Look, this is how we are going to make a difference.
It is no secret that women in the marketing/advertising world deal with an outsized amount of abuse and harassment from men in the industry.
And it is no surprise when the old timers still like telling stories about taking Muppets to strip clubs, or whatever. It is pretty disgusting.
See the button there in the upper right hand corner?
Even with the efforts of great organizations like LinkUnite we still need to deal with mysogonistic nonsense and double standards. It is simply not tolerable.
I have heard dozens of cringe stories from women, and truthfully we here at Troutman Amin, LLP are tired of it.
So to help end this terrible issue ONCE AND FOR ALL we are starting a totally free and ANONYMOUS–if you choose to be anonymous–way for women to report abuse and harassment at industry events and conferences.
The idea here is to permit the firm to create a catalog of reported abuse and look for trends and ways that conference organizers and women leaders in the industry can better combat and control misbehavior. Plus it will allow us to determine whether there are repeat offenders–or guys who are out right predators–out there so that we can identify bad actors and make sure they are removed from the ecosystem, shall we say.
Now look, this page isn’t perfect just yet but we thought it was VERY important to have this up ahead of Contact.Io. I know Ferree has taken a VERY strong stand on this issue–and I love it–but until women have a safe space where they can go and report instances of abuse the problem isn’t going to stop.
Help others avoid the same fate!
And look, we fully understand that a women’s choice to remain anonymous is her own– while we encourage women to come forward and assert their rights, it is brave enough to tell their story in an anonymous manner to help other women in the industry to avoid the same potential fate.
Last, let me add– we are not going to make a dollar off of this. This is NOT the sort of work we do and we are NOT going to try to make a buck referring cases out to some Plaintiff’s law firm. That is not what this is about. It is about protecting and EMPOWERING the incredibly awesome female talent out there and making sure they are safe at these conference and events. (By the way employers–it is YOUR job to keep these folks SAFE! Take it seriously.)
You do need to read the disclosures on the site folks– we do NOT become your lawyers just because you submit a form. Again, it is not that sort of thing. But we WILL help you to find resources if you want our help–because we really do want to assist folks who are suffering out there.
We will have more coverage of this critical issue but for now the Report Abuse button is LIVE now on the troutmanamin.com website. Feel free to make your reports regarding past conference right away so we can begin to develop visibility in terms of the scope of the problem here.
And to the guys out there–support the ladies. Encourage them to report abuse you hear about and let’s all be respectful of each other.
Much love TCPAWorld.