What will go down in history as a significant milestone for women this year is the #MeToo movement, which encouraged scores of women across the world to share their stories of sexual harassment. The hashtag rose to prominence this year after actor Alyssa Milano tweeted about it and called out to women to take up the cause. The tipping point for the massive campaign was the Harvey Weinstein sexual assault scandal, in which actors took on the big-shot Hollywood producer and opened up about abuse.
It led to many big names in Hollywood coming forward with surprising revelations. In what seemed like a chain reaction of sorts, the movement marked the fall of many once-admired actors like Kevin Spacey. #MeToo campaign did not restrict to the field of entertainment alone—women shared stories of abuse at home, academic institutions and places of work.
And this year, TIME magazine rightfully named these women who heralded the movement as 2017 'Person of the Year'. "This is the fastest-moving social change we've seen in decades, and it began with individual acts of courage by hundreds of women, and some men, who came forward to tell their own stories of sexual harassment and assault," said TIME editor-in-chief Edward Felsenthal as he unveiled the cover on Wednesday. The ensemble cover features Ashley Judd, one of the first actors to openly accuse Weinstein of sexual harassment, singer Taylor Swift, former Uber engineer Susan Fowler, strawberry picker Isabel Pascual, and lobbyist Adama Iwu. The cover also features one woman whose face has not been revealed. The magazine cover refers to them as 'The Silence Breakers', and goes with a strap line: “the voices that launched a movement”.
The 'silence breakers' beat President Donald Trump who was the runner-up in the ranking, followed by Chinese president Xi Jinping.
