Archives for March 2012

*Over 100 organizations, groups and college campuses from 17 countries are co-sponsoring Anti-Street Harassment Week. Any group is welcome to become a co-sponsor.

* Watch videos where several participants of Anti-Street Harassment Week talk about why they’re involved.

* Artists anywhere: submit your artwork to be included in an art exhibit on street harassment in Washington, DC on March 18, 3-9 p.m. Details.

* Plan for International Anti-Street Harassment Week, March 18-24…register your event

* Find out what’s happening in your area.

* What were you wearing when you got stared at or street harassed? Submit your photo

* Huffington Post coverage

Activism Announcements:

New:

* In Washington, DC, thanks to activists speaking out, the transit system launched a new way to report sexual harassment

* High school students in Chicago created a 30-second anti-street harassment PSA through Free Spirit Media

Reminders:

* College men in the USA share tips on how men can stop street harassment

* SSH founder Holly Kearl is quoted in the March 2012 issue of Cosmo magazine with advice on dealing with gropers. Read an extended version of her advice on the blog.

* The Adventures of Salwa campaign has a hotline for sexual harassment cases in Lebanon: 76-676862.

* In Bangalore, India, there is a helpline for street harassment 080 – 22943225 / 22864023

10 Tweets from the Week:

1. ‏@aliciasanchez whole TL is talking about #streetharassment on international women’s day. we have so much work to do to be safe in our bodies in this world.

2. @clairesgould #streetharassment on Connecticut Ave on a Thurs night? Really? What did you hope to accomplish by yelling “hey legs!” at girl walking alone?

3.@theriverfed Sounds like my life. Less now I’m older. RT @mikeb476: storify.com/dawnhfoster/st… Sexual harassment of women on the street.

4.‏ @nmoawad Salwa and her new friends! #endSH #nasawiya twitpic.com/8u1yvb

5. @DawnHFoster Right, here’s a quick blog post on street harassment: bit.ly/wrgAjT & standalone storify of women’s experiences: bit.ly/yWkeIY

6. @danyeeeezy levels of street harassment are highly correlated with the outdoor temperature.

7.‏ @mernathomas U can’t rationalize sexual harassment no matter how many times it happens to you. Always the same humiliation #endSH #egypt

8. @jenninsfw Does anyone else ever get the urge to catcall construction workers when driving by? #2wrongsdontmakearight

9.‏ @sallyNassar Yesterday marks my very first middle finger-ing to some sexual harasser #endSH #IWD

10. ‏ @HarrietThugman Ugh. I went 30 blocks without harassment…soon as I pass 110th street…the Black men have to bother me…UGH

He told me to “get in it if I wanted a good time.”

March 10, 2012 By Contributor

Trigger Warning – Attempted Kidnap

On my 20th birthday, I was walking between my halls of residence and my boyfriend’s, down a quiet residential street at about 6 in the evening (it was totally dark though, since it was halfway through December). A car screeched to a halt just past me, and proceeded to do a three point turn very quickly. A friend had had trouble with a flasher along this road, so I decided it could be suspicious, and sped up. A man got out and opened the boot [trunk], which was now pointing towards me. He told me to “get in it if I wanted a good time”.

I kept walking. He followed me. I started running (in high heels). So did he. By this stage, I was screaming down the phone to my boyfriend, and finally managed to reach a busier road. The man stopped chasing me, but shouted to “come back, I was only joking!”

Some joke, or some serious threat of kidnap and rape, I should say. I suspect I was targeted, as the street is known for being one used by students a lot, and by extension, young girls. I still don’t feel safe after dark.

– Anonymous

Location: Knighton Grange Road, Leicester, UK

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.

“Hiya, you’ve gone fat in your face!”

March 9, 2012 By Contributor

Going back a couple of months, I was sitting on the bus and a man got on. I don’t know him personally but I remember he worked as a security officer in the bus station a few years ago. I see him from time to time as he lives in my area. Usually he is with his wife when I see him and he would say hello. However, this time he was on his own. Now you’re probably expecting me to tell you that he tried to hit on me.

No actually, he insulted me. “Hiya, you’ve gone fat in your face!” he said casually.

Too stunned to answer, I just awkwardly smiled and looked away feeling mortified. He sat down and just started talking to another passenger as though nothing had happened.

Just to clarify, I’m a little overweight but not noticeably big. I felt confident with my appearance that day but after that remark, it knocked me back. I couldn’t believe he could be so rude and act like it was normal. What an asshole.

– Clarice

Location: No 63 bus, North Cornelly, Wales

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.

Will Street Harassment be Outlawed in the UK?

March 8, 2012 By HKearl

michelle-bachelet — Executive Director of UN Women Michelle Bachelet at the Convention opening signing in 2011. Image via UN

Today the United Kingdom becomes the 19th country and Turkey the 20th country to sign the “Council of Europe Convention on preventing and combating violence against women and domestic violence,” which was written in April 2011. (See which countries have already signed it.)

The Convention states that gender-based violence is a “violation of human rights and a form of discrimination against women and shall mean all acts of gender-based violence that result in, or are likely to result in, physical, sexual, psychological or economic harm or suffering to women, including threats of such acts, coercion or arbitrary deprivation of liberty, whether occurring in public or in private life.”

Countries that sign the Convention agree to pass legislation or criminalize or impose sanctions against different types of gender violence, including domestic violence, honor killings, stalking, and sexual harassment. Here’s the exact language about sexual harassment, which presumably includes street harassment since it does not say the sexual harassment must occur in workplaces or schools:

“Parties shall take the necessary legislative or other measures to ensure that any form of unwanted verbal, non-verbal or physical conduct of a sexual nature with the purpose or effect of violating the dignity of a person, in particular when creating an intimidating, hostile, degrading, humiliating or offensive environment, is subject to criminal or other legal sanction.”

Given this language of this article in the Convention, anti-street harassment activists in the UK are lobbying for new legislation against street harassment. Way to go!

But of course, they’re getting pushback.Via the Guardian:

“Former attorney general Baroness Scotland, who worked on the convention for four years under the Labour government, said the clause on sexual harassment was not intended to cover less serious incidents such as wolf-whistling and public teasing. However, campaigners on the issue said the convention was “what we’ve been trying to get for years”.

Julia Gray, founder of the London branch of US movement Hollaback, dedicated to getting rid of street harassment, said: “The way we see it is if you want to tackle it you tackle all of it – you say no to all forms of unwanted sexual harassment; that includes wolf-whistling, comments, everything.”

A Downing Street spokesman said it was too early to discuss possible sanctions for sexual harassment.”

With all due respect to Baroness Scotland, why isn’t the Convention supposed to include “less serious incidents”? Those are the incidents that are the most common. They are the incidents which annoy, degrade and anger us, and which allow harassers to become emboldened to escalate to more serious crimes. I agree with Julia Gray, it’s only a half-hearted attempt to address this form of gender discrimination unless it includes all forms of sexual harassment!!

Even though this is a Convention for European Countries, countries like Canada, Mexico, and the U.S. could sign it too as they are “Non-Member States of the Council of Europe.” But considering how the U.S. still has not signed the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW), adopted in 1979 by the UN General Assembly, I doubt the U.S. will sign this Convention either.

Clearly, we still have a lot of work to do to change attitudes about sexual harassment, especially “less serious forms.” So let’s keep speaking — share your street harassment stories and talk about the ways in which street harassment impacts your life.

UPDATE: Read an op-ed by Hollaback London founders Bryony Beynon and Julia Gray in the Guardian

Big News – WMATA will Address Sexual Harassment

March 8, 2012 By HKearl

3.7.12 holly, chai, CM bowser, ben, DC 001 — L to R: Holly Kearl, Chai Shenoy, Council Member Muriel Bowser, Ben Merrion

Exactly two weeks after several people in Washington, DC, gave public testimony about sexual harassment on the DC transit system and offered recommendations, WMATA has swiftly taken steps to make our recommendations happen!

Chai Shenoy, co-founder of Collective Action for Safe Spaces/Holla Back DC!, CASS board member Ben Merrion, and I learned about these initiatives yesterday. First we met with Ward 4 City Councilmember Muriel Bowser and two hours later, we met with about 10 staff at WMATA.

When we went into the meeting with WMATA, we had low expectations. In the days leading up to the hearing, WMATA said statements like, “one person’s harassment is another person’s flirting” and had given the impression that they thought sexual offenses weren’t a big deal. We were pleasantly surprised by what they had to say.

Chai wrote about what happened at the meetings on the CASS blog:

On the eve of International Women’s Day (ahem, yesterday), we met with Council Member Bowser and WMATA in two separate meetings. It was a day of follow-up meetings. We were interested to know if CM Bowser had heard back from WMATA. We were also curious as to what, if anything, WMATA was planning on doing to address our concerns about public sexual harassment and assault on the transit system.

CM Bowser expressed her commitment to push WMATA to do something, at minimum the public service awareness campaign and trainings. We talked to her about our concerns about the gap in law where in DC police (not true in MD/VA) have to see someone committing a misdemeanor to arrest them. This affects individuals who report indecent exposure, public masturbation, etc. Unless the cops see it, nothing can happen. Even if the person took a picture of the perpetrator in action. It’s essentially a free pass to perpetrators: Come to DC! Yikes. CM Bowser wants to address this issue and is figuring out ways to do so.

After that meeting, we had a lunch break. Thank goodness for the great weather yesterday that kept us company.

As we walked over the WMATA headquarters for our 2P meeting, we kept wondering outloud what WMATA would share with us. We were escorted to a conference room where some Senior level WMATA officials were sitting including Lynn Bowersox (Director of Communications), Dan Stessel (Chief Spokesperson), Regina Sullivan (Director of Government Relations), Michael Taborn (Chief of Transit Police), and others.

After an hour and half, we walked away with WMATA pledging to do a public service awareness campaign, launching as soon as April, technology upgrades to include a webportal for individuals to submit their experiences with harassment and assault, a newly dedicated email address on this issue (where people can upload pics/video), new trainings to ALL staff, and quarterly data reports on harassment and sex crimes.

Yeah, you read that correctly.

A PSA.

Data collection on harassment and sex crimes.

A dedicated email address and webportal (and specialized hashtag and possibly other techie things).

More & better trainings.

YEAH. yeah. yeAH!

You did it. Your tenacity to share stories of harassment and assault everywhere, including those that happen on the metro, is creating a culture of change in the nation’s 2nd largest transit system. That is big, really boombastic B.I.G.

Of course, our work isn’t done (this is not a Mission Accomplished moment). They have to launch it. It has to succeed. But, instead of being critical, let’s pause and celebrate this first step.

Have a glass of wine, bubbly water, beer or two in celebration of this on International Women’s Day.

In solidarity,

Chai, your humble servant.

P.S. Feel moved and want to get involved? Shoot us an email at info at collectiveactiondc.org.

You can also donate to CASS. Right now, our work is unpaid, volunteer driven. We took time off from work to attend the meetings and testify at the hearing, but we could do so much more with funds to hire at least one staff person to work on these issues full time.

This is HUGE news.

I am really proud of our city. Many people do not take these issues seriously so I applaud WMATA and also Councilmember Bowser (she’s up for re-election – vote for her if you can!) and her staff for listening to our testimonies, taking our concerns seriously, and then immediately taking action. They plan to include CASS and Stop Street Harassment in the whole process so we can have input on messaging and implementation, which of course is key. Come to a forum with Metro on March 22, 5:30 p.m. at AAUW, 1111 Sixteenth St, NW, Washington, DC, and share your thoughts with them, too.

WMATA is now on target to be the nation’s leader for addressing sexual harassment on the transit system and they hope to be a model for transit systems across the country.

And, as Chai mentions, WMATA’s decision to address this issue is in great part because of all of the people who shared their harassment stories at the hearing and on the CASS blog over the last three years and also thanks to the two dozen people who wrote to WMATA after the hearing to share their stories. Having media coverage highlighting our concerns from the Washington Post, ABC news, and WAMA didn’t hurt either.

Stay tuned for more updates on our progress. And please be in touch if you want to see something happen in your city. We’re happy to chat and offer advice.

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