There’s a feature piece in The Australian today by Chris Kenny. ‘The Unkindness of Strangers’, subtitled: ‘When an ugly post goes viral via social media, victims find there is very little they can do about it.’
Sexism, pornography, social media, bureaucratic accountability and the contest of ideas; this story touches on these volatile topics and reveals the challenges of the digital age, and its propensity for hypocrisy and injustice. The way women are treated in public debate has become hotly contested ground in recent years …
It took me awhile to summon the strength to agree to go public on this story. Months of unrelenting abuse last year caused me to go under the radar for a while. Now, getting it (well, one aspect of it) out there, brings feelings of exposure and vulnerability. But I felt that what happened had to be brought to light. For eight months I was shunted, fobbed off, given the flick and ignored by the Australian Public Service Commission and Australian Tax Office regarding a complaint about a public servant who tweeted requesting naked images of me. It had started to feel like they were running some kind of protection racket.
It was over dinner with public servant friends that I learned about APS codes of conduct. It seemed tax department officer Darryl Adams had pretty much breached them all. My friends encouraged me to make a formal complaint (reprinted below) and told me how to go about it.
As I told Kenny: “It takes a lot of time and energy, especially emotional energy. There was a principle I thought was important: that people shouldn’t be harassed and be intimidated by officers of the crown who we pay to do their job. He is a servant of the people and was publicly requesting lewd material of one of those people.” (Actually I used the words ‘masturbatory material’ not ‘lewd’ but the Oz lawyers didn’t love that so much so it got changed).
It was this mind numbing, soul deadening, reply that sealed it for me. I knew then I had to take it higher if I was going to have any chance of a meaningful response.
From: Lowe, Anne
Sent: Friday, 15 February 2013 4:37 PM
To: Melinda Tankard Reist
Cc: Lowe, Anne
Subject: RE: ATO response to my complaint [SEC=UNOFFICIAL]Good afternoon
Thank you for your email of 2 February 2013 in relation to your complaint made to the Australian Public Service Commission (APSC) regarding the conduct of an ATO employee.
I advise that the APSC was advised of the outcome of our investigation of your complaint in September 2012. As the recipient of the original complaint the ATO understood that the APSC would, in accordance with usual procedure, advise you of the outcome of your complaint. I regret that this has obviously not occurred.
I advise that the ATO dealt with your complaint in accordance with ATO policy and procedure and the matter has now been finalised. Due to constraints imposed by the Privacy Act 1999 I am unable to provide you with any further information regarding the outcome.
Thank you for bringing this matter to our attention.
Anne
Anne Lowe
Director People Team | Health & People Management | ATO People
ATO| Working for all Australians
It wasn’t until the intervention of the Assistant Treasurer David Bradbury (whose portfolio includes the ATO) that there was any real interest in my case. I was lucky – unlike most women in this situation, I had a senior contact in Government. He helped put me in touch with a senior staffer in Bradbury’s office.
After briefing the Minister, the staffer wrote a strongly worded email to the Taxation Commissioner on the Minister’s behalf, copied in to the Special Minister of State, requesting he look into the case. The email was sent at 3.20pm. At precisely 3.48pm I received a voice message from the ‘Head of People Management’ of the Australian Tax Officer, citing ‘urgent investigation’, ‘receiving full briefing’, ‘will call you again this afternoon’. He was helpful, acknowledging my complaint had been badly handled, and later wrote advising it had been upheld (though I couldn’t be told what disciplinary action had been taken). This was a year after the tweet I had complained about.
I got more action from Bradbury’s office in an hour than I got from the APS and ATO since last June and am very grateful for the Minister’s involvement. I felt like it was the first time my harassment was taken seriously. I feel sorry for those without contacts though. Do they just disappear and say nothing – like those departments seemed to expect me to do? This was the main reason I decided to talk to Kenny.
Here’s my letter of complaint to Mr Stephen Sedgwick, the Australian Public Service Commissioner.
‘Counsel Carlton on tweet: Deveny’, The Australian, May 11, 2013
See also: Deleting online abuse content a ‘near impossible’ task.
17 Responses
Thank you so much for your courage in speaking out about this publically. The refusal to take sexual harassment seriously, and the way in which victim’s complaints are minimised, are exactly how creeps like this get away with it. Absolutely disgraceful that the ATO let this drag on for so long despite their own stated policies and administrative lip service to them.
Oh man. I feel you.
I’ve had death threats, rape threats – and most recently a slew of “men” on my Facebook wall calling me a “c*nt* and a “sl*t” – for no apparent reason. Two of these guys were stupid enough to do this from their actual profiles with their places of employment listed.
The Catholic School definitely took it a lot more seriously than the large household-name manufacturing company, but after threats of taking the whole thing to the media as an example of how bad things can go when you let your employees run wild, I was informed the guy in question had been disciplined (although I doubt it was much beyond … dude … be more careful next time).
It was interesting to me how many people attacked me for reporting this to these guys employers … apparently, I should have just let it go … but seriously. People need to learn there are ramifications for your behaviour online. It’s not 1997 anymore. You’re no longer anonymous.
This is appalling behaviour by Darryl Adams and Duncan Fine. Does Mr Adams actually believe that if he is a ‘fake character’ on twitter (Fake Paul Keating) that it is somehow more acceptable to sexually harass women online?
Duncan Fine claimed that retweeting was not an endorsement of the abuse. What exactly were his intentions then? I get the feeling it wasn’t to highlight the abusive treatment of women online. Poor form.
Good on you Melinda. These people need to be named and shamed.
As usual, amazing courage Melinda! Thank you on behalf of all women.
Melinda, I am sorry you have suffered in this way. Sure you could ignore him as the twerp (deliberate use of nothing substantial) he is which could be the easier path but thank you for putting in the time and effort to stand up and not let it go. Thank you for using your connection to get action. We know you are doing this for us all. When there are consequences for such abuse and the ‘rest of the world’ gets to hear about it like this I just want to say well done you!
Thank you Melinda, for airing this deplorable, bullish behaviour. It takes courage and will hopefully, give courage to others to have their grievances fairly heard and dealt with.
Echoing Mandy’s comment, thank you on behalf of all of us, Melinda, for withstanding the emotional and personal toll it must have taken to pursue this harasser. Time and time again, the activist and advocacy work you do results in real-life consequences for people and companies who perpetrate against women and children. Many of us (including myself!) find time to complain about all the abuses, but not actually raise the stakes for abusers who dare to continue the way they’re going. Thanks from all of us for making things just a bit riskier for those who feel entitled to treat women with contempt!
Hi Melinda. My initial anger at the”Tweeter” quickly turned to admiration for the way in which you have handled this most unsavory instance of bullying. I am a karate black belt, and I can tell you, I punched the air-HARD- in celebration of your strength of character. Talk about biting off more than they could chew! I just hope that the lesson has been learned, and that the sexist tweeters don’t now pursue another target. I detest bullying, but we should always remember: bullies are usually people who are trying to hide some significant personal deficiency, or deep insecurity.
Pathetic isn’t it it. Small men trying to make themselves feel important. How dare they.
I wonder how their mother/sister/wife would feel about it?
Melinda, thank you for sharing this, you continued efforts to protect children and women are not in vein. Your bravery has inspired me to take action and speak up on occasions where previously I would of just let it go. People should be made accountable for what they say and do. You are amazing. Thank you.
It is misogyny folks these men are enacting not ‘sexism’ and it is pseudo male sex right to subject any female they wish to vile women-hating insults.
These males are not a ‘tiny percentage of respectable males,’ but are acting in their male belief that it is acceptable for males en mass to target women via social networking sites and subject them to vile sexualised insults. Remember these men are blatantly demonstrating they hate women and view women as non-human and such male misogyny is being condoned by powerful men occupying positions in government.
As always men in powerful governmental positions claim legislation has been enacted to ensure male sexual harassment of women within the workplace is no longer acceptable, but passing legislation is not the same as enacting it and monitoring said legislation. Clever men, they ensure that each individual woman is responsible for initiating charges against individual men who believe it is fine for them to subject women to vile women-hating insults and/or threats of male sexual violence.
The government won’t help because that is not the government’s role – so guess what happens? Why women swiftly learn that attempting to get powerful men to actually listen and act when the issue is minor (sic) because it affects women not men, ensures that men continue their endless campaign of women-hating.
These men did not suddenly decide all by themselves ‘hey let’s subject that non-human female to male sexual harassment/threats of male sexual violence, no instead these men swiftly realised the internet is the ideal place for men to openly demonstrate their women-hating attitudes. Plus popular culture and malestream media endorses and condones male sexual harassment of women because it is not ‘important’ given men aren’t the ones routinely being subjected to sexualised insults and threats of male violence.
Now if the issue was one of racism or homophobia – then government action would be swiftly taken and the reason is because these two issues affect men – because anything which affects men is important but women aren’t human so men can’t harm something which isn’t human.
To be clear – the issue concerns virulent male hatred/male contempt for women not ‘people engaging in sexualised insults.’ Ignoring the sex of these male perpetrators ensures as usual men remain invisible and that is precisely what men want to remain invisible and only appear when they are subjected to threats of violence or believe another male has insulted them.
If you seriously believed that the tweet was threatening and a form of harassment, why did you not go to the police? Adams acted as an individual and his behaviour had nothing to do with his job or his employer.
In choosing to take revenge by informing his employer about his personal behaviour you perpetuated at least as great a wrong on him as he had on you, or perhaps worse. Encouraging his employer to harass him on your behalf was unethical and inappropriate.
http://indolentdandy.net/fitzroyalty/2013/05/10/darryl-adams-vs-melinda-tankard-reist-harassed-at-work-for-personal-behaviour-online/
Fitzroyalty, looks like you’ve put a lot of time into defending this fool’s dispicable behaviour. What a good service you are doing to the world, fighting for the rights of men to sexually harass women on the internet!
Your comment is typical of what many women have come to expect if they speak out against sexual harassment. They are making a big deal out of nothing, it wasn’t really that bad and the woman is just out for revenge!
He acted as an individual and it had nothing to do with his work? Conditions for the public service are pretty clear about what sort of individuals they want to take on. Fools with fake twitter accounts who want to sexually harass women need not apply.
The misogyny, porn-inspired sexual comments and harrassment that infest the internet, that men feel is their due rigt to propagate, make for a very toxic environment for women. What’s most enraging is that we are expected to just ‘deal with it’, cave in, silently accept this demoralizing culture. We women have to stand up in solidarity againt this. Know that you have the support of many women! You did the right thing, no matter what some people will say to excuse those behaviors or leave them wihtout consquences. I admire you for standing up for yourself and by doing so, you are standing up for all women as well!
Brian Ward, Whilst I do understand your distinction regarding the limits of employment as it should relate to employees private lives, I do not agree with you entirely. Your critique of Ms Reist is based on your notion that her actions pursuing the perpetrator via an opportunity which presented itself via his employer is somehow questionable or even wrong.
I am not debating why Ms Reist hadn’t contacted the police, although from experience, I suspect the answer is quite obvious. Ms Reist found the leverage she needed to get her ‘”revenge” on the perpetrator and she exploited it. Well good on her. In any case, you are not stranger to extracting revenge, albeit using different methods. On your website you have a notice which explicitly states you will retaliate when people spam you
“…If you send me unsolicited (spam) email I may publicly humiliate you. Corporate goons should read the information for media and marketers to save themselves the embarrassment.”
Sounds like a threat of revenge to me. A quick search through your old posts reveals that you do not hesitate to use the leverages available to you.
I recently came across this issue whilst catching up on Brian Ward’s blog Fitzroyality and have to say I agree with him 100%. I do not agree that people should be able to hide behind their keyboards and abuse women be it sexually or otherwise, however if you are so worried about such people and it gets to the stage where you feel threatened then you should ultimately be contacting the Police, not tracking the user to their employer and reporting it them.
Any good employer should have stopped this complaint in its tracks and referred you to the Police as well, as it was in no way related to the user’s employer. Had the user been using his employer’s network however, then it may have been grounds to make a formal complaint to them, but I somehow doubt this was the case and or any evidence was produced to show this.