TOKYO (TR) – Earlier this year, a series of social media posts were made with the hashtag “The real reason I quit my job” (＃私が退職した本当の理由).
The posts talk about the real experiences of people who were forced to quit their jobs due to sexual or power harassment. In many cases, the stories date back years.
NHK (Mar. 8) sought to find out why people are finally able to talk about the reality of their abuse. The network also wanted to know the real reason they couldn’t talk for so long.
Interviews with several people about their thoughts behind the hashtag revealed that difficult issues that have faced Japanese society and companies in the past are going unchanged.
“It’s usually the part-time girl who quits”
Kicking off the hashtag was a post by Moe Kamitouno, a pseudonym, documenting an incident from 20 years ago. In late January, she wrote, “An employee at my part-time job suddenly hugged me.”
It all started when she saw a discussion on social media about Fuji TV’s response to the Masahiro Nakai scandal and felt a strong anger that the victims of sexual harassment were being taken lightly.
She wanted people to know how deeply sexual harassment can leave scars and affect a person’s life. So, she wrote in detail about what happened, mentioning the company’s real name so that she wouldn’t be accused of lying.
On her way home from a drinking party at the company where she was working at the time, a male employee who was teaching her how to do her job forced her into a taxi, where he held her hand and hugged her.
“I was scared and thought it had to be a lie,” Moe wrote. “I couldn’t help but wonder if there was something behind the kindness he had shown her and the help he had given her when she was in trouble. I felt sad. I couldn’t stop feeling angry at being betrayed.”
When Moe’s mother consulted the store manager, she was told, “In a situation like this, it’s usually the part-time girl who quits.”
In the end, the company decided to transfer the perpetrator, but Moe’s health deteriorated due to the cruel words she received from other employees around her.
After that, she moved to another store and continued to work there, but she decided to quit her part-time job due to the continued heartless attitudes of the other employees.
“Let go of my burden and realize that I wasn’t to blame”
Moe’s post received a variety of responses. Some messages were from people who had experienced similar sexual harassment. “I realized I wasn’t the only one who had suffered for many years,” one person wrote. Another said, “After reading your post, I was finally able to let go of my burden and realize that I wasn’t to blame.”
Moe told NHK, “What I wanted to convey in my post was that it’s okay to be free from the pain that you couldn’t talk about until now. If I hadn’t spoken out, there might have been people who would have been even more troubled, so I think I was able to reach some extent.”
Encouraged by such posts, other women have used the “#” designation to report their victimization.
Mizuki, again a pseudonym, worked in sales at a pharmaceutical company. She joined the company as a new graduate about 15 years ago, but says she was sexually harassed by a doctor at a client company when she was still a new employee.
“I didn’t like it, but I thought that if I handled it well, I’d be a real saleswoman. I tried really hard to suppress my feelings of fear and dislike,” she said.
“Would you like to be my woman?”
Mizuki wanted to use the pharmaceutical knowledge she learned at university to be successful in sales. She researched data and studied hard to get the doctors to use her company’s medicines.
However, as she was inexperienced, she continued to be ignored by the doctors. She then began to think, “I just have to be on their good side.”
She would go to practice golf with her colleagues on her days off to play golf with one particular doctor as settai, or entertainment. She talked about private matters that would make the doctor happy.
One day, as she was bringing the doctor home from a drinking party by taxi, he suddenly grabbed her by the hand in the back seat.
“I remember being so scared that I froze up,” Mizuki said. “I went blank, couldn’t brush him off and couldn’t say a word.”
Furthermore, on another day when she visited the doctor, he suddenly asked her, “Would you like to be my woman?”
Mizuki said, “I was shocked. I couldn’t say no, so I just laughed and said, ‘No, no, I’m not good enough.’ He was much older than me, so I didn’t think he would see me like that. But every time we met after that, he would ask me, ‘Would you like to be my woman?’ In the end, I became afraid to go alone.”
When Mizuki consulted her direct supervisor, he responded by having his supervisor accompany her when she visited the doctor. However, she says that he also sexually harassed her by forcibly kissing her on the cheek. Her supervisor was a married man much older than her, and although she admired him at work, she never thought she would be the object of his affection. Although she would occasionally go out drinking with her boss or senior colleagues, she says she always went out drinking with them because she was happy to hear about work.
“I was shocked and thought, ‘What?’ But I just had to laugh it off. Something like, ‘Please stop.’ But that day, I just kept thinking about why he suddenly said something like that. I chatted with him, jokingly saying, ‘If you do that again, I’ll punch you with my fist.’ But maybe he didn’t get my refusal across, because afterwards he asked me, ‘Do you want to go out with me?'”
As a result of all this, Mizuki became ill. She was later diagnosed with adjustment disorder and taken a leave of absence.
In the end, she had no choice but to quit her job. “Looking back, I think it would have been better if the company had said, ‘You don’t have to go to that place [where the doctor carried out sexual harassment].’ It seems like that was normal at the time, but I don’t want it to be normal anymore. I don’t want the next generation to have to go through the same thing.”
“It’s your fault for not refusing”
Immediately after Fuji TV held a press conference to deal with the scandal involving Masahiro Nakai Masahiro, the number of posts, including reposts, under the hashtag reached 110,000.
“I quit the company I joined as a new graduate because of sexual harassment,” one person wrote. “I consulted with the HR department, but they shut me down.”
Another wrote, “I reached my limit and consulted with the management, but they said, ‘You seduced [him]. It’s your fault for not refusing.’ I couldn’t handle it, so I quit.”
Trends regarding victimization emerge by simply analyzing frequently used words and hashtags in the posts.
The word “women” was accompanied with talk of discrimination and victimization on the grounds of age and gender, including such a statement as “young female employees are treated like hostesses.”
Topics related to “society,” “understanding,” and “remembered” were also seen, with comments such as “seeing this hashtag reminded me of a past experience” and “society as a whole should understand this meaning.”
For topics related to “companies/bosses,” words such as “drinking party,” “new graduates,” and “president/senior” were also used.
Many topics discussed victimization by people in higher positions, such as “my boss invited me to a hotel after a drinking party” and “my boss sexually harasses me on a daily basis.”
The word “consultation” was also used along with “company/superior,” but there were many negative expressions such as “they didn’t respond when I consulted them.”
“Someone will end up dissatisfied”
Shinobu Naito is a researcher at the Japan Institute for Labour Policy and Training. She tells NHK that she often hears that victims of sexual harassment say that they can’t consult with their company because they are not believed.
“They are told, ‘Maybe it was your fault,’ and so they feel that they cannot consult with their company,” she says. “Also, there are many cases where the perpetrator of sexual harassment is a superior or executive. So, they cannot consult with their company because they are afraid that the company will protect their superior.”
Companies are legally required to take appropriate measures, such as quickly verifying the facts, when an employee or other person reports sexual harassment. However, it is up to each company to decide how to respond specifically.
Hiroto Shimizu is an attorney who has advised many companies on how to deal with sexual harassment. He says that companies face difficulties in dealing with such cases.
“Companies should carefully interview those who report harassment and provide them with mental care, but in the case of sexual harassment, which often takes place behind closed doors, they have to be careful about punishing those suspected of being the perpetrator,” Shimizu tells NHK. “In reality, without concrete evidence such as audio or video recordings, it is difficult to take disciplinary action or encourage resignation. If disciplinary action is taken without sufficient evidence, the person who was punished may sue the company. Because companies are neutral, as a rule they do not actively collect evidence of perpetration.”
He also points out that when it is necessary to transfer someone to another department the decision tends to be made based on economic merit.
“The company probably wants to keep a person who is profitable for them,” Shimizu says. “Sometimes that person is a talented young person. But, generally, they may want to keep the boss who is doing well. After all, it’s a human relationship. So, it’s almost impossible for everyone to be satisfied. Someone will end up dissatisfied. It’s extremely difficult.”
“Corporate culture has not changed significantly in the last 10 to 20 years”
Among the 110,000 posts under the hashtag “The real reason I quit my job” (＃私が退職した本当の理由), there were posts from people who had already quit, as well as from people who are currently suffering.
“I’m still fighting to quit. This hashtag gives me courage,” one person wrote. Another said, “It wasn’t enough to make me quit, but the trust I lost will never come back.”
In response to such posts, some companies have taken action, issuing statements saying they will work to prevent recurrences.
On the other hand, experts point out that even with the progress of changes to laws and regulations the current situation is that companies’ awareness and responses have not changed significantly.
“In many cases, companies do not recognize the fact that sexual harassment or power harassment has occurred because employees quit without being able to consult with the office,” Naito says. “Unfortunately, it can be said that corporate culture and corporate efforts have not changed significantly in the last 10 to 20 years.”
She adds that society and companies should take seriously the fact that people who were unable to give their true reasons for quitting in the past are now speaking out one after another and making the issue visible on social media.
“The hashtag is not just a confession of harassment,” she says, “but is a complaint about the actual reason for leaving the company. For companies, it is an exodus of valuable human resources. What has happened is harassment, whether it be a human rights violation or sexual assault. I hope that companies will accept what has come to light and use it to change their organizations.”
