Women in music business pressured to take a seat alongside ‘sexual abusers’ at award exhibits
Women within the music business are pressured to take a seat alongside “sexual abusers” at award exhibits and face “endemic” misogyny, MPs have warned.
In a report revealed on Tuesday the Women and Equalities Committee particulars a “boys club” the place sexual harassment and abuse is widespread. The cross-party MPs mentioned ladies’s lives are being ruined whereas using non-disclosure agreements (NDAs) is making a “culture of silence” within the multi-billion pound business.
They warn that regardless of will increase in illustration “discrimination and misogyny remain endemic” with feminine artists “routinely undervalued and undermined”.
The Committee additionally heard proof from the Musicians’ Union which detailed the misogyny confronted by musicians-in-training. They described feminine college students being “cat-called in rehearsals” and “made to feel uncomfortable by male lecturers”.
They have been additionally instructed “they couldn’t play their instruments properly if they didn’t sit with the legs open in orchestra rehearsals”. The report concluded: “Women in the music industry have had their lives ruined and their careers destroyed by men who have never faced the consequences of their actions.
“Much of the proof we acquired has needed to stay confidential, together with commentary on tv exhibits and family names.” It added: “People within the business who attend award exhibits and events at the moment accomplish that sitting alongside sexual abusers who stay protected by the system and by colleagues.
“The music industry has always prided itself on being a vehicle of social change; when it comes to discrimination, and the harassment and sexual abuse of women, it has a lot of work to do.”
The report additionally mentioned that MPs had acquired “distressing evidence” on the affect of NDAs. It mentioned: “Victims with little agency in the process are threatened into silence by organisations seeking to protect their reputation and the perpetrators of abuse who work for them.”
MPs advisable the Government think about a “retrospective moratorium on NDAs” involving sexual abuse, harassment, sexual misconduct or bullying. Committee Chairwoman and Tory MP Caroline Nokes mentioned: “Women’s creative and career potential should not have limits placed upon it by ‘endemic’ misogyny which has persisted for far too long within the music industry.
“Our report rightly focuses on improving protections and reporting mechanisms, and on necessary structural and legislative reforms. However, a shift in the behaviour of men—and it is almost always men – at the heart of the music industry is the transformative change needed for talented women to quite literally have their voices heard and be both recognised and rewarded on equal terms.”
