A separate case brought by Kawshigan in Singapore’s Magistrate Court was dismissed last month for abuse of process, and the woman’s lawyers said Kawshigan was ordered to pay her legal costs. In that lawsuit, he had demanded nearly $17,000, alleging that the woman had violated an “offer” she had made, which included “offering space for [Kawshigan] to share inspiration, struggles and achievements” and “meet on the basis of mutual availability, beyond coffee settings.”
The woman argued that the lawsuit for $17,000 was an abuse of process because it was “brought for an ulterior motive” to compel her to “comply with his demands to resume communication with him, among other things.”
The lawsuit illustrates a challenge women around the world face: that men sometimes feel entitled to their affections. “Women don’t owe men their time or attention, much less their friendship, love, sexual activity or emotional labor,” Aware Singapore, which advocates for women’s rights and gender equality, said in a statement about the lawsuit. “Attempting to demand or enforce these things, through legal means or otherwise, may constitute harassment.”
Singapore is ranked 49th in the World Economic Forum’s Global Gender Gap Report 2022, making it the country with the second highest level of gender equality in Asia after the Philippines. Japan has long struggled with gender-based income inequality, and the mere whisper of feminism in South Korea could spark widespread outrage. Yet Singapore, like many other developed countries, struggles with sexism and misogyny, such as the ubiquity of incels, or involuntarily celibate, anti-feminist men.
Kawshigan first met the woman in a “social setting” in 2016, according to the magistrate’s ruling. “Over time, their friendship developed, but problems began to emerge” in September 2020, when “they no longer agreed on how they saw their relationship.”
The woman saw Kawshigan as a friend, while Kawshigan “regarded her as his ‘best friend'”, according to the court, which said she wanted to see Kawshigan less often, which upset him. He said such action would be “a step back” in their “relationship”. She, in turn, told them to set boundaries and urged Kawshigan to be “self-reliant.”
Kawshigan did not respond well to this, according to the ruling.
He sent the woman a letter in October 2020 threatening legal action for damages due to “emotional distress and possible libel”. She told Kawshigan that she was really uncomfortable. He threatened that if she failed to comply with his demands, she would face “damage to her personal and professional endeavors.”
The woman agreed to participate in counseling sessions with Kawshigan, keeping his legal threats at bay, according to court documents. But after about 1½ years of counseling, she felt the exercises had become pointless, she said, because Kawshigan “seemed unable to accept her reasons for not wanting a relationship or association with him.”
She got a restraining order against Kawshigan, who then filed the lawsuit in magistrate court while the other case was pending.
Kawshigan said in an email that “as important proceedings are still pending”, he would not comment until the case was decided. Kawshigan represented herself in both cases, according to court documents.
Siyuan Chen, an associate professor of law at Singapore Management University, said Kawshigan’s claim was “probably unfounded”.
“Essentially, the alleged harm has to come from somewhere, be it a contract or a claim,” he said, adding that the magistrate’s verdict showed that “neither can be established.”
