WASHINGTON — Serious accusations against former Hollywood mogul Harvey Weinstein have put a spotlight on sexual harassment that experts believe to be prevalent, but underreported, in American workplaces.
Most complaints of harassment are filed with the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, which enforces federal laws that make it illegal to discriminate against employees or job applicants.
“They would be the first to say that sexual harassment as a general matter is vastly underreported,” said Jocelyn Frye, a senior fellow with the Center for American Progress.
“A lot of folks are just afraid to come forward.”
To rectify the situation, Frye said leadership has to start at the top. “It’s important to clearly communicate from the top of the organization [and] all the way down that offensive words and lewd conduct are simply unacceptable.”
Here are a few of Frye’s recommendations to help fight workplace harassment:
- Establish a strong policy.
- Create a complaint process.
- Ensure people understand that process.
- Make sure there’s no retaliation for reporting offenses.
- Hold people accountable and evaluate whether they’re following the rules.
Discrimination in the workplace can take many forms. It can be based on race, color, religion, sex (including pregnancy, gender identity and sexual orientation), national origin, age (40 or older), disability or genetic information, according to the EEOC’s website.
The EEOC receives about 90,000 charges a year. Of those, about a third involve harassment of some sort. Frye said nearly half of the harassment charges involve sexual harassment.
WTOP’s Dimitri Sotis contributed to this report.
