By Angela Della Porta, SSH Correspondent
When someone asks why I am involved in the fight to end street harassment, they often ask with some exasperation. It seems to many that street harassment – the entire spectrum from unwanted advances to following, stalking, masturbating in public – just isn’t as bad as the alternative: physical violence and sexual assault. Many chalk up harassment on the street to compliments or attention that the harassed person really wanted but just won’t admit.
As we continue to point to pop culture for a reflection of our culture’s values (who could have missed the debates about Robin Thicke’s summer jam/rape anthem?), we all can’t help but get the message that no matter what a woman is saying, she really does want men’s sexual advances. We can’t help but to internalize those messages to some degree.
In my personal experience, I have always said that harassment is not the victim’s fault – it’s the harasser. However, as many of us do, I find myself holding myself to different standards. I’ve often thought about what I’m wearing as not the cause of the harassment necessarily, but as a contributing factor. I knew that having dyed hair, wild outfits, large, printed glasses, and body piercings distinguished me from many other women. I still felt like I should dress in whatever way I chose, but I let harassers convince me that I was making the choice to be harassed by wearing a certain style.
As my college years came to a close, I took out the piercings. I was surprised when the level and frequency of being harassed on the street didn’t change at all. I thought, “Well, I do still have a unique presentation.” After I graduated, I began looking for jobs within education, and so all the tattoos were covered, and my off-the-wall style was reduced to khakis, blouses, and cardigans, my hair returned to a very natural brown. When the harassment didn’t stop, or even slow, I knew it couldn’t have been the clothes that garnered all the attention, and my hair wasn’t what was causing harassers to stop and comment. When I swapped out my pink and leopard frames for small, black ones, I was still harassed. In business casual, with no piercings, visible tattoos, colored hair, or glasses that stand out, I was forced to understand that harassers do the harassing, and nothing I wear or don’t wear could change that.
If I was no longer “asking for attention” with my appearance, then why was I still getting so much of it? Because as long as we all continue to treat harassment like a compliment and allow Robin Thicke to determine whether women “want it” or not, even the most enlightened, progressive minds will internalize the oppression that continues to guide their choices, even if they meant to subvert it all.
So what does that mean? We’re all doomed to patriarchy if we listen to the radio? No – but we do have to use our networks, friends, and web 2.0 to continue to change hearts and minds. We have to quiet every voice that says, “It’s not a big deal,” even if that voice is in your own head.
And if all that fails, just jam to The Law Review Girls’ Defined Lines parody.
Angela Della Porta is a recent graduate of Clark University in Worcester, MA. She will join with Teach for America in Detroit in the fall. Until then, she’s spending her time in rural Maine. Follow her on Twitter: @angelassoapbox
