Chapter 2: “Creating a Balance of Power”: Gender and Empowerment in the #MeToo Era

The #MeToo movement has forced instances of sexual misconduct out of the shadows and into public awareness. Through this public visibility, the #MeToo movement has changed perceptions of sexual consent, harassment, and assault; it has also altered legal accountability, workplace policies, and everyday expectations. Before #MeToo, over one-third of women had experienced sexual violence, and almost one in five had survived rape or attempted rape (Smith et al., 2017). Yet over half of the survivors did not acknowledge their experiences as either rape or sexual assault, particularly when the circumstances did not correspond to stereotypical “rape scripts” (i.e., violent stranger attacks; Donde et al., 2018). The #MeToo movement has chipped away at survivors’ reluctance to define their experiences as such; it has also encouraged survivors, especially women and other gender minorities, to speak out about their experiences.