Stop Street Harassment

Making Public Spaces Safe and Welcoming

Archives for July 2013

“I couldn’t shake the freaky feeling”

By

For my summer internship I have been traveling to and from DC via metro. As I texted my sister that I had reached my home metro stop, a man approached me and was very quickly four inches from my face. I looked up, startled, and asked if I could help him. Maybe he needed directions? He threw his hand towards me and said, “Hi my name is ‘uncomfortable street harasser’s name’ and I think you are beautiful.”

I had absolutely no idea what to do. My whole life I have been taught that if someone asks for a handshake, you reciprocate, and I had no desire to antagonize this crazed man, so I did. Immediately, I regretted it (and purelled later).

He said again, “You are beautiful” and added, “I am going to take you on a date.” At this point I had gained some composure and responded, “Thank you but I am not interested.” What the hell was coming out of my mouth? Why was I “thanking” him? This weirdo had come up to me while I was minding my own business and begun to harass me!

He then continued to ask me out on a date and tell me how much I would be missing should I reject him, which I already had multiple times. As I continued to politely deny him, I looked around to see where and what other metro stop people were doing. Was I safe? There was an older man with an LSU cap across the street giving my harasser a solid stare. He recognized that I was not comfortable and motioned for me to come over to him. But what if I was just exchanging one unwanted come on for another?

I went for Option C – excuse myself. I firmly told my street harasser that I had to make an important phone call and walked over to where others were waiting for a bus. The man eventually stopped staring at me and my sister arrived, but I couldn’t shake the freaky feeling.

I have to say. I am much more vigilant when waiting at the metro, even if I think I am safe in the sunlight.

– Katie

Location: King St. Metro Stop, Alexandria, VA

Share your street harassment story for the blog.

Share

“The situation is going from bad to worst”

By

Hi, all. I’m a transexual woman who lives in a small town in Spain.

While I am respected by the majority of neighbours, there is a a small group of lazy young people, maybe in their late adolescence, who sit on the stairs of the church who say all kind of insults, ranging from fagot, transvestite, whore, and ask, “Do you have condoms?”

Every day the situation is going from bad to worst, today they started to walk behind me while menacing me.

I’m considering seriously to start to walk the streets with the cellular recording video on and present a formal denunce to the police using the records as proof.

Do you have any suggestions for dealing with harassers and/or ending street harassment in general?

If you expect harassment in a concrete situation, put your phone in mode video and recording on. But avoid to do it in sight of the harassers, this could end in a physical aggression. Do it before the harassment, there are situations like mine where it is perfectly predictable.

– Amanda Azañón Teruel

Location: Las Navas del Marqués, Hermita de la Plaza del Cristo, Spain

Share your street harassment story for the blog.

Share

“Long live the struggle of Egyptian women”

By

Trigger Warning

Between June 30 and July 3, nearly 100 women were subjected to mass sexual assaults by mobs of men at Tahrir Square in Egypt, the Human Rights Watch reported.

Later on July 3, @OpAntiSH tweeted: “So far (July 3rd, 1:30 am) we got 68 reports of mob assaults, we intervened in 46, & have at least one rape case.”

Volunteers with OpAntiSH and Tahrir Body Guard have stopped scores of attacks across those days. Today they are taking the day off, gearing up for more interventions tomorrow during the political protests planned.

On top of the violence, government leaders blame WOMEN for the attacks, saying they shouldn’t be there.

In response, a coalition of groups in Egypt issued a statement yesterday, this is an excerpt:

“The undersigned organizations and groups believe that the attempts of the authorities to use the incidents of sexual assault against the women to “smear” the opposition’s demonstrations mark the rock bottom of the official rhetoric of state institutions. The Egyptian authorities have failed to interpret the violent sexual assaults against women in spaces of demonstration as an extension to years of neglecting sexual crimes against women and the usage of these crimes by successive authorities, starting from the regime of former president Hosni Mubarak up to the rule of the Muslim Brotherhood, to punish women for their presence in the public space. Rather than attempting to find solutions to the crisis of sexual assault, the Egyptian authorities use the assaults as a smearing tool against the opposition, in an attempt to portray them as a group of “thugs”.

The undersigned organizations and groups believe that the strategy of using sexual assault to “stigmatize” women demonstrators opposing Mohammed Morsi is irresponsible and will not contribute to eradicating rape and sexual assault. Sexual violence has become a stable feature of the streets of Egypt, and not necessarily associated with large crowded demonstrations. The approach adopted by the Egyptian authorities only contributes to the aggravation of the problem.

The responsibility of protecting peaceful protesters falls on the Egyptian authorities, according to international law. Egyptian authorities are also responsible for investigating incidents of sexual assault and rape, guaranteeing that perpetrators are brought to justice, and providing adequate, effective, prompt, and appropriate remedies, including the rehabilitation of survivors; which entails providing psychological care as well as legal and social services, according to international human rights law. The Egyptian authorities must bear its legal responsibility towards the survivors of sexual violence rather than using the incidents as political tools against the opposition.

Long live the struggle of Egyptian women.”

Agreed and co-signed. We stand in solidarity with Egyptian women and everyone who is working hard to make sure they are safe in public spaces!

Share

Street Harassment: Lessons from Egypt

By

The first time I ever saw an incident of street harassment in Tahrir was long before the Square had made it into world news headlines. I distinctly remember the sight of the woman holding her harasser by the collar of his shirt while packs of passersby gathered around bombarding her with implorations to let him go.

But what did he do? What do you mean he harassed you, was it just talk? Let him go! Are you really going to report him over THAT? The police will not do anything; just let him go. Harassment? That doesn’t happen here, what are you trying to get out of this poor man?

“I’ll let him go over my dead body,” she said flatly.

That afternoon, I watched this young woman literally drag her harasser all the way to the police station. I, like the gathering crowd, found the idea of reporting a harassment case to the police exasperating; at best, they would ignore her pleas to report, at worst, she would have been a laughing stock for the officers. Indeed, after a while, the man emerged from the police station, looking quite flustered but otherwise free from charges. The woman he harassed soon followed looking quite unbothered herself.

“Why did you report him knowing they will just laugh at you?” I decided to approach her and ask.

“I don’t care what they will or will not do, I wanted everyone to watch him being dragged around for harassing a woman and I wanted him to see everyone watching him,” she said.

Before the revolution, it was incredibly rare for anyone to use the term “harassment” in Egypt; they called it other things, mostly “catcalls” and even then the matter was never considered a serious problem. Only when physical assault was involved was it taken seriously.

That street harassment was not addressed as such is partially linked to the lack of political space from which we may have highlighted the issue as a human rights violation.

Then, as the January 2011 revolution took place, we saw a whole other face to street harassment. Mob attacks by the hundreds on both journalists and protestors soon made it into headlines news. All of a sudden, people started talking about street harassment as a criminal act, as something that ought to be punishable by law.

And then the fury died down as we all went back to our daily lives. The problem then was that street harassment became part of our daily routines. With the lack of order and stability that followed the revolution, physical and verbal harassment became an everyday thing for the women of Cairo. Before, harassers would carry out the deed with a sense of privacy- in isolated places, late at night etc.- tapping into the common notion that street harassment was not really a problem for Egyptians and therefore making it more difficult for us to shame the behaviour.

After 2011, street harassment became reflective of a certain power dynamic. Every major protest came with a renewed wave of attacks, often employed as a deterrence tool against political expression. But this time, we were ready. The formation of Tahrir Bodyguard, Op Anti-SH and other movements not only provided physical protection of female protestors, but also enforced the reality that Egyptian women will stop at nothing to take ownership of their streets and of their revolution.

On June 30, despite the continued brutality of sexual assault, more Egyptian women took the streets than ever. While our issues with street harassment are not resolved, our continued fight against it has come to mean one thing- that we are on the right track.

 Yasmine Nagaty is a Political Science graduate and an aspiring writer from the American University in Cairo and currently works at the Egyptian NGO Misr ElKheir. You can follow her on Twitter.

Share

“He literally stalked me to my street”

By

I’d been at a friend’s house all night having a few drinks until the early hours of the morning. It got to 4 a.m. and it was light outside, so I thought I’d start walking home (30 minute walk overall) and it’d be pretty safe as I could see everything clearly around me. In hindsight, I shouldn’t have walked home alone, but I honestly thought I’d be okay because I usually am.

I get about 10 minutes into my walk home only to hear someone on a bicycle, and they start cycling past me only to then go onto the pavement and stop right in front of me. This alone terrified me. I then realise it’s a guy, and I instantly freeze.

He smiled at my reaction, then proceeded to ask me if I had a cigarette…so I lie and tell him I don’t smoke, hoping he’d go off. He didn’t. He edged towards the road and started cycling again. I was literally clutching my phone in my pocket so tight, ready to actually hit him a round the head if he came closer. He then slowed down and edged towards me on his bike again near the pavement, obvious to him that I was extremely uncomfortable.

He then said. “You’re very beautiful, aren’t you?” followed by a leer.

Bearing in mind I looked awful from a heavy night drinking, wearing leggings and a dress with a hoodie…so this just creeped me out even more. I just smiled and looked down. He then asked me where I’d been and why such a “beautiful girl” was walking in the early hours of the morning. I replied with “a friends house”, still looking at the floor. He then asked for my age, and I told him 18 to which he replied, “I’m 17″.

I looked up at him and he did not look 17. Early 20’s at the youngest. I was trying to get a good look at his face because I was at this point terrified for my safety. I was hoping by now he’d actually leave me alone, I was so scared. I was trying to be as normal as possible, I didn’t want to provoke him in anyway so I thought it’d be easier to answer his questions. He then said, “Do you have a boyfriend?”

I lied again and said yes, really hoping that he’d leave. He then said, “What a lucky man, you’re so beautiful.”

I just nodded and looked away, and he cycled off shouting, “Bye” in the process.

I could have literally had a panic attack on the spot. Bearing in mind I was alone, 20 minutes away from my house, there were lots of alleyways coming up where he could have easily been waiting down and I was drunk. Drunk and stumbling. I have generalized anxiety disorder so my reaction was a lot worse to that of a normal person, and I was really finding it hard to pull myself together.

I was walking home paranoid as anything, carefully crossing onto the “safe” side of the road every time an alleyway came up in case he was there. I was so sure he’d gone, I was looking behind me every few seconds. I then approached my road and literally sighed with relief, because I thought I was safe then. I was literally about 20 seconds away from my house, when I see a bike.

It was him. Cycling towards me. Down my road.

He smiled at me and said, “Long walk for a girl isn’t it?”

I just looked at him and sped up. I looked behind me and he was cycling off. Then I half ran home, fumbling for my keys and looking to see if he was behind me. No sign of him, so I open my door and shut it quickly but quietly behind me, hoping he wouldn’t see or hear what house I was going into.

Then everything sunk in and I had a panic attack, absolutely terrified. There is no way, absolutely NO way in hell that it was coincidence he was down my road. From where he saw me last, to my road was 20 minutes away. You have to go down multiple different streets to get there. He literally stalked me to my street.

It was the scariest thing that’s happened to me for a long time. I’m so terrified he saw what house I went into.

– Leah-Grace

Location: Clacton-On-Sea, Essex, England

Share your street harassment story for the blog.

Share