80% of Moroccan actresses surveyed declare having been victims or witnesses of at least one case of gender-based violence in their profession, specifies this study carried out by the Association of Mediterranean Meetings of Cinema and Human Rights (ARMCDH ). They suffer several forms of violence: psychological violence, economic violence, sexual violence. When it comes to sexual violence, actresses particularly described it as the main form of violence. Younger actresses are often the most exposed to sexual blackmail, sexual innuendo or touching.
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Economic and physical violence affects women in all professions linked to the cinema sector in Morocco, the study specifies. On the other hand, psychological and sexual violence mainly concerns the most vulnerable people, such as young women at the start of their professional careers and professionals in economically precarious situations. It appears from the analysis of the results of the interviews that psychological violence was mentioned 10 times as the main form of violence prevalent in the Moroccan film sector, followed by economic violence (common practices exercised by hierarchical superiors lacking transparency in the ‘assignment of tasks), then by sexual violence.
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The people interviewed justify the proliferation of psychological violence by the difficulty of proving its existence and by the reasons given by the perpetrators of this violence (high job demands, need for total commitment, low employee involvement, etc.). They believe that non-compliance with the specifications issued by the Moroccan Cinematographic Center or television channels in partnership with production companies creates conditions conducive to the appearance of gender-based violence, in particular because of the schedules of work (often exceeding 12 hours per day) and additional charges which are not objectively evaluated in the contracts.
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Furthermore, the study shows that women are poorly represented in professional chambers, federations and unions representing technical specialists. The 12 professional associations in this sector have more than 100 management members, including only 10 women. This low representation weakens the ability of professionals to participate in collective advocacy and denunciation of gender-based violence in the Moroccan film sector.
Swiss
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