January 2021 | Stop Street Harassment

Dear Friends,

Happy New Year! We hope you are all staying safe and healthy and thriving as best you can at this challenging time.

Our partner Safecity/Red Dot Foundation is helping us keep International Anti-Street Harassment Week going this April, and we are grateful for their support and leadership this year. Groups like Catcalls of NYC, Hollaback! and L’Oreal Paris are also playing a big contributing role.

So, we invite you to join us in speaking out against street harassment during our 11th year of action, April 11-17, 2021.

Safely Take Action

We imagine much of the world will still be practicing social distancing and even quarantining in April, and so we encourage you to engage in online action (and use the hashtag #StopStreetHarassment) or, if it’s safe to do so, take small offline actions, like go with a friend or two to chalk on sidewalks or post flyers in your community.

Here are two other examples of how to be involved, and we’ll share more in the coming weeks:

1. Online Training

L’Oréal Paris has partnered with the expert NGO Hollaback! to launch STAND UP AGAINST STREET HARASSMENT: a training program to help people safely intervene if they witness or experience street harassment. As part of the International Anti-Street Harassment Week, help combat street harassment by taking the training program on standup-international.com, and then, share the word about the training in April.

2. COVID-19 Stories

We know that street harassment continues to be an issue, but it’s a problem that is getting a lot of attention right now. You could collect and share online COVID-19-related stories from your community to document the problem and raise awareness that it’s still a serious issue that many people are facing.

Share Your Ideas & Plans

If you have ideas already, you can let us know what you’ll do by filling out this form, and you can let us know if you’d like to be listed on the website as a participating co-sponsor, stopstreetharassment@gmail.com.

Thank you! -Holly

Dear SSH Community,

I am so grateful to everyone who stayed with us during this difficult year of 2020 when so much of our lives changed and when many of us had to prioritize our families/caretaking (me included…even now I can’t write this whole post without being interrupted).

Stop Street Harassment is still here you though, and we will continue to advocate for safe public spaces in 2021!! One big event will be our 11th annual International Anti-Street Harassment Week, in collaboration with Safecity, held virtually from 11 to 17 April. Save the date!

And in the U.S., we have this good news, a women’s history museum was approved and street harassment is a topic they’d consider.

And in the planning process, the key will be an “expansive view” of women’s history, Gross said, including women of different abilities, trans and queer communities, and the experiences of women from all walks of life: “women who were performers, women who were writers, women who were seamstresses, women who were farmers, women who were domestics,” she explained. “I want it all.”
Such an expansive view could also extend to more experiential ways of teaching history, Gross said, including the history of street harassment in the US. “From the first women starting to work and having to navigate public streets, there were all kinds of perils,” she explained, especially for Black women. “They carried hatpins; they learned how to use their purses and bags defensively to protect themselves.”
It will be interesting to see if the museum could find a way to recreate or use “that embodied experience” to teach about the misogyny that has been a major part of American history, Gross said.”

It’s hard for me to imagine that our country now takes this issue so seriously it’d be part of our national museum, but street harassment is a huge issue in women’s lives, dictating many aspects of our life, so it should be! I can’t wait to see what happens.

Happy New Year to you and your loved ones. May 2021 be a year of peace, productivity and joy.

Join our 11th Annual Anti-Street Harassment Week

Happy New Year 2021!

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