Stop Street Harassment

Making Public Spaces Safe and Welcoming

Archives for October 2009

Morning drive by

By

Chicago, IL – I was walking from my boyfriend’s northwest side apt one morning (around 6 am), on the way to the bus back to my place. A tan van slowed down and kept pace with me while I walked for about half a block. I gave it an annoyed look; it sped up and drove off.

I’d walked that 1.5 blocks before with no problem but the van just made me realize that the mornings were darker, I was alone and no one would be around if something happened to me.

Nothing was said – but then, nothing needed to be said. A van slowing down to follow a woman alone on a dark street, at sunrise? Not a compliment. Menacing.

– anonymous

Location: Chicago, IL

Share your street harassment story today and help raise awareness about the problem. Include your location and it will be added to the Street Harassment Map.

Share

Chemical Castration for Sex Criminals?

By

Manuel da Cruz kidnapped Marie-Christine Hodeau while she was jogging near a forest, 30 miles south of Paris, France, last week. She was able to call the police from the trunk of the car and gave them the make and registration of the vehicle. Cruz killed her before police could help (she actually escaped at one point when he stopped to change cars but he caught her again). The articles I read did not say if she was sexually assaulted too; it does not seem like it. The information she provided led to his arrest and the police recovered her body in the forest.

This is the extra kicker: Cruz, a father of four, had been sentenced to 11 years in prison for the kidnap and rape of a 13-year-old girl in early 2000s, but he was released seven years later (and he returned to the same place where his victim lives)!

Rightly so, this case is generating an outcry against the French judicial system.

It’s also generating pressure for the “hardening of a law introduced in 2005 which allows sexual offenders to volunteer for so-called ‘chemical castration’ – the use of anti-hormone treatment to reduce or destroy the sexual appetite.” This is already used in Germany, Belgium, and Denmark.

Last week, the justice minister, Michèle Alliot-Marie, said that “she would propose a draft law by the end of this month to toughen the existing legislation. She said, however, that chemical castration would remain ‘voluntary.'”

I know very little about this topic, but I’ve found out that chemical castration is reversible and is used to diminish or switch off the libido/sex drive, but that only lasts as long as the treatment. This legislation and mindset suggests that rapists rape because of an uncontrollable sex drive – but aren’t issues like power and control more at play? And if so, will chemical castration really help?

What do you know/think?

Share

He “only” wanted to follow her

By

I was walking back home one night, in my lovely neighborhood in central Paris, it was around 8 or 9 PM. I felt a guy walking towards me and got tense. What effort would I have to produce to make him leave me alone in an efficient way?

The guy began talking to me, the regular bullshit. He was not aggressive but very insistent. I remained calm, didn’t make eye contact but still told him in a polite way I didn’t want anything from him and wanted to be left alone.

The guy literally walked me home – I was almost there when he first approached me. He was just a few meters away from me so I figured I would have time to open the door of my building and quickly get in. I rushed and panicked because I realized he had put his foot in the door. I lived in what used to be the superintendant’s apartment so I had no other locked door to cross, only mine.

The guy came right after me and as I was opening my own door, he kind of rushed and we both fell on the ground of my little apartment. He fell over me, to tell the truth. It was all dark and I was so scared I began peeing on myself – all kinds of visions went through my mind: “So it’s happening to me, now, the door is going to close back on us, the guy is going to rape me and nobody will hear me or even try to come to help.”

It all went very fast. The guy stood up and kind of backed off, I didn’t exactly pushed him or fought or anything like this. He looked a little puzzled and as he was standing there, already out the door, I told him he was crazy and he had to go. He said he was sorry, that he had thought I had entered a staircase and not my own home and that he “only” wanted to follow me (like it’s more honorable, or something.) He finally left in a very neutral manner, like nothing had happened. I was in shock.

I think, at a certain point, he got scared by the whole situation. Maybe he didn’t want to go that far and scare me that much. I don’t think he really knew what he was doing but still, all I really know is that, as is true of many men, he couldn’t take “no” for an answer.

– E. B.

Location: Paris, France

Share your street harassment story today and help raise awareness about the problem. Include your location and it will be added to the Street Harassment Map.

Share

He "only" wanted to follow her

By

I was walking back home one night, in my lovely neighborhood in central Paris, it was around 8 or 9 PM. I felt a guy walking towards me and got tense. What effort would I have to produce to make him leave me alone in an efficient way?

The guy began talking to me, the regular bullshit. He was not aggressive but very insistent. I remained calm, didn’t make eye contact but still told him in a polite way I didn’t want anything from him and wanted to be left alone.

The guy literally walked me home – I was almost there when he first approached me. He was just a few meters away from me so I figured I would have time to open the door of my building and quickly get in. I rushed and panicked because I realized he had put his foot in the door. I lived in what used to be the superintendant’s apartment so I had no other locked door to cross, only mine.

The guy came right after me and as I was opening my own door, he kind of rushed and we both fell on the ground of my little apartment. He fell over me, to tell the truth. It was all dark and I was so scared I began peeing on myself – all kinds of visions went through my mind: “So it’s happening to me, now, the door is going to close back on us, the guy is going to rape me and nobody will hear me or even try to come to help.”

It all went very fast. The guy stood up and kind of backed off, I didn’t exactly pushed him or fought or anything like this. He looked a little puzzled and as he was standing there, already out the door, I told him he was crazy and he had to go. He said he was sorry, that he had thought I had entered a staircase and not my own home and that he “only” wanted to follow me (like it’s more honorable, or something.) He finally left in a very neutral manner, like nothing had happened. I was in shock.

I think, at a certain point, he got scared by the whole situation. Maybe he didn’t want to go that far and scare me that much. I don’t think he really knew what he was doing but still, all I really know is that, as is true of many men, he couldn’t take “no” for an answer.

– E. B.

Location: Paris, France

Share your street harassment story today and help raise awareness about the problem. Include your location and it will be added to the Street Harassment Map.

Share

“I’ll bet next time he buys marshmallows”

By

Today I’ve been writing my street harassment book chapter on ways women can respond to harassers in the moment – if they feel safe enough to and wish to – and success stories illustrating those ways.  The stories come from my informal survey and from stories submitted to this blog and other anti-street harassment blogs. The Street Harassment Project has a whole depository of great stories and I got a nice laugh from the stories from one contributor in particular. (I don’t condone violence or insulting harassers and I’m not including either of these stories in my book, but it’s hard not to feel some vindication at the outcomes of the stories when too often men get away with this kind of crap)

“Construction sites are full of men who hoot & holler, make rude gestures, etc. They feel safe in doing so, because they’re behind fences, on scaffolds, and with thier buddies. Cowards!

I had to walk past one such site at least twice a day. I’d heard comments, but none of these men had ever actually addressed me. Until a specific afternoon, when one of these guys hollered, “Hey lady, come up here and suck my dick!”

I’d had enough. I have a smart mouth anyway, and before I even thought about it I yelled back “Well maybe I would if I could FIND it under that fat gut of yours!” Jeez. Even I was embarrassed, but his buddies on the scaffolding nearly fell off laughing, and the women near me cheered.

From then on, when I walked past that site, all these guys would dare holler at me was “Hi lady! How ya doin’? Nice day huh?” with big grins on thier faces. And I never heard another lewd commect from ANY of them to ANYONE the whole rest of that remodel. I felt like Wonder Woman!

….

A friend of mine worked nights at 7-Eleven and a creepy little guy browsed around the store until he was the only customer, then brought a can of creamed corn to the counter. She turned aside a bit to ring it up, and when she turned back, he’d taken his willie out and laid it on the counter. She panicked, and did the first thing that came to mind…she smashed it as hard as she could with that can of creamed corn. Split it down the middle. She called 911, totally freaked, and one of the policemen said to her, as they hauled this pervert away in the ambulance, ‘You did a good thing here. Don’t feel badly, he had it coming. I’ll bet next time, he buys marshmallows!'”

Share