Honoring The Woman Forum Sexual Harassment: IS Violence..

Sexual harassment is a physical violence which affects women mind and causes harm to  women psychologically and physically. Headaches, and  insomnia are symptoms of this injury. In addition, sexual harassment is a violence that uses fear and intimidation as a mean of control and exploitation of women, and keeps them in their social and economic inferiority outlined by the masculine culture.
It thus turns into an authority and  power to force women to evacuate the public spaces and leave it to men. Sexual harassment affects the heart of relations between men and women as two different social types. It affects the most intimate in this relationship, that is the sexual relationship, and is therefore targeted at women as a gender. The purpose of these behaviors and goals are:
- To have access to sexual services and favors by the harasser.
- To get at women as feminine social type.
- Expressing degrading and vulgar Values to the characteristics of female gender.  - To tell women that they belong to an inferior gender in the social type.
- To consciously remind women that they violated the barriers set by the patriarchal culture, and women existence "anomalous" in spaces which has been considered a privileged male space, such as : Work - Street - Education - public spaces.
- Causing damage and harm to women.
- The exclusion of women from development efforts and results.
- Violating the principles of freedom and the right to life which the main system of human rights was based and founded upon.
- Violating women rights for dignity, security, physical safety, and mental health.
- Expressing the unequal power relations between men and women.   Sexual harassment is then a form of violence against women and an emphasis on physical and psychological violence at the same time. It is based on the serious mechanics of : frequency, urgency, and changing the appearance and space of the harassment (at work or university or by phone or stalking and following in the street). These mechanisms emphasize the following:
- sexual harassment is a conscious behavior .
- Sexual harassment behavior is based on coercion and pressure that ignore the women desire and wish, and their right to refuse or consent.
- Sexual harassment is a behavior that glorifies masculinity as a classy, superior,and positive value, and despise femininity as an unclean, weak, and negative value.
- Sexual harassment is an act linked to sex and gender, and therefore reflects discrimination in its most evident forms.
- Sexual harassment is a behavior based on the abuse of power and authority, whether actual or physical (employer - manager - head of ) or a symbolic authority which is masculinity. 
Sexual harassment is a social and psychological phenomenon in origin, that has various results and dimensions that must be confronted and intervened to fix it. Sexual harassment takes three manifestations:    - Oral sexual harassment: outrageous sexual remarks and comments  / asking sexual questions  / obscene jokes / urgency in the request for a meeting .... etc, which is the most prevalent sexual harassment.
- Non oral sexual harassment: suggestive lookings, or physical nods and hints.
- Material sexual harassment: beginning with fondling and touching, and ending with assault.  The main indicator for it is, its initiation by the same person repeatedly and with insistence. Its place in most cases is enclosed spaces (places of work / study).  Sexual harassment leads to crises, psychological suffering, loss of confidence, and a sense of inferiority to the harassed. It also extends to the harassed livelihoods and sources of income, and thus it is a form of oppression, and it is the worst kinds of exploitation. And the only way to escape from it due to the circumstances surrounding community, traditions, and culture and the lack of legal protection, is the weapon of silence, and sacrificing source of livelihoods, or give up the study, and relinquishing the exposure of this behavior.   Sexual harassment then, is violence against women as long as it causes damages and pains, and  bothers women and limits their freedom and will. But the silence surrounding it is the most dangerous, due to cultural, religious, and community considerations, which make from women when victims of sexually harassment , a reason for this harassment by seducing, tempting, and luring the male harasser, to molest her for being in space she does not belong to. Such ideas create a sense of guilt for the victim, and borne her silent to avert conditions which may increase the suffering and threatening social stability. The absence of competent institutions and centers to receive and support victims of sexual harassment of women, make them reliniquish exposing such sexual behavior, and turn escape solutions like silence, ignoring, or leaving work or study   Sexual harassment contradicts and undermines,based on its purposes and objectives,the three basic principles of human rights:
Equality: It is a behavior which reflects the unequal power relations between men and women and aims to diminish women as a feminine gender. It expresses the primary and degrading concepts, values and beliefs for feminine gender as a lower status, and enforces discrimination practices against them.
Freedom: This behavior is seeking the exclusion of women from the efforts and results of development, and it is a form of oppression and one of the worst kinds of exploitation which threatens the livelihood and empowerment of women. It also threatens the existence of women in the spaces of work and the street, education, and other public spaces.
The right to life: It is a conduct that violates women right to dignity, security and physical safety, and causes psychological damage and harm to  them. It leads to crises and mental suffering, loss of confidence, a sense of inferiority, and confusion and disorder and in the minds of women.  Despite the failure of lawmakers to develop a specific definition for sexual harassment, and the lack of international consensus on a uniform international legislation to respond to it, but I will try to put here a definition for sexual harassment based on the foregoing. I propose that the definition of sexual harassment as follows: "any and all behavior or conduct or act of a person towards another person, that takes the character of determination and perseverance, intended to seduction, deceit and corruption, which result by it the organized persecution and exploitation of an individual, causing an imminent risks, surrounded by fraught with inconvenience and harassment, threats and claims , in order to reach sexual objectives, that cause anxiety, confusion, embarrassment, and distress for a period of time, which its outcome is humiliation, oppression, injury and harm, that is causing a violation of physical, psychological, and mental security, safety and dignity of the harassed, and interference, disruption, loss of confidence and a sense of inferiority to the harassed party. ".