What Happened : In a twitter thread, woman describes her horrific Careem experience with a male captain who passed extremely sexists and uncomfortable statements. The Thread:
She concluded by saying, “All I can say after this experience is that being a woman in this country absolutely sucks!!” Like always, Careem responded to the thread, ensuring to take prompt action and investigating into the situation:
However, it was not clarified what action had been or would be taken against the captain. Instead an unsatisfactory record of possible outcomes was provided for driver’s grave misconduct. Several users responded to the tweet, and showed outrage towards the company for not doing better screening while recruiting captains. They further urged the company to introduce an emergency helpline button that could be used as an alarm in such situations.
@careem does such a bad job of screening these drivers, i have stoped taking it. Some of their drivers r criminals & in sex trafficking rings. Someone needs to sue this company for endangering lives of women, Their app has no emergency helpline button.
— Séphora (@valkyrie786) July 2, 2021
There should be a panic button in the app that if any rider find anything scary, push it to let call center take care of the rest. And such drivers must be heavily fined & banned least for 6 months and make his profile public. One such example will be enough to curb such events!
— People Feelings (@PeoplSentiment) July 2, 2021
Way ahead: Careem simply need to do a better job. It must devise appropriate mechanisms to ensure screening and background checks of all drivers. Their CNIC number, car and police verifications must be displayed so that every passenger can see and record the information for security purposes. Tracker installation in all cars must be mandatory. After all the aforementioned measures, Captains must also be given proper socialization training on how to interact with their passengers – especially women. Lastly, they must be warned of the repercussion and consequences they may face if an incident of harassment arises. It’s paramount for Careem to understand the severity of the issue and to take proper responsibility to alleviate such occurrences. There have been endless reports of incidents where captains took advantage of girls travelling alone. Surprisingly, Careem has always responded in the same manner where it guarantees to take strict measures so that the same incidents don’t occur again. Yet, nothing happens. Women face the same sort of harassment everyday. Over and over. And honestly, we are tired. When public transport is unsafe, women’s safety and their right to own up to public spaces are compromised. Owing to our cultural norms and society’s patriarchal framework, it is already super hard for women to simply exist. Whether in private or in public spaces, the crimes against women are endless. Given that public transport is already highly male-dominated, it is cardinal that Careem provides a safe means of transportation for women. Click here to see more from Propergaanda.