#metoo – big queenly thanks to @tracelysette & @violadavis posting this so i felt brave enough to! A post shared by ilana glazer (@ilanusglazer) on Oct 17, 2017 at 12:11pm PDT

Inspired by Viola Davis’s and Trace Lysette’s #MeToo posts, Broad City star and co-showrunner Ilana Glazer posted one of her own. In the post, Glazer shared that she has been sexually harassed “countless times,” whether she was working as a waitress or as a showrunner. She was even sexually harassed by “a creepyass doctor just last year and filed a complaint with NYC.”

However, when she was harassed as a showrunner, she had the power to hold the men who did it accountable. The post continued: “I’ve fired a couple dudes — one background actor and one sound guy. i was asked “are you sure?” hm okay yeah lemme think a sec– YEAH I’M FUCKING SURE. cuz getting sexually harassed seems to be a constant, but having the opportunity to do something about it is rare.”

First off, “YEAH I’M FUCKING SURE.” The anthem of every woman who’s been asked if she’s sure was really harassed or assaulted.

Second, I appreciate how this post celebrates the badassery of being able to fire your harasser while acknowledging how rare that opportunity is. When women are pressured to be brave or speak out against their harassers, the power dynamic often gets lost in discussion – but the abusers often have so much more power. A 2003 study found that 75% of employees (of any gender) who reported their sexual harassment were retaliated against in the workplace. And women who do speak up can often find that their harassers still don’t face any consequences. (See: the women who accused Donald Trump, only to see him elected president.)

And this power dynamic is just one of the many reasons why we need more women running things behind the scenes: in the director’s chair, as producers, as head writers, etc. Women can and do sexually harass their employees, and they’re not immune to the abuse that power invites. Eradicating rape culture is going to require a far more radical cultural shift than the hiring of more women. However, it’d definitely be a whole lot harder to make a successful career as a misogynist creep if you faced getting fired from every other job by a female boss – instead of enabled at 90% of those jobs by a male one.

We definitely need a world where even the least powerful women don’t have to worry about being harassed. But we also need a world where, when harassment occurs, “the opportunity to do something about it” doesn’t fall so overwhelmingly to men.

(Via The Hollywood Reporter; image: Lane Savage and Comedy Central)

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