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ABSTRACT
The current surge in media attention surrounding workplace sexual harassment cases has created a hypersensitivity among coworkers and left employers scrambling to tighten HR policies and training procedures in an effort to mitigate a company's exposure to liability. But, why now? Are workplace sexual harassment cases on the rise? Is harassment occurring in industries uncommon from those typically known in the past? The #MeToo and Time's Up movements are shining a light on the fact that workplace harassment is found in all types of industries, not just those highlighted in recent media. The statistics regarding the number of sexual harassment incidents occurring in any industry, however, cannot be determined with any level of reliability or validity due to the high number of cases that go unreported, and the widespread usage of Confidential Settlement Agreements that, until recently, were part and parcel of most settlements in sexual harassment cases. The secrecy surrounding such agreements arguably has contributed to the ongoing prevalence of workplace sexual harassment. This mandate of silence is also to blame for the post-traumatic stress plaguing victims of sexual harassment. While historical research has shown that workplace harassment has existed for decades, the movements have found a platform at a time when all aspects of the issue are converging, thereby making the time ripe for changes in legislation and challenging employers to rethink the way anti-harassment training is conducted.
Key words: sexual harassment, confidential settlement agreements, #MeToo.
INTRODUCTION
Time Magazine's 2017 Person of the Year cover story was "The Silence Breakers" - the faces of women and men who came forward to give a voice to the subject of sexual harassment. On October 17, 2017, Facebook reported that there were more than 12 million posts, comments and reactions regarding "#MeToo" in less than 24 hours by 4.7 million users around the world (Khomami, 2017). In the year that followed, the campaign that launched a worldwide conversation about sexual harassment, especially in the workplace, unleashed a wave of disclosures from women sharing their experiences of sexual harassment by clicking hashtag "MeToo". The movement resonated with millions of women who identified with the stories being reported from well-known celebrities. Women with stories that were before shrouded in secrecy were now sharing, "It happened to...