The corresponding Finnish document was presented and approved at the club meeting on November 25, 2020
Adapted from the AYY association guide:
https://yhdistysopas.ayy.fi/harassment-and-inappropriate-treatment/?lang=en
If you encounter harassment
- If you become a target of harassment yourself or notice harassment, let the harasser know in clear terms that you want them to stop.
- If the harassment case is severe enough to qualify as a criminal offence, contact the police.
- If you need outside help to resolve the situation, you can always contact Kupla Harrasment contact persons or board of Kupla kupla-hall@list.ayy.fi.
If you notice a situation of harassment it is always better to interfere than to watch from the sidelines, even if you are not sure what the right way to interfere is.
If you do not want to interfere on your own, you can do it together with a friend.
If someone remarks on your own behaviour, do not stubbornly argue back but think about your behaviour and be prepared to apologise.
For later investigation, it is worth writing down what happened and to keep in store the related discussions on social media, for example.
The harassment contact person and/or the Kuplas board will try to get everyone involved possibility to talk to each other. Focus will be on the matter at hand and do not on some other events – there is time to deal with them later, if necessary.
If the situation is still unresolved, AYY’s harassment contact persons can be contacted
In accordance with Kupla’s game rules, harassment and discrimination are prohibited in Kupla’s operations. Harassment is also one of the forms of discrimination prohibited by law (Equality Act (1325/2014).
The harassment contact person and the board of Kupla are also responsible for clarifying harassment on social media channels, but everyone has an obligation to intervene in this form of harassment in the same way as harassment at events or premises: by expressing that the harassment must stop.
Definition of harassment and inappropriate treatment (from AYY’s association guide)
Harassment is insulting behaviour directed at an individual’s personal characteristics, such as gender, age, origin, world view or sexual orientation. Harassment can be directed at a person directly or indirectly – a sexist or racist joke, for example, is harassment, even if it is not meant to be hurtful. Harassment is a form of discrimination and thus illegal as per the Non-discrimination Act.
Not all unwanted behaviour fulfils the definition of harassment or discrimination, but other types of inappropriate behaviour should be interfered with as well. Inappropriate behaviour can be, for example, excluding someone from a community, even if it is not connected to any of the abovementioned personal characteristics. The establishment of groups of friends is natural, but associations should be open to everyone interested in the topic, and everyone should feel welcome in the operations of an association.
It is difficult to set specific boundaries for what is harassment or inappropriate treatment. You can take it as a rule of thumb, however, that if someone experiences the operations as distressing or unwanted, they can be defined as harassment or inappropriate treatment. If you are not sure whether the things you have noticed are inappropriate or not, it is still worth bringing up the topic. Often, there is a reason for feeling that something is not ok, and it is better to interfere with even the small things than to not interfere at all.