A photo of a man sitting on a TTC subway train was posted to Instagram on Jan. 16. And then it spread like wildfire.

“PLEASE SHARE,” the caption urged, before alleging the man groped a young woman who was sleeping while sitting next to him around 10 a.m. the same day.

The post went viral, shared and reshared across Toronto on various social media platforms. After an investigation, Toronto police arrested a man Thursday and alleged that he sexually assaulted two women in January.

When someone shares their sexual assault experience, it makes women feel safer to share their stories, said Farrah Khan, manager of Consent Comes First at Ryerson University.

“Too often we brush off those stories or we’re told to brush off those stories, to say it wasn’t so bad, you weren’t ‘raped,’ he just groped her breast,” Khan told the Star.

“Sometimes you think like, did that really happen? The most common response to sexual violence is freezing. When one woman validates and verifies that not only did this happen, but it’s a big deal, it opens up the floodgates almost to allow women to really take seriously what happened to them.”

Khan said she couldn’t comment on this specific arrest but spoke broadly on how social media can influence people to come forward with their own experiences of sexual violence.

“Social media has changed in some ways how we share information when things happen,” she said.

Speaking out about something publicly can be empowering.

“The thing that keeps sexual violence going in a lot of ways is the shame blame and fear,” Khan said.

“There’s this idea that we’re asking for it — especially with young women” between the ages of 16 and 25, who face a higher rate of sexual violence than women in other age groups.

Often, people experience something Khan calls “bystander apathy,” meaning they are less likely to intervene when people are present due to fear of being seen as a problem.

Or people reassure themselves that the situation isn’t a big deal and they don’t need to intervene. It is common for witnesses to harmful situations to freeze up.

Taking action right away is great, Khan said.

“We want people to intervene, we want people to support the person who’s been harmed,” Khan said.

An open conversation about sexual violence is empowering women to come forward with their own experiences.

“We’re normalizing that it does happen, that we need to take action, that we have a responsibility to take action,” Khan said, urging public institutions like the TTC to say that people have the responsibility to speak up.

The social media post prompted a petition on change.org claiming the man seen in the photo was an instructor at York University and called for his removal.

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The instructor taught a class on management accounting.

“The part-time instructor has not attended campus since York University became aware of alleged reports regarding an incident on the TTC,” university spokesperson Yanni Dagonas said in an emailed statement.

“The university has made arrangements for his courses to continue as scheduled with alternate instructors. This has been communicated to registered students.”

Dagonas said a bulletin had been issued to the community about the Toronto police news release and encouraged anyone in need of support to come forward. Dagonas declined to comment further.

In a news release Friday, police allege a man sexually assaulted two women while they were seated on a train, once on Jan. 3 and again on Jan. 16.

Const. Jenifferjit Sidhu told the Star the social media posts led to the investigation. As a result, police have “two ongoing and active investigations” related to the incident, she said.

Sidhu confirmed two separate women have come forward with allegations. The victims contacted police shortly after the post surfaced online.

“There was something circulating on different social media platforms and as a result multiple women did come forward and an investigation started,” she said.

Sidhu said the investigation started because the women came to police, not because police saw the post online.

Sidhu told the Star the man surrendered to police.

Nicolae Stefan Pop, 51, of Toronto, is charged with two counts of sexual assault and scheduled to appear in court on March 19.

If you have been the victim of sexual violence, Toronto’s Rape Crisis Centre is available 24 hours a day at 416-597-8808. More information is available here.