Women use virtual reality simulation to beat sexual harassment in Singapore varsities
“Wow, your shirt is very see-through. Are you wearing matching underwear?” the person says lewdly.
It’s a virtual reality simulation-but it’s enough to shock 23-year-old Elizabeth Lee into silence as the scene plays from her headset.
The VR technology is section of the Girl, Talk project which is targeted at helping women fight against harassment in Singapore.
“I would feel that I would respond in a far more confrontational way,” Lee admits. “It felt very physically close... it had been just really disgusting to listen to such crass remarks.”
Sexual harassment is a key issue in the city-state’s university campuses after students at a top institution took to Instagram to recount a tale to be secretly filmed in a dormitory shower.
The victim, Monica Baey, felt the perpetrator got off too lightly and her decision to go public has been dubbed Singapore’s #MeToo moment.
There have been 56 cases of sexual misconduct involving students from six Singapore universities between 2015 and 2017, according to information Education Minister Ong Ye Kung provided to Parliament last May.
But many students told AFP the true figure is far higher and several incidents go unreported.
Girl, Talk was made by four women-Danelia Chim, Seow Yun Rong, Heather Seet and Dawn Kwan-at Nanyang Technological University (NTU), who felt that while #MeToo had raised awareness there is little to “equip survivors” about how best to respond in several situations.
“Even if you’re caught in a physically vulnerable situation, having the capacity to evaluate your position and make choices about how you behave and react could be incredibly empowering,” the group say on their website.
‘Sexual harassment is common’
The VR simulation features five scenarios based on real experiences. They enlisted male friends to do something out the scenarios and filmed them.
It had been partly inspired by the task of psychologists at a US university, who developed a VR programme to tackle sexual harassment after discovering that young women had a better a reaction to virtual scenarios than conventional role play.
Lee explains: “I believe it will be prepares me better for these various possibilities. It emotionally readies me. I'd know what further steps to take. I would know to tell a friend, and get support from the city around me and go and take further action if it’s necessary.”
“I actually feel that it’s (harassment) quite common, that sadly it's been normalised. When you truly go and dissect what persons say to you, some of these things are actually a bit crass and very inappropriate, and it needs to be acknowledged that it’s not okay to say might be found about women’s bodies,” she adds.
‘Wall of silence’
A YouGov survey found greater than a quarter of ladies in Singapore had experienced sexual harassment but only 56 percent had reported the incidents.
However there is absolutely no specific law against it-instead such acts are included in the Penal Code and the broader Protection from Harassment Act, for which the maximum penalty is often half a year in jail and a $5,000 fine.
And while Singapore is undoubtedly one of the world’s safest cities with little violent crime, cases of molestation increased a lot more than 15 percent to at least one 1,632 between 2010 and 2019.
Sexual assault involving penetration rose from six cases in 2016 to 13 in 2019, however the number of rapes recorded by the State Court dropped from four to two in the same period. Marital rape was only criminalised in Singapore this season.
Baey’s supporters say her revelations helped break down a wall of silence surrounding sexual misconduct in the socially conservative country.
The 24-year-old, who's their studies at the prestigious National University of Singapore, took to social media this past year to protest, arguing that the male student who filmed her received a lenient punishment.
He was given a 12-month conditional warning by police, designed to write an apology letter by the university, and suspended for a semester, according to local media.
Many feel her story has fuelled public debate on the problem, while universities have brought in measures to better protect their students.
NTU has introduced a mandatory anti-harassment online module and insisted it really is going for a “zero tolerance stance”. The NUS now provides minimum one-year suspension for serious offences and immediate expulsion for severe cases-previously that they had allowed students two strikes before removing them.
Girl, Talk’s VR simulation and other digital campaigns are further breaking taboos and help give women a voice.
Student Chin Hui Shan says: “It made me realise that I face this issue.”
