2021 Reviewed: Nascent #MeToo movement, but such a long way to go

The bravery of one woman heralded a deluge of sexual harassment claims

By Gina Agapiou

Resilience is an important skill for journalists seeing as the newsroom can sometimes be a gateway to trauma. So, those of us who thought the worst had ended with 2020, were in for a shock.

The outbreak of the coronavirus pandemic created a series of socio-political and economic consequences which left most people struggling financially, unable to trust the government (especially after the release of the prequel to the Al Jazeera’s Cyprus Papers documentary) and craving affection in a social distancing era.

And that was not all. Cyprus welcomed 2021 with an extremely delayed #MeToo movement which gave a taste of the extent of social harassment incidents in the island.

This found me unsure whether to be glad that people were speaking up, horrified or feel sorry because justice would not come for everyone.

The domino effect of reports began thanks to Greek Olympic gold medalist Sophia Bekatorou but also local sports shooter Andri Eleftheriou who both were courageous enough to publicly speak about how they were sexually abused by men of authority in the sports world. Their vulnerability sparked a series of sexual harassment and abuse complaints in Greece and in Cyprus.

But what was shocking for both media workers and the public is that this was not the first time Andri had spoken up about the harassment.

The 37-year-old Olympic athlete had first described her experience on television back in 2018 and again in December 2020 but no one bat an eyelid until Bekatorou came forward.

Andri had said that she had been sexually harassed and abused by a male member of the Olympic Committee at the 2006 Commonwealth Games in Melbourne and also in Beijing in 2008. What was even more astounding is that Andri eventually decided to file a police report after a personal meeting with former Justice Minister Emily Yiolitis who had promised her support. This of course happened after her unofficial allegation gained widespread media attention.

In an unsurprising turn of events, both women’s reports could not be taken to court and the rest is legalese. In Andri’s case, the attorney-general deemed there was not enough evidence to form a criminal case.

But all was not lost, because Andri, who remained collected and managed to rank seventh in skeet shooting in Tokyo Olympic Games 2021, also paved the way for more women – and hopefully men too – to spit out their own traumas.

Reporting on crimes of a sexual nature can be extremely tricky. One must keep in mind the agency they give to the victim, the responsibility they assign to the abuser and be extremely meticulous on how they communicate the details of the crime since such cases are often sensationalised.

Slowly but surely, the reports rose to dozens and police were striving to keep investigations out of the media’s spotlight.

If not a revolution, it was certainly a revelation for the residents of this conservative country who at times still view sexual abuse as another family secret, or an embarrassing incident that shouldn’t ever be spoken of.

It wasn’t long before clerics and politicians also found themselves in hot water amidst the reports that hopefully signalled the beginning of a new era, where people who experience this kind of trauma feel safe to report it.

Perhaps though sexual harassment and abuse within the church deserves its own article and as a woman I am not even allowed inside the altar.

Despite the partial awakening, the reports did not mirror the global data. If one in three women worldwide have been physically or sexually abused, where were they in Cyprus?

I was alarmed to think that thousands of women have not reported their abuse for various reasons which ironically emerged after the first sexual harassment allegations.

Violence against women and girls has also been characterised as a shadow pandemic fuelled by Covid-19. But this power pandemic has been long-standing, and it has been continuously fuelled by sexism, toxic masculinity and gender inequality.

But this is Cyprus. Just like we waited for a global health crisis to try and address inadequacies in our hospitals, it was only when the issue was found in the spotlight that some pink washing efforts were initiated.

Then again, more than a year later, the discussions for the establishment of a 24/7 sexual harassment referral centre have not moved forward, and the creation of a facility targeting adults with childhood sexual abuse experiences – approved by cabinet in 2019 – remains in the works.

What we fail to realise is that sexual education in schools plays perhaps the most important role in forming sensible adults and more focus must be spent on prevention.

As we all know the existence of a law is not as important as its implementation, while the announcement of an already established domestic violence police unit is meaningless if authorities know there are mentally unstable men harassing women out there but choose to do nothing because at the end of the day there are no facilities to help treat those people.

But more money will be spent elsewhere. Like the coronavirus and the relentless sameness of the stories, harassment cases all start sounding similar. They get their time in the spotlight, but the public lose interest and move on. In the process the promised money and programmes get forgotten.