Sexual Harassment

Sexual harassment is unwanted sexual attention that one person or a group of people place upon another person or group. Harassment can be direct: verbal, visual, emotional, physical or outright sexual actions. It can be indirect, in the overall set-up of the classroom, lab, locker room, workplace, residential hall  or other public place in which the décor, accepted protocols or unwritten, informal practices make the environment uncomfortable or outright hostile for, or discriminatory against, the person being harassed. Often the person harassing has, and exploits, some control over the person being harassed, as a student leader, a boss, a GSI or professor, a coach or other person with some authority. It can take the form of the harasser offering to trade a favor for sexual services—a better grade, recommendation, promotion or other so-called benefits. You are being harassed if you are being negatively impacted by the direct action or the set-up of the environment, regardless of whether those actions or the set-up are intended or not.