• violates your dignity
• makes you feel intimidated, degraded or humiliated
• creates a hostile or offensive environment

Sexual harassment can include:

• sexual comments or jokes
• physical behaviour, including unwelcome sexual advances, touching and various forms of sexual assault
• displaying pictures, photos or drawings of a sexual nature
• sending emails with a sexual content

You don’t need to have previously objected to someone’s behaviour for it to be considered unwanted.

Examples of sexual harassment

Sexual and sexist speech

If your tutor, fellow students, employer or co-worker uses unwelcome, repeated sexual and/or sexist speech around you, that is harassment even if the person doesn’t do anything further.

Examples of such speech include:

• Crude or sexist jokes
• Sexual references and gestures
• Sexist comments and other derogatory language

Requests for dates and sexual favours

Your harasser may also repeatedly ask you to go on dates or engage in sexual favours despite your negative response. The person may insist it’s just a joke and not a serious request, but it still counts as harassment.

Presentation of sexual materials

Another behaviour is to show you, or even just display, sexually suggestive materials. This can be anything from sharing pornography with you to simply having inappropriate photos as screensavers. Taking away your choice to view such materials makes your workplace unsafe.

Unwanted physical touch

Physical touch is most often associated with sexual harassment because it is the most obvious and concrete behaviour. The important thing to know is that this includes more than just sexual touches. Any type of touch that you have not given permission for or that makes you feel uncomfortable is unacceptable.

Exchange of sexual favours for incentives

The harassment may escalate to requiring you to give the person sexual favours in return for receiving college or workplace benefits. This behaviour tends to be the most easily litigated because the effect on your employment or college place is very clear.

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