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Archives for 2011

10 Ideas for Sexual Assault Awareness & Prevention Month 2011

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Do you care about ending sexual assault and helping survivors? I know many of you do because my 2010 post listing 10 ideas for action has been well viewed! Well, I care, too and fortunately for us there are tons of resources, activities, and initiatives this month (and most are applicable beyond the month) that make it really easy for us to do something.

Before I give you 10 of those resources and initiatives (most of them are new for 2011), here is a powerful excerpt from President Obama’s proclamation for Sexual Assault Awareness and Prevention Month 2011:

“Despite reforms to our legal system, sexual violence remains pervasive and largely misunderstood.  Nearly one in six American women will experience an attempted or completed rape at some point in her life, and for some groups, rates of sexual violence are even higher.  Almost one in three American Indian and Alaska Native women will be sexually assaulted.  Young women ages 16 to 24 are at greatest risk, and an alarming number of young women are sexually assaulted while in college.  Too many men and boys are also affected.  With each new victim and each person still suffering from an attack, we are called with renewed purpose to respond to and rid our Nation of all forms of sexual violence…

Each victim of sexual assault represents a sister or a daughter, a nephew or a friend.  We must break the silence so no victim anguishes without resources or aid in their time of greatest need.”

So what can we do about it?

1. Believe/help survivors. I loved a tweet earlier this week from Students Active for Ending Rape (SAFER). At minimum, they noted, believe survivors when they tell you. I’ll add, visit the website of the Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network to find information to help you help the survivor. And to find information to help yourself.

2. Find help. If you are a survivor who isn’t sure where to turn to or how to get help, I highly recommend visiting the RAINN website. I volunteered with them for 2.5 years and applaud their work. You can find information about a phone or online hotline and information about recovery.

  • Are you in the military? RAINN has a new helpline called Safe Helpline specifically for survivors in the military.
  • Are you male? Visit the website 1 in 6 for resources specifically for you.

3. Play BINGO.  The Washington Coalition of Sexual Assault Programs developed a new thought and conversation provoking game of Bingo! They filled each square with ways in which participants can be part of the solution to end sexual violence.

4. Use the arts. Take part or organize arts-based initiatives to raise awareness about sexual assault. Four examples of initiatives include:

  • The Clothesline Project, an initiative to bear witness to violence against women. Women affected by violence decorate a shirt and hang the shirt on a clothesline to be viewed by others as testimony to the problem of men’s violence against women.
  • V-Day event offers several performance and film screening options for groups to implement in their community in February, March, and April. The purpose of these events is to raise awareness about violence against women and girls as well as raise money for local beneficiaries that are working to end violence. There is no theater or producing experience necessary. Visit the V-Day website to learn how to organize a V-Day event.
  • Story of a Rape Survivor (SOARS) is an award winning multimedia performance you can bring to your community that entertains as well as educates the audience about sexual assault prevention. Featuring the music of Nina Simone,Maxwell, and Sade, SOARS tells one woman’s story about how she reclaimed her body, sexuality, and self-esteem after being sexually assaulted in college. SOARS is a cutting-edge theatrical experience that stars a diverse cast of women, combining photographs, dance, spoken-word poetry and music as a way to educate about healing from sexual violence.
  • By wearing a white ribbon, White Ribbon Campaign members make a personal pledge to “never commit, condone or remain silent about violence against women and girls.” You can order materials to help challenge the community to speak out on the issue, learn about sexual violence, and raise public awareness.

5. Wear jeans. Make a social statement by wearing jeans on a designated day in April (this year it is April 27) through Denim Day in LA & USA as a visible means of protest against misconceptions that surround sexual assault. Order their Denim Day Action Kit and raise awareness at your workplace, neighborhood, or community. Encourage each person who participates to donate one dollar to Denim Day to fund prevention programming. (I just ordered my kit.)

6. Make a pledge. This month, Students Active for Ending Rape encourages college students, alumni, parents, faculty, and administrators to transform their awareness into activism by pledging concrete action toward ending college sexual assault.

7. Tweet or Write Facebook Posts. The National Sexual Violence Resource Center provides a variety of resources each year for Sexual Assault Awareness & Prevention Month, including free reports and manuals and campaign materials. This year, they’ve created social networkers with 30 suggested tweets/posts to publish, one per day in April. (I just tweeted the suggestion for April 1.)

8. March. Organize or participate in a Take Back the Night March in your community or on campus and make a statement that women have the right to be in public and to go about their lives without the risk of sexual violence. Order a kit with resources for the event.

9. Support consent. One fun way to work to prevent sexual assault is to talk about and emphasize consent in all sexual activities. Here are two amazing initiatives you can bring to your campus or community to do that:

  • The Consensual Project is an interactive, sex-positive, fun workshop during which participants can learn why consensual hooking up is hotter hooking up. College students are an ideal audience for this workshop.
  • The Line is a film that explores the intersection of sexual identity, power, and violence. How do we negotiate our boundaries as sexually liberated women? How much are we desensitized to sexual violence? Through conversations with football players, educators, survivors of violence, prostitutes, and attorneys, this personal film explores the “grey area” and the elusive line of consent. This April, 16 participating Hollaback! chapters will show The Line and host community events, screenings and parties in cities around the globe.

10. Do something about campus sexual assault. The rates of campus sexual assault are quite high, yet very rarely are there adequate prevention programs or proper channels for handling perpetrators. AAUW and SAFER created a Program in a Box toolkit with ideas for concrete action that can lead to concrete change, tailored for audiences of students, faculty, alumni, and parents of students. Download the free toolkit and find out what you can do to make campuses safer for all.

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“Hey, back there when someone yelled ‘nice ass’ at you… that was me!”

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My classics from the college years…

I worked for a concert promoter and one night I was waiting outside a rock club to pass out fliers to the people exiting. It was cold, like it is in Chicago. So I had on a big coat. The bouncer let me come into the foyer to get out of the cold, where I took off my coat and he felt it appropriate to say, “I thought you were cute before, but after you took off your coat, I thought, damn, you’ve got a bangin’ bod!”

Walking down the stairs of the L train station in my neighborhood, I heard someone behind me yell, “Hey! Nice ass! NICE ASS!” I hoped against hope that it wasn’t directed at me. I didn’t look back to see. After I exited the station, a man came up to me and tapped me on the shoulder. He said, “Hey, back there when someone yelled ‘nice ass’ at you… that was me! THAT WAS ME!” I was really surprised by his excitement at telling me that he was, in fact, the grotesque man cat-calling me. Until, of course, he explained to me that you are supposed to say ‘thank you’ when someone gives you a compliment. Where were my manners? Then he asked if he could walk me home, to which I declined.

Standing on the corner of Western and Addison, in the winter, snow on the ground, puffy winter coat down to my knees, a man in an SUV made a left turn onto Addison and rolled down his window in the middle of the intersection to yell at me, “That’s a nice pussy!”

None of this made me feel beautiful or special. But it definitely made me uncomfortable and I wanted to hang out at different clubs, move to a new neighborhood, and find a different route to work. I should not be forced to change my life to avoid harassment. I deserve to walk down the streets of my city in peace.

– Jayme

Location: Chicago, Illinois

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“These sexually exploited comments were coming from children”

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I have been harassed twice last week. Both incidents were small but the affect it had on me was BIG.

I have had it with society. What has happened to our supposed ‘civil’ race? The human race. We have become more savage and uncivilised than animals. Even they are far more dignified than us! I swear by it.

I was waiting for a taxi outside a guest house in Porthcawl. The night before, I had dyed my brown hair, blonde. Only it turned out slightly ginger. I wasn’t all that bothered about it. I could dye it again. The only thing I was sensitive about was what OTHER people might think. Would they stare at me? Would they laugh at me? Will some arrogant asshole come along and make a snide comment? Well, I was half expecting it… and my fear was confirmed.

A gang of teenagers were walking on the other side of the road and were ALL staring at me. “Here we go” I thought to myself. And when I looked back, a boy made a face and said “Eww”. Then a girl did the same. I sighed. I knew it!

Then they carried on walking as though nothing had happened. Yes, to them, maybe it was ‘nothing’. But guess what you jerks?? Your sheer ignorance happened to ruin my day! I’m sure you would feel proud of that wouldn’t you? If you knew.

Then a few days later, I was on my way to my local community hall and I had to walk past a shop. Three young boys were hanging around. They only looked about 12. I didn’t think much of them until after I had walked past them, I heard shouts of “Can I bum you?” “Move that ass!”

These sexually exploited comments were coming from children. As I walked on ignoring their jeering, I shook my head in disbelief. What has this world come to?

Sexual harassment is getting younger and younger. I have experienced this before with young kids. And each time it happens, it disgusts me more and more. Where are their morals? Are their parents aware of how they are behaving when they are not around? Where have they picked this type of language up? It beats me.

All I can say is they are not being taught a very important thing – respect. And I find it very saddening.

– Clarice

Location: South Wales, UK

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Happy 30th anniversary, street harassment

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Sometimes it can feel like street harassment activism is new, that the problem is new. But it’s not. Email, online articles, blogging, tweeting, and texting help us hear about it, talk about it, share our stories and help amplify our voices, but it’s something activists have addressed for decades.

For example, as early as 1909, many individuals, including those at the Women’s Municipal League, proposed women-only cars during rush hour on the New York City subway. They thought sex segregation would “assure that women were not forced to cope with ‘the fearful crushes,’ and with sexual insults, and that they would not have to safeguard themselves from men’s sexual aggression.”

The women-only subway cars did not come to pass but a few years later, once there female police officers, one of their duties was to look out for sexual harassers on the subway and streets. And of course today, there are anti-sexual harassment PSAs on the NYC subway thanks to pressure from groups like New Yorkers for Safe Transit.

I first saw the term street harassment in 2006 on the sites of The Street Harassment Project and HollaBack NYC. It’s especially surprising I’d never heard or read the term before since one of my majors as an undergraduate was women’s studies and my master’s program was in public policy and women’s studies. I was well versed in gender violence issues like rape, sexual assault, domestic violence, and sexual harassment in the workplace, but I hadn’t heard the term before or even a discussions about it even though now I know street harassment happens at a more frequent rate for women and girls than sexual harassment in the workplace or schools.

Was that because it’s a new term?

No.

During my research for my thesis and then my book on street harassment, I was surprised to learn that the term had been around since at least 1981. Anthropologist Micaela di Leonardo wrote the article “Political Economy of Street Harassment” for Aegis Magazine on Ending Violence Against Women that year. When I asked her about the origin of the term, she said it came out of the rape crisis movement in the late 1970s and that, to her knowledge, (and to mine, after years of research) she was the first one to use it in a printed publication.

When I read her article, I was upset and a bit disheartened: thirty years later, her article is 100 percent relevant. Someone who didn’t know when it was published and read it may think it was a current article.

Pockets of activists have been working on this issue for decades, but street harassment still occurs, it’s largely socially acceptable, it’s not widely discussed, and its occurrence is frequently blamed on women when it is discussed.

On the other hand, had there not been activists working to address street harassment for decades, I shudder to think how much worse the problem would be today. Thanks to them, at least there is a name for the problem, there are articles and books and documentaries and a growing number of activists and people speaking out. Our work today builds on the work of women and men from decades ago. As frustrating as it is to realize we are fighting the same battles, thank goodness they started the battles instead of just letting it go.

On this, the last day of Women’s History Month, on the 30th anniversary of the first publication of the term street harassment, I encourage you all to read “Political Economy of Street Harassment” (it’s only six pages).

Let the article remind you how long women have been speaking out on this issue. And let it inspire you to speak out and to do MORE. To use technology to your advantage. To use your voice to your advantage. To keep working to change the social acceptability of street harassment and taking action in our communities to end it.

As I continue to battle on, I hope that street harassment will become so socially unacceptable that by 2041, no one reads articles and blogs from 2011 and thinks, wow, how relevant, this could have been written today. Let’s work together to get there.

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48 hours of harassment in Budapest

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This weekend was a special one for sexual harassment. In the past 48 hours, all of the following have happened to me:

1) A group of man make kissing noises at a woman in a skirt. I am with my friends and (not too loudly) say, “Oh wow. A woman in a skirt. Never seen one before.” The men harass and follow us for a block.

2) I am walking with a male friend. A young man walks up to us and asks my friend if I am his girlfriend. Male friend says no. Upon realizing that I am un-owned, young man turns to me and says, “Hey Bitch. Can I cum on your face?” I stop walking, look him in the eye and say loudly and seriously, “What the fuck did you just say to me? That is not funny. It is NOT funny.” He walks away.

3) I get off a public tram in the middle of the afternoon. A man scans me up and down. I tell him to fuck off. He follows me down the street towards my house. I turn, stomp my foot and scream in his face: “WHAT THE HELL IS WRONG WITH YOU? YOU NEED TO GET THE FUCK AWAY FROM ME NOW!” He shrugs and walks around me. I have to stop and wait for him to pass my house so I can go home safely. The street was full of people. Not a single person said anything at all.

Did I defend myself? I guess. Did it affect any of these idiots? Doubt it. But I shouldn’t have to do anything. I shouldn’t have to weigh defense against ruining my evening by making a public scene. I have a life that is mine and it goes outside. How dare anyone try to scare me back into my chilly apartment?

And by the way, I live in Europe. And I was wearing long pants and two sweaters in all of these incidents.

– Whitney

Location: Budapest, Hungary

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

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