The Hollywood Commission on Eliminating Sexual Harassment and Advancing Equality has made protecting freelancers a priority. According to The Hollywood Reporter, the Anita Hill-led Commission is putting together a code of conduct, response system, and anti-bias training program for the thousands of Hollywood freelance workers who aren’t privy to conventional workplace structures or human resources departments.
Per the source, the protection of freelancers — such as writers, directors, actors, and crew members — has somewhat slipped through the cracks since the rise of #MeToo and #TimesUp. Above-the-line unions have begun organizing and enacting anti-sexual misconduct and other anti-discrimination protections, but freelancers generally don’t have access to them.
“While the Commission’s members have training and reporting systems already in place, there are still huge gaps that leave the thousands of freelancers who work in our industry unprotected,” said Hill, the Commission chair. “This is why it is essential that we confront the problem of workplace harassment and bias together. To achieve our goals of ensuring safe and respectful workplaces, eliminating sexual harassment, and advancing equality, we must ensure that everyone is protected.”
The Commission has vowed to design “a comprehensive system for reporting, addressing, and resolving claims of harassment and other forms of bias” for freelancers, along with anti-bias best practices and a model code of conduct.
Commonly known as the Anita Hill Commission, the Commission was launched in December of last year. In the wake of the Harvey Weinstein revelations and the ascendency of #MeToo, a group of entertainment execs, experts, and advisors started it in order to make Hollywood workplaces safer, fairer, and more equitable for women and marginalized communities.
Hill brought workplace sexual harassment into the national spotlight when she testified at Clarence Thomas’ Senate confirmation hearings in 1991. Her story became part of the national conversation once again when Christine Blasey Ford testified about Brett Kavanaugh’s alleged sexual abuse during his confirmation hearings this fall. “We must make it unequivocally clear that if the government is not prepared to protect women from sexual violence, we in our industry will do it ourselves,” Hill wrote after Kavanaugh was confirmed. “Throughout our industry, there is a profound sense of betrayal and despair among many that the government no longer cares about protecting their basic rights to be heard and to have their pain recognized as a public concern.”
“Scandal” star and #TimesUp supporter Kerry Washington portrayed Hill in HBO’s Emmy-nominated 2016 TV movie “Confirmation.”
