Archives for May 2011

Appropriate way to pay a compliment at a club/bar

May 31, 2011 By Contributor

I thought it would be worth sharing a positive story:

Frequently when the subject of street harassment comes up, men seem to have questions as to what mode of communication is appropriate when wanting to compliment or indicate interest in a woman. While certain behaviors are clearly offensive, others are more nebulous, so I always appreciate curiosity.

Friday night my girlfriends and I went out dancing, and the evening produced a perfect example of what is appropriate behavior as opposed to offensive, menacing harassment:

We were taking a break on the outdoor patio of the dance club. We were celebrating my friend’s impending wedding, so she was adorned in a novelty veil and bride sash. An ever-so-slightly disheveled man approached us and asked us who was getting married.

*Side note: This is almost always the moment in the interaction where the females tense up and have to immediately assess whether the man is a harasser or simply friendly. It can be extremely difficult to judge in that moment, so we frequently draw from past experiences (i.e. if he’s disheveled, he might be a harasser; if he’s overly loud, he might be a harasser; etc.). It is exhausting when you can never just accept a seemingly friendly inquiry as just that. It causes females to stop being open and nice to strangers for fear of them being potential harassers.*

–Anyway, I politely pointed out which friend was getting married.

He turned to her and said “Congratulations.” He then turned back to me and said “You all look fabulous. All of you. And I mean that with respect.”

I said thank you, he said you’re welcome, and then he walked away.

I know that everyone’s bar is set at a different height, but as someone who is always hyper on guard due to years of extreme harassment in this town, I can solidly say that this man did a fine job of paying 6 women a compliment and indicating his admiration without being disrespectful of making us feel at all threatened.

I thought it was an example worth sharing.

– B

Location: Rumors dance club/bar, 19th & M NW, Washington, DC

Share your street harassment story today and help raise awareness about the problem.
Find suggestions for what YOU can do about this human rights issue.

New film: “Do they think we like it?”

May 31, 2011 By HKearl

I’m excited to share another new film about street harassment (in the past few days I’ve shared ones from Cape Town, South Africa; Delhi, India; and Philadelphia, USA). This one is from England.

Here’s the description on YouTube:

“A short film about street harassment that was researched, designed, scripted, filmed, directed and edited by volunteers from Initi8 at Nottingham Trent University with guidance and support from Gill Court at Platform 51 Nottingham. The film was inspired by Nottingham’s International Women’s Day events with the aim of raising awareness of street harassment of women and how it makes them feel.”

I’m feeling overcome by emotion witnessing the outpouring of women and men speaking out this week from all over the world. Keep it up!! Keep sharing your voices, stories, and raising awareness that street harassment happens and that it’s not okay.

“No groping” on buses in Colombia

May 31, 2011 By HKearl

Via Love Matters in the Netherlands:

“We don’t need that kind of support,” runs the slogan on a poster showing a man thrusting himself up against a woman.

“We don’t want that hand,” reads another ‘no groping’ poster. They’re part of a campaign against sexual harassment on the buses of Colombia’s capital Bogota, set up by a group of women who’ve had enough of wandering hands and offensive sexual comments.

“During rush hour, when the buses are packed, the male passengers take the opportunity to stand close to women and feel them up,” says Marisol Dalmazo of the Latin American Women and Habitat Network in Colombia. “It’s offensive and restrictive to women.”

Marisol has been running a programme since 2007 in Bogota to promote neighbourhood women’s centres and make the streets safer for women and girls. And she’s the driving force behind a campaign to put a stop to one of the harmful side-effects of Latin America’s macho culture: street sexual harassment.

“It’s something that’s always happened and not only in Latin America,” she stresses. “It’s now important that we draw attention to the issue and make men aware that what they’re doing is sexual harassment and mustn’t be tolerated under any circumstances.”

“We put up posters at every bus station and bus stop,” she says. “The bus company employees help us – they even wear t-shirts with slogans against sexual harassment.”

Marisol and her organisation also act out role plays about sexual harassment on the bus. Women dressed as men perform scenes about groping, and then ask passengers what they think about the behaviour.

“We generally get positive responses,” she says. “More and more, people think sexual harassment should be condemned, that this kind of behaviour mustn’t be tolerated.”

I love how Marisol and other women took the issue of groping on the buses and street harassment into their own hands and even have bus employee cooperation in their efforts to prevent it. Their initiatives should be inspirational to people everywhere who are fed up and have had enough of sexual harassment on the streets, in the parks, on the buses and subways.

Find ideas for what YOU can do at an individual and/or a community level. Every action makes a difference.

Anti-street harassment film out of Cape Town, South Africa

May 30, 2011 By HKearl

This important new anti-street harassment video was created by filmmaker Pascale Neuschäfer. She lives in Cape Town, South Africa, and she agreed to answer a few questions about herself and the film.

Stop Street Harassment (SSH): Please tell me a bit about yourself and why you decided to make this film.

Pascale Neuschäfer (PN): I am a filmmaker and an actress and I made the promo with the help of my partner and some friends who are interested in gender rights issues and who feel comfortable speaking up about it. I became frustrated not only at the frequency with which incidence of street harassment happen, but at the fact that women are mostly told to ignore it. This included many of my friends (both women and men) who couldn’t see the inherent harm in catcalling. I think this attitude stems largely from ignorance (South Africa having one of the highest rates of gender-based violence in the world, including rape, corrective rape and murder) and from fear: the fear of a public humiliation, as well as the fear of augmented violence when confronting a harasser.

SSH: How has street harassment impacted your own life and what’s inspired your decision to speak out against it?

PN: A defining moment for me was being harassed by a 15 year old boy, who responded very aggressively when I confronted him about his behaviour (I posted this story on your blog a few months ago). Making the 30 second fictional short was an outlet for me, a woman to make the statement: women hate it when men harass us! There is nothing polite, or politically correct about it, because there is nothing polite about being harassed and I feel very strongly that women should speak up. However, I also think there are many women in the world who often cannot speak up (particularly in patriarchal societies like South Africa, where women are brutally murdered and raped, simply for being openly gay) and I think it’s important to engage in open debate about these kind of issues. I also believe that street harassment is just the tip of the iceberg to other, violent gender-based crimes.

SSH: Do you have any future plans regarding street harassment and film?

PN: I am hoping to get funding to make full-length documentary and to start a media campaign (including Public Service Announcements which highlight how violence escalates) , because I have found that even just speaking to my friends (men and women) has had a positive effect on the way we now either DO respond (if we didn’t previously), or in the way in which we CHOOSE to respond.

SSH: Wonderful. You’re doing amazing work with your film and I look forward to seeing what you do next!

For others who are interested in filmmaking and documentaries, check out more anti-street harassment documentaries and films and find tips for making your own!

Employer threatens to fire anyone who calls police about harassment incident

May 30, 2011 By Contributor

This did not happen to me. It happened to a life-long female friend of my sister. To protect their identities, I’m not going to say any names of people or places.

At work, one of her male co-workers drilled a hole in a wall to the women’s bathroom and spied on her when she was in there. When the boss found out, he fired the employee and fixed the wall. He then threatened to fire anyone who reports to the police what happened, because he wanted to protect the place’s reputation.

This is disgusting. He deserves a much harsher punishment than losing his job. Where does the boss get the idea that a gross invasion of privacy like this is not serious enough to report to the police? What if the boss was in the bathroom and someone spied on him? Would he have reacted differently?

She doesn’t want to report what happened because she’s afraid of losing her job that she really needs. What should she do? Should she report it and not care about losing her job? Should she sue, so she wouldn’t need the job? Should she try to tape the boss threatening to fire her and have him arrested for obstruction of justice?

– Anonymous

Share your street harassment story today and help raise awareness about the problem. Find suggestions for what YOU can do about this human rights issue.