The hidden face of Rototom: «Peace & Love» and sexual harassmentLa cara oculta del Rototom: «Peace & Love» i assetjament sexual

This August 2026 marked the 31st edition of Rototom Sunsplash, a reggae music festival that has been held every year in Benicàssim since 2010.

Lasting one week and featuring a concert site with more than five stages, the international festival has concluded amid various complaints from attendees, not only regarding the artistic programme, but also concerning the reduction of basic services, the increasing of prices, a high police presence, and several incidents involving private security staff. In this case, Artista o Musa has provided a platform from which to explain and publicly denounce, from a feminist perspective, the situations that some attendees of this year's edition have communicated.

The 2026 edition closed with 169,000 attendees from almost one hundred countries. Festivalgoers stay in different spaces during the event: either in private apartments in the town or in the camping area provided, for a fee, by the festival itself. Families with children coexist there alongside young and adult people eager to have a good time and share experiences.

Unfortunately, sexism and sexual violence can occur anywhere, and for that reason every organisation should strive to provide safe spaces and commit to prevention, assistance, and response measures in the event that such situations occur, such as the well-known purple points (punts liles). Throughout the entire festival and camping area there were only two purple points, which, due to the festival's size, were not always accessible: one was located at the entrance to the concert area, next to the Red Cross point, while the other was situated in the staff and family camping area (Camping A).

I. Sexism at Rototom and a Personal Experience.

We are aware that all the situations described below reflect the patriarchal system in which we live, but, on a smaller scale, they also stem from the model actively promoted by the festival itself. These dynamics are perpetuated on stage, with a predominantly cis-male programme and a generalised sexist attitude: the overwhelming majority of female dancers accompanying male artists is just one example among many.

On a personal level, incidents of harassment were numerous and occurred throughout the festival. Within the concert grounds, we encountered men who openly approached us with sexual intentions and who even became offended when we rejected them, assuming they moved away at all, as this was not always the case.

The camping area is where most incidents of harassment occur, particularly in the shower and toilet area of Camping B. This space consists of prefabricated toilets and mixed, open showers, partially covered with a semi-transparent green tarpaulin that allowed virtually everything to be seen from outside, including the supposedly individual showers. There, while showering, we encountered voyeurs sitting and staring towards the sinks and showers, sometimes holding mobile phones as if they were recording. There were also instances of exhibitionism by cis men that caused considerable discomfort. It was especially when we were alone or accompanied only by another woman that they would approach us and observe us lasciviously, making comments about our bodies, such as “you’re so sexy” and “I like your body”, among others, with the intention of starting a conversation and flirting. All this while they were naked and looking us up and down from less than two metres away. On more than one occasion, they even had erections. All of this came on top of a large number of interactions with men who, while we were brushing our teeth, cooking, or doing anything else, approached us in order to flirt in a very persistent manner.

There is no purple point or any kind of assistance in this area. The nearest personnel are the security guards stationed at the access points to the campsite and therefore relatively far from the shower area, and they do not appear to have any training or instructions regarding sexual harassment and gender-based violence. To whom were we supposed to report all of this if there was no one present in the place where these incidents occurred? Were we expected to run, naked, to the purple point located in the other camping area, losing sight of the man who had made us uncomfortable and whom we would barely be able to describe to the staff at the purple point? Were we supposed to turn to the security guards? In fact, other public complaints made during this year's edition regarding the disproportionate and violent response of security staff to an incident of a different nature lead us to doubt the effectiveness of that body and its ability to act with the necessary care in situations of harassment such as those we experienced. 

Faced with these intimidating and disgusting situations, as might be expected, we did not seek assistance from private security but instead hurried back to our tent to tell the friends we were with, crossing our fingers that the creep would not continue watching us and would not know where we were sleeping. In short, going to wash oneself meant doing so with insecurity and fear of suffering an assault. Moreover, the experiences described here are only the tip of the iceberg: the workers at the purple point themselves informed us that they had already received more complaints of a similar or even more serious nature.

II. The Rototom's (Lack of) Responsibility.

Beyond discussing it among ourselves and after having experienced several of these situations, we decided to go to the purple point to report them or, at the very least, to ensure that the festival organisation was made aware of them. Our disappointment with the response given by the purple point staff was enormous: they informed us that they had no means of acting regarding what had happened to us and that, although they could communicate it to the festival, they believed it would be more effective if we ourselves publicly denounced it. What ultimately completely marred our experience at the festival is the utter lack of awareness on the part of the organisation regarding these situations, along with the shortage of purple points and professionals capable of dealing with them.

It is striking that a festival that seeks to build a space based on the principles of “respect”, “equality”, and “peace & love”, and that repeatedly emphasises the importance of community life and peaceful coexistence, should be completely ignorant of, or worse still, aware of and unwilling to address, the violence that takes place there every day of the festival.

For this very reason, we demand that the festival assume the responsibility that falls to it: guaranteeing the safety of all attendees and therefore implementing effective protocols and staffing, actively promoting awareness both preventively and during the festival itself, and organising spaces for it. Accordingly, we demand that they implement, at a minimum, the following measures:

• Prevention and Awareness-Raising Regarding Gender-Based Violence, Sexual Harassment, and Sexist Aggressions

Just as the festival each year commits to various struggles and demands relating to fundamental human rights, and just as this year it placed particular emphasis on raising awareness about the danger of fires (through social media posts, informative emails, and prohibitions against lighting fires in the camping area), we ask that:

1. Specific awareness campaigns on consent and against harassment be carried out throughout the year via social media and email (the “respect code” available on the website is insufficient, vague, ineffective, and inaccessible) and, during the days of the festival, through public-address announcements, informational purple points in visible locations, and signage throughout the festival grounds and camping areas (especially in shower areas).

2. A specific protocol be established as a prevention tool for responding to situations of harassment, and that it be made public so that all attendees are aware of it from the outset.

   
   

   - Assistance and Response to Situations of Sexual Harassment and Sexist Aggressions

   
   

Although we would all like to live in a utopian world in which no forms of violence exist, the reality is that we live in a patriarchal and sexist society, and we cannot be left resourceless when such situations occur. Therefore, it is necessary to:

1. Implement and make public an effective protocol, as a response tool to sexual harassment and sexist aggressions, establishing that any person who harasses or commits an aggression will be reprimanded and, depending on the seriousness of the events, expelled from the festival.

2. Establish daytime and nighttime purple points in all camping areas (Campings A and B, the bar and shower area, and the camper area) and at every festival stage. These must be points that people can approach if they experience harassment or sexual violence and that provide an immediate, confidential response centred on the wellbeing of those harassed or assaulted.

3. Create a reporting mailbox and make it available to all those wishing to confidentially report sexist, racist, and LGBTI-phobic aggressions. This will allow the organisation to maintain a record with which to quantify cases of harassment and aggression.

In light of all this, we wonder how many women have suffered similar situations at Rototom Sunsplash and have not found a safe space in which to report them, and who may even have decided to stop attending the event because they consider it a hostile and unsafe environment.

For this reason, our intention is to denounce the lack of measures for the prevention of and response to situations of harassment and sexual violence at the festival. We believe it is important to point out the shortcomings of the organisation and urge it to improve so that these situations do not occur again and so that all festival attendees can enjoy a safe space and enjoy the music, the venue, and the atmosphere with complete normality in future editions.

For a safe culture free from sexism.