Stop Street Harassment

Making Public Spaces Safe and Welcoming

Draft anti-sexual harassment law presented to Egyptian parliament

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For months I’ve read how Egyptian activists and lawmakers have been working on a new law against sexual harassment (including on the streets and other public places) and this week it was finally introduced.

“A draft of the law presented to the parliament’s legislative committee on Monday recommended that punishment should be at least one year in prison and or a fine of 1,000 Egyptian pounds (Dh666). The legislation is based on a 2008 study by the Egyptian Center for Women’s Rights (ECWR) that found 83 per cent of Egyptian women and 98 per cent of foreign women had been sexually harassed, usually on the street or on public transport. A large number of men – 62 per cent – even admitted to being or having been perpetrators of sexual harassment….

‘We need to redefine the meaning of sexual harassment, which is lacking in Egypt’s current criminal code, and include sexual harassment in the workplace – not only in public places – and transportation, and mobile and internet sexual harassment as well,’ said Mohammed Khalil Qoueita, the deputy of parliament’s foreign affairs committee, who is behind the new law.

There is no current law that mentions or defines sexual harassment, while a colonial-era law from 1937 speaks vaguely of violation of honour and morals.

‘One of the reasons sexual harassment is widespread is that there is no deterrent law against those who do it,’ Mr Qoueita said. ‘We need to create a culture of women having the courage to go to police when they are sexually harassed.’ In that way, women can regain respect and fight against a culture in which men look down on them.”

I hope it passes, though I wonder if the year in prison punishment is harsh enough that women will be too worried to report harassers? Thoughts? What would be a fair punishment?

I wonder what would happen in the US if there was a similar study to the one the ECWR’s conducted? Or even if each state conducted one? Studies about harassment on public transportation in Chicago and New York City have led to policy changes, so I think there’s a good chance that such studies could make a difference.

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Mapping Street Harassment

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I turned in my book on street harassment to my editor on Friday. Phewww! Now I have time to do blog and website maintenance I’ve neglected the last few months.

To start, today I updated my Street Harassment Map webpage with stories from the blog contributors who indicated their location. Check it out (and please have patience and refresh your browser if the red pushpins do not show up at first) and note how widespread this problem is. It’s not just something that happens in cities like New York City or Washington, DC (and even if it were, it would still be a horrible).

Want your story added to the map? You can anonymously submit it using an online form.

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Covered from head to toe, groping continues

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Women in Cairo. Image via the Boston Globe

I’m sick of hearing people blame women for street harassment by saying things like, “if only women covered up it wouldn’t happen.”

In many countries where women ARE completely covered, harassment occurs. 90 percent of women surveyed in 2009 in Yemen had been street harassed and most women wear a veil. Egyptian woman Hadeel al Shalchi wrote a great opinion piece for The National about the insane amount of street harassment in Egypt, and the following section discusses the issue of being covered and still being harassed:

“The onus in our society has largely lain on women to prevent sexual harassment. If a girl doesn’t cover her hair or wear very conservative clothing, then she’s obviously asking for it and wants the harassment, the prevailing attitude seemed to be.

As a result, more women began to cover up. The hijab and niqab became common in Egypt, not purely for religious reasons but also because women wanted to avoid the unpleasantness of being glared at by the opposite sex.

But when the harassment continued, Egyptian women knew there was something seriously wrong.

Covered from head to toe in black, they were still being groped, propositioned and annoyed. What more could they do? …

Three years ago, an amateur video of women in hijabs being attacked in downtown Cairo during a holiday event was made public. Shocked Egyptians were brought face to face with the ugly nature of harassment. Some mobile-phone images showed men tugging at young girls’ clothes. Others showed the girls being physically attacked.

This was real evidence of a very real problem. Those who had ignored what every woman knew could deny it no longer.

Women’s groups were emboldened to launch anti-harassment campaigns, teaching women that the problem was not their fault and encouraging them to persist in bringing complaints – even small ones – to the police. They were also urged to take self-defence classes and to use what they were taught on men who abused them in the street. …

In Egypt, sexual harassment will, most probably, continue to exist for a long time to come. Attitudes that allow such behaviour appear culturally ingrained. But increasingly women are waking up to this reality and beginning to reject it.

Women here are saying it loudly: enough to being groped on the subway, to being undressed with a look, to being followed to work. This must stop!“

Amen. Enough!! Street harassment MUST END and it will not end by requiring women to be completely hidden from view. Instead, men must stop harassing women and there must be cultural respect for women. What can you do? Here are a few ideas, feel free to share more in the comments.

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16 year-old attacked on subway, fights back

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Cyan Brown, via NY Daily News

One of the fans of Stop Street Harassment on Facebook brought the following horrific story to my attention, so I’m already breaking my holiday hiatus and quickly posting about it.

The NY Daily News is reporting that as many as eight men surrounded a 16-year old girl outside a restaurant in Queens and harassed her. They say there may have been “unwanted sexual advances” and the men continued them as she went into a subway station. She ran onto a subway car and the men followed her and dragged her off. During the struggle, she fatally stabbed one of the men, then ran back to the subway and got on. The men chased her but did not catch her. The stabbed man had a long list of convictions, including attempted murder, which makes the fact that they were trying to drag her off even scarier.

While the narrative of what happens makes it seem very clear that this was a hurrendous case of street harassment and she was defending herself to prevent who knows what else from happening (how would YOU respond if a group of 7-8 men tried to drag you away somewhere), but the article says a police officer only “suspects” she acted in self defense. So… is there more to the story or are they being overly cautious about naming what happened? Because this sounds exactly like self defense.

Unless they reveal a whole other situation they better not charge her with anything other than self defense. As the Facebook Fan who alerted me to this story said,

“I think it’s important that we contact the DA to ensure that charges are not brought against this woman. She was clearly a victim of street harassment. If she didn’t defend herself god knows what these thugs would have done to her.”

Read more at Holla Back NYC

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Thank you & holiday break

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I’m turning in my manuscript for my book on street harassment in one week and with the holidays, I figured it was a good time to take a week break from the blog. So, no posts for a week. I also want to give a few thank you shout outs.

Thank you everyone who has submitted their street harassment stories and commented on posts this past year.

Thank you to the hundreds of anonymous people who took my various informal, online surveys and to all the activists who have let me interview them about their work. Collectively, you’ve made this book possible.

I also want to thank my family, partner, and my friends who have provided feedback on the manuscript, especially those who have taken the time and energy to read the whole thing.

Happy Holidays everyone and I’ll be back in full force in Jan. 2010.

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