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This chapter considers the role of emotions in understanding and preventing sexual harassment. Men tend to regret failing to act on a sexual opportunity more than the regret the transient embarrassment associated with being rejected for acting on what is actually an unwanted approach. Despite their widespread use, existing training programs to prevent sexual harassment are generally not effective. One reason is that they tend to motivate compliance by the fear of lawsuits or termination, which may be ineffective if potential harassers view defiance of the threat as a way to demonstrate courage. Rather than focusing on fear, training methods that focus on shame could be more effective; however, it is important to consider the nature of the induced shame. Social movements such as the #MeToo hashtag might be counterproductive to the degree that their efforts to induce shame lead harassers to withdraw or to attack their attackers.

Ladies and Gentlemen! First of all, I would like to thank the organizers for inviting me to this important programme, and it is indeed a pleasure for me to speak in this timely programme. Secondly, I would like to mention that I am not a lawyer, and do not even have an academic background in any sector. I am simply a medical doctor and have lived in a male-dominated society that is poverty driven and is in a continued conflict situation. I have experienced discrimination based on my sex, ethnicity and the religion that my family practised. In order to survive such a situation, I chose and continued to fight for equality and human rights in Afghanistan. My talk today is based on my personal experience in a country where human rights abuse and violation is our daily scenario, sometimes even unnoticed. Afghanistan is a country that suffers from four decades of war; almost the majority of the powerful countries in the world are somehow involved in the conflict. Different regimes have come and gone, each one of them violated the human rights of the people, particularly the rights of women, children and other vulnerable groups including the rights of minorities.