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Emma Watson gives £1m to UK women’s justice fund ahead of Baftas

By AFP
18 February 2018   |   11:57 am
Actress and activist Emma Watson has donated £1 million to kickstart a new British fund to help women facing harassment and abuse at work, launched ahead of Sunday's Baftas and backed by hundreds of female entertainment stars.

This file photo taken on March 13, 2017 shows actress Emma Watson attending the New York special screening of Disney’s live-action adaptation ‘Beauty and the Beast’ at Alice Tully Hall in New York City. “Beauty and the Beast” star Emma Watson is taking legal action after dozens of private pictures of her trying on clothes were stolen and posted online, her publicist said on March 15, 2017.”Photos from a clothes fitting Emma had with a stylist a couple of years ago have been stolen,” the 26-year-old British actress’s spokesman told AFP.”They are not nude photographs. Lawyers have been instructed and we are not commenting further.”<br />Media reports said the pictures were shared on the so-called “dark web” — an encrypted part of the internet not easily accessible by users lacking specialist knowledge.ANGELA WEISS / AFP

Actress and activist Emma Watson has donated £1 million to kickstart a new British fund to help women facing harassment and abuse at work, launched ahead of Sunday’s Baftas and backed by hundreds of female entertainment stars.

The justice and equality fund was announced in an open letter supporting the US Time’s Up movement, signed by around 200 women, including actresses Kate Winslet, Emma Thompson, Kristin Scott Thomas, Keira Knightley and Saoirse Ronan.

The letter is addressed to “dear sisters” — as was a similar missive signed by Hollywood stars last month — and calls for an international movement to stamp out a culture of abuse exposed by the Harvey Weinstein scandal.

The fundraising page for the new fund shows Watson, who won fame in the Harry Potter films and is now a UN Women goodwill ambassador, made the opening £1 million (1.13 million euros, $1.4 million) donation.

Knightley and British actor Tom Hiddleston have both given £10,000 to the fund, which will be used to set up a network of advice, support and advocacy projects to tackle abuse across all sectors of work.

It follows a legal aid fund set up by A-list stars in the United States to help both women and men abused at work.

“In the very near past, we lived in a world where sexual harassment was an uncomfortable joke; an unavoidable, awkward part of being a girl or a woman,” the letter published in The Observer newspaper says.

“In 2018, we seem to have woken up in a world ripe for change. If we truly embrace this moment, a line in the sand will turn to stone.”

‘Imbalance of power’

The letter was published ahead of the British Academy Film Awards on Sunday night, when stars are expected to repeat the protest staged at last month’s Golden Globes awards and wear black in a show of solidarity with victims.

Some are also expected to bring activists with them to highlight their work.

“As we approach the Baftas, our industry’s time for celebration and acknowledgement, we hope we can celebrate this tremendous moment of solidarity and unity across borders by coming together and making this movement international,” the letter says.

It emphasises that revelations about abuse in Hollywood have now spread across the world, saying the movement is about more than just the entertainment industry.

It highlights problems in Britain such as the gender pay gap and changes to work that often make it more insecure.

“This movement is intersectional, with conversations across race, class, community, ability and work environment, to talk about the imbalance of power,” the letter states.

Around 160 activists and academics have signed a sister letter pledging support for the new fund, which will be administered by the organisation Rosa.

The signatories thank the high-profile stars for helping “push issues such as sexual harassment and rape into the public consciousness in an unprecedented way”.

“We believe that this is a moment in time when we can harness our collective energies to dismantle the wall of silence that surrounds violence against women and girls,” they say.

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