Archive note: This text comes from the old archive of Nomika Epilekta and is carefully preserved for historical and informational reading.

Sexual harassment is considered to be any verbal or non-verbal conduct of a sexual nature that aims at or results in offending the dignity of a person and, above all, of a woman.

It may appear through unwanted romantic or immoral proposals, proposals for meetings outside work, the sending of romantic sms and e-mail messages, annoying flirting, obscene remarks, and even jokes with sexual content. There is also non-verbal harassment, when the unwanted conduct is expressed through acts such as unnecessary touching, caressing or pinching of the body.

As the years pass, incidents of sexual harassment in the workplace are constantly increasing. This is a delicate issue, which does not concern only women but every worker. Of course, compared with the number of women who fall victim to sexual harassment and, more generally, to discrimination in this field, the corresponding number of men is almost nonexistent.

Only one in ten incidents is reported. Female workers do not dare complain, so as not to lose their jobs and not to be publicly exposed, a fact that in our days is aggravated in view of the economic crisis.

It is, therefore, a conspiracy of silence that is difficult to break. Yet as long as this behavior is concealed and not reported, a vital part of society will continue to be terrorized and devalued.

With regard to “harassment” and, above all, to the degraded position of women in the past and their nonexistent social rights, a situation that is largely maintained even in the present century, the book by the historian, essayist and writer Theodoros Karzis, “Woman in the Middle Ages”, published by Filippotis, second edition, 1997, proves particularly useful; by reading it, the reader acquires especially useful knowledge and training, and for this reason we warmly recommend it.