No longer anonymous: the Australian creative industry is a misogynist’s playground
This article is based on lived experience. It references emotional abuse, grooming, sexual assault and rape within the Australian creative industry. It refers to data from reputable sources that can be referenced throughout.
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Writer Ella Campbell takes a stand and sends a message to Australia’s advertising culture.
The time for anonymity is over. We must be brave. Australian advertising culture has to change. A report released earlier this month by shEqual, gently titled ‘Perceptions of Gender Equality in Australian Advertising’, has unearthed some truly damning findings about our industry.
The report highlights that women are still experiencing sexual harassment, assault and discrimination in the workplace at disturbingly high rates. To make matters worse, we are also highly likely to encounter negative consequences for speaking up against this behaviour.
The promise of repercussion lingers like a bad dream just beyond the email to HR. Will I lose my job? Be shunned by the team? What will happen to my reputation? These are very real and very terrifying thoughts to confront when you’re being tormented in a place that’s legally meant to keep you safe.
This has been happening for decades and the same men are doing it over and over again.
It’s not time for the victims to be known but the perpetrators.
We all know who they are.
All the good guys in the industry should call them out.
Or are they still complicit?