Featured image: via Amy Life
Amy Life & Sharessa Naidoo
As students, safety in university spaces is something we feel we should be able to take for granted. But how can students feel safe if their abusers are allowed to remain on campus? Sexual assault shouldn’t be part of the university experience. Seeing your abuser in the same spaces where you are trying to study should not be a common experience for students either. Yet, it remains the case that university establishments would rather let students off the hook for sexual assault than receive the negative press that’s attached to having known rapists on campus. Using redressal systems that are not fit for purpose, systems that were originally intended for cases of academic misconduct, is a surefire way of avoiding the issue at hand.
#MeTooEdiUni was set up in the wake of a petition from Aarti Mukehedkar calling for the University to change the way they handle cases of sexual misconduct. Aarti’s experience of the university’s redressal system is similar to many other students with numerous reports of victim blaming, unfair hearings and lack of support following negative outcomes. Given the adverse effects on students’ mental health, the obvious miscarriage of justice and the overall disregard for student safety, we felt it was necessary to spark a movement for change. Our campaign was focused on the specific need to review the Student Code of Conduct (the document outlining the redressal process) and change a system designed for dealing with academic misconduct and make it fit for the gravity of sexual assault cases.
Petitions, open letters and protests allowed us a seat at the table and yet, whilst we were part of the conversation, we did not feel listened to. It’s easy to fall into the trap of thinking that being in the room guarantees you a voice and perhaps we fell into this trap too. Despite our carefully outlined amendments to the code, our ideas for improving fairness, for taking into account the diverse experiences of students, for keeping people safe, we were met with only faint smiles and empty promises. It is in the interests of institutions to focus on the small minutiae of important documents, to make changes but never the ones that will equate to a real difference in the systems set out by the document. Our improvements were eventually reduced down to simple clarifications, the odd change of word order or added explanation, but nothing that would amount to a better, fairer, and safer redressal system. It was, in want of a better expression, soul destroying. There are only so many times you can sit at a table of people with more power than you and ask for victims of sexual assault to be believed before you become exhausted and simply give up. The problem is that this is exactly what the University wants, it’s how these systems remain unchanged, and it’s how miscarriages of justice go uncorrected.
Bureaucracy is the weapon that institutions wield against change-makers and it’s certainly effective. Eventually, after months of effort and no real changes, we were told that if we wished to continue raising the issue, we must voice our concerns via the Edinburgh University Students Association. This was an easy way to silence us – we could only speak through a system, not through our own voices. In order to make change then, we must ask others to speak for us, there is no longer a seat for us at the table and nothing has really changed. We still hear about students going through the process and being left out to dry while their assailant faces no consequences for their violent actions, and we are angry. They are angry. And we are all tired.
It’s hard to see through this mist of gloom, to see the light of change at the end of a dark, labyrinthine tunnel. But as Sharessa Naidoo, a previous president of Girl*Up and one of MeTooEdiUni’s campaigners points out, the campaign marks a significant step forward. We have heard about the experiences of students, and the issue is out in the open. The awareness that the campaign created will hopefully mean the next students to fight for changes won’t have to start from scratch – something that both Sharessa and I feel incredibly proud of. More change is needed, of course, especially with regards to tailored support for BAME survivors.
“Concrete change is still needed as university survivors require tailored support. As a brown woman, I call on the university to hire more BAME sexual assault response staff, specifically trained to help BAME survivors. My experience growing up outside the UK as a racialized minority means my experiences and feelings related to sexual assault are vastly different. If I were to undergo an assault, there would be cultural shame. My self-perception would shatter, which has forever been based on my ability and my family’s ability to protect me. Being exotified is another experience only BAME individuals have, that affects our sexual encounters. Conclusively, there are many instances where racism and a sexual assault are inseparable.”
Sharessa Naidoo
It is vital when campaigning for overhauls of sexual assault redressal systems in higher education to account for the diverse experiences of diverse student bodies and it’s concerning that university’s failures to even look at the way their redressal system causes harm will perpetuate existing inequalities.
When it comes to the issue of sexual violence in higher education, there is an important question that we must ask: is it that these institutions can’t improve justice, implement trauma-informed processes, account for experiences of BAME and other minority students, or is it that they won’t? And if they won’t why won’t they? When student safety is at risk, are we really going to be fooled into believing that a system designed for academic misconduct can cope with cases of sexual misconduct?
Author Bios
Amy Life is a fourth year French and Philosophy student and the Undergraduate Communications Intern for GENDER.ED. She has previously been the president of Edinburgh University’s Feminist Society and is one of the founders of #MeToo Edinburgh University.
Sharessa Naidoo graduated with a MA in Maths and Philosophy from the University of Edinburgh in 2023. She is a 4th generation South African of Indian-origin. Much of her experiences are shaped by her South African upbringing and time spent in her Johannesburg-based all girls’ high school as a South Asian. She served as Girl Up Edinburgh’s President at the university from 2021-23. Girl Up Edinburgh is a student club a part of the global Girl Up UN Foundation Movement aimed at empowering young girls and women to be community leaders. Her time at Girl Up gave her greater exposure to sexual assault on campus and the ability to talk to survivors. She is passionate about anti-racism and how structural injustices can be identified and solved most effectively.
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