whereby half were replaced by ladies CITATION Kat17 \l 1033 (Bennhold, 2017). It has sparked global push to revisit policy framework in many organizations to ensure that the workplace is free from sexual harassment. In many levels, the movement has been a success though sexual harassment in the workplace has not been rooted out. The success of the movement is largely due to social media and though the initial online presence has reduced, the movement has spread to different platforms and has since become organic and continues to cause change in many parts of the world. The movement has sparked debates but to pull down the societal frames that fan the vice i.e toxic masculinity, the movement has to evolve and target other aspects of the society. The power of social media has empowered new demographic segment which wouldn’t otherwise be protesters to voice their opinions on societal issues. Sexual harassment stems mainly from gender inequality. This is the underpinning issue that has engrained the issue in the society. Hence, to tackle sexual harassment, any societal structure that enables it must be addressed. The society must be ready to have uncomfortable discussions on how to root it out. According to CITATION Ann14 \l 1033 (Macduff, 2014), without room made for disagreement and contestation, a robust notion of active citizenship is therefore undermined. Gender inequality is not genetic it is taught and any society that wants to root it out must walk the talk. It is taught often through subtle processes such as demarcating the toys for children which teach boys to be more aggressive and stand up to your self while girls are taught to be nice and read people’s feelings CITATION Eva18 \l 1033 (Cox, 2018). These beliefs are surefire to toxic masculinity and passive femininity which continue to drag the fight against gender inequality. Sexual harassment is just but the evidence of gender inequality and the MeToo movement has not fought the beliefs, cultures and other societal structures that enable them. There is still a long way to go to bring down these structures that continue to facilitate sexual harassment. Since the MeToo movement started, there has been some change. High profile people have been arraigned in court for sexual misconduct and successful convictions achieved against them. CEOs and politicians have stepped down and many companies around the world have revisited their workplace policies to update it to reflect a new culture that is intolerant to sexual misconduct. Many people even in predominantly relatively more patriarchal societies have come forward to air their issues and it is fair to say they have not been ignored. Though in some circles some people feel that the movement has overreached CITATION Haa18 \l 1033 (Haas, 2018), generally it has brought greater good than harm. The successful arrest, trial and conviction of Bill Cosby, a prominent and decorated actor, the ongoing trial of Harvey Weinstein, firing of Matt Lauer, a prominent journalist with NBC and the stepping down of AI Franken, a democratic senator, etc are evidence that the movement has been successful. On the other hand, the movement has not been very successful in other cultures especially in some Asian countries where patriarchy is more institutionalized as a societal norm. In South Korea, which is a traditionally patriarchal society with several legal frameworks institutionalizing gender inequality has seen a higher resistance to the MeToo movement. According to the CITATION Sot19 \l 1033 (Suzuki, 2019), men in South Korea are accusing the government of reverse discrimination. The ongoing changes brought by Moon’s administration to remove gender inequality are termed as reverse discrimination of men. Men accuse the new systems of favoring women and discriminating boys which has negatively affected Moon’s popularity ratings. The goal is to paralyze reforms designed to empower women and create gender equity. They are also lobbying courts to ensure ‘presumption of innocence’ which is key in prosecuting sexual harassment CITATION Sot19 \l 1033 (Suzuki, 2019). Concisely, the MeToo movement has come a long way and it has further to go to continue bringing down the system that have enabled sexual harassment. There are some concerns among even the supporters of the movement that the MeToo wave may have adverse effects on innocent men. Some people point out that some contexts may be taken out of context and the man is perceived to be a sexual predator in the court of public opinion. Some women are concerned that some men near them might be falsely accused by malicious women of sexual harassment and even if they can prove their innocence, much of their dignity and respect might be lost already. They may even lose their careers, women and live in the shadow of a false accusation that destroyed their lives. Thus, there is concern that MeToo movement might go too far or be ‘weaponized’ against men by malicious people. Additionally, some women fear that the movement may prompt the patriarchy to stifle their careers. They point out that men in powerful positions may discriminate hiring processes to leave out women as they do not want to be too close to people who may accuse them of sexual harassment CITATION Kat17 \l 1033 (Bennhold, 2017). Some people are viewing this as the unintentional consequence of the MeToo movement that men might create protectionist structures around them and lockout women in workplaces and other circles to avoid being falsely accused of social misconduct CITATION Ali19 \l 1033 (Green, 2019). Green points out that some high-profile men in organizations now have to serve ladies differently from men because of the fear of sexual misconduct allegations. This shows that probably ladies may be served in a hurried manner because the individual does not want to attract potential cases of sexual misconduct. Thus, some pro...