Stop Street Harassment

Making Public Spaces Safe and Welcoming

Meeting with WMATA to talk next steps in harassment campagin

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Today Zosia Sztykowski, Co-Executive Director of Collective Action for Safe Spaces and I met with the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority (WMATA) at their headquarters in Washington, D.C. to talk about sexual harassment on the system. For three years, we’ve been working with them to see the implementation of an online reporting options, collating of reports on verbal harassment incidents (instead of only forms of harassment that rise to the level of a crime), employee training, and a PSA campaign. We’ve collaborated on a number of outreach days, too.

This meeting was in part a celebration of the second wave of ads (see an example on the right) and an opportunity to plan our outreach efforts for International Anti-Street Harassment Week/Sexual Assault Awareness Month. We also discussed other ways the system could do more around this issue. Stay tuned.

WMATA has been responsive to our suggestions and ideas and we are proud to work with them. We hope many other transit systems follow suit!

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Sign Petition to TGI Friday’s!

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Last week, TGI Friday’s released an ad that trivializes street harassment. Collective Action for Safe Spaces and SSH teamed up with Care 2 to create a petition asking TGI Friday’s to pull it. Please sign!

The petition reads, in part:

“Many of us remember the viral video of a woman walking down the streets of NYC for 10 hours, only to be harassed over 100 times. This video quickly spread around the world, and led to discussions about how common and serious street harassment is and how much it limits women’s access to public spaces.

In TGI Friday’s latest ad, #AppCalling,the company used the same footage from the viral anti-street harassment video, but replaced the woman in the video with various appetizers, like a cheese stick. “Nobody likes a catcaller… But who can blame someone for #AppCalling,” the ad reads.

That’s right — TGI Friday’s is comparing the daily plight of women to to food, trivializing street harassment in the process. Even worse, the man who created the original anti-street harassment video says he sees nothing wrong with the ad, and allowed TGI Friday’s to use his footage.

Please sign the petition to tell TGI Friday’s — stop trivializing street harassment, and pull your ad!“

 

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Anti-Street Harassment Week is 4 Weeks Away!

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Over the past two weeks, a newly released study in Australia found that 87% of women have been street harassed, the Peruvian Congress passed a new law against street harassment, Chinese activists were detained for planning a protest about sexual harassment on their transit system (sign the petition!), and an Afghan woman held an 8 minute protest march in Kabul (and is now in hiding after facing death threats). Street harassment is a serious global issue.

From April 12 – 18, we are organizing the fifth annual International Anti-Street Harassment Week and already more than 110 groups in 30 countries have pledged to participate. The purpose of the week is to allow us to join together in solidarity and amplify each other’s voices and work so that the world listens.

Together we can let people affected by street harassment know it’s not their fault and they’re not alone. We can inform communities that this is a problem that we all need to care about and address. And we can demand changes. Thank you for being part of it.

IMPORTANT INFORMATION:

1. Tell Us What You’re Doing!
We want to know what you’re doing! Please either completethis form or e-mail Britnae with details, BPurdy@stopstreetharassment.org. This is important. It will help us direct individuals to the relevant event/s in their area. It will also help us gain more media attention for the week/issue overall if we can share specific interesting events that will be occurring. Thank you in advance for your help.

2. Ideas for Action
Do you still need ideas for what you can do? Here are several. We especially hope to see offline discussions involving diverse community members of all genders and backgrounds. It will take EVERYONE to truly create safer communities.But at minimum, any individual can participate through simple acts like telling their street harassment story, writing chalk messages, and sharing information online.

3. Tools
We have a large selection of shareable images and downloadable fliers on our website. Check them out and use them! They are available in a number of languages…but we’d love to have even more. Please email Britnae, BPurdy@stopstreetharassment.org if you are willing to translate a few sentences.

4. Write a Blog Post
If you’d like to write a blog post for Stop Street Harassment (or have an entry cross-posted from your blog) that would be great! It can be for the week itself, or you can advertise what you’ll be doing for the week and why (as Hollaback! Amsterdam just did). Just reach out to Britnae, BPurdy@stopstreetharassment.org with a short pitch about what the blog would cover and the preferred date or time range you’d like it published.

5. Tweet Chats
We are finalizing the daily tweet chats (info to come). If you are planning to host one but haven’t been in touch yet, please reach out so we can add it to the official list. And in general, please plan to use #EndSH for the chats as well as for any relevant street harassment tweets throughout the week.

6. Global Night of Action, April 17
As part of International Anti-Street Harassment Week, Stop Telling Women to Smile (STWTS) is organizing an international wheat pasting night on April 17th, 2015. Individuals and organizations around the world can download and print STWTS posters via stoptellingwomentosmile.com soon. The goal is that on April 18th, walls across the world will show the faces and words of women protesting street harassment.

Feel free to reach out anytime with questions, suggestions, or information!


Thank You,
Stop Street Harassment Board & Volunteers
Questions? Contact Holly: hkearl@stopstreetharassment.org

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Chinese protesters illegally detained

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Nine Chinese women who were planning a protest against sexual harassment on public transportation in Guangzhou for International Women’s Day have been illegally detained by police, four have been released but five are still there. Via the Guardian: “The remaining five reportedly planned to distribute stickers with slogans such as ‘Police: go arrest those who committed sexual harassment.'”

I know the Chinese government is horrible on human rights issues, but really? Simply planning to protest against street harassment can result in THEM getting arrested?

Via Reuters:

“No formal charges have been levied, but they were suspected of “picking quarrels and provoking trouble”, lawyers said, a charge authorities have used in the past to jail political dissidents. [IDnL3N0MG2B7]

The case has drawn criticism from international rights groups, the European Union and the United States

“We expect the Chinese authorities to release them without delay and to allow them immediate access to legal assistance and to their families,” a spokesman for EU Foreign Affairs and Security Policy said in a statement from Brussels.

The United States also called on China to release the five activists immediately.”

We join them in calling for their release. If you are outraged too, you can sign this letter. You can learn about the women being detained in this Feministing blog post and this Facebook page.

H/T @mcdersa

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TGI Fridays #AppCalling Ad Needs to GO!

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3/18/15 UPDATE: Please sign the petition! | I gave interviews about the ad for NY Daily News and HuffPost and board member Lindsey Middlecamp’s tweet about the ad was quoted in this TIME article.

In a move that shows extremely poor taste, TGI Fridays hired Rob Bliss, the creator of the two-minute viral video “10 Hours of Walking in New York City as a Woman” to make a parody commercial for them where food (appetizers) are street harassed.

A Mashable article says:

“Restaurant chain TGI Fridays hopes people get the joke…Fridays is trying to goof with the audience, aiming to lure in customers, especially millennials, with the all-digital campaign breaking Monday. The video, dubbed #AppCalling, isn’t meant to be taken seriously, as opposed to the original, which pointed up brutish and aggressive behavior that’s all too common in women’s lives.

‘We believe app-calling (not cat-calling) food is a funny premise,’ said Brian Gies, Friday’s chief marketing officer. ‘Please note that no apps were harmed as a result of this video!'”

I get the joke and I’m not laughing.

I find it disgusting and in poor taste that TGI Fridays would make light of this serious issue and use it as a gimmick to try to sell food. Even if they note on the video description that catcalling is offensive, that is not enough.

The concept and the video ignore the reality that street harassment is a widespread problem. It can be upsetting and scary and can limit people’s mobility. It can be threatening and indeed, the actress from the original film faced death threats for simply being in the film. And, what most people don’t realize, is it disproportionately happens to teenage girls. Is that really what we want to promote?

When companies like TGI Fridays (and Snickers, Fiat, Allstate, etc) make ads like this, it makes street harassment seem okay, funny, and normal. It shouldn’t be any of those things.

We urge TGI Fridays to discontinue this campaign immediately.

H/T Collective Action for Safe Spaces

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