When I was living in Cincinnati, OH, I frequently walked or biked everywhere. On several occasions I was harassed, hollored at, whistled at, and at times grabbed. On one particular occasion, a young man yelled at me as I was walking by. I ignored him. The he yelled, ” Damn baby- You thick. Mmm” I guess this was his eloquent way of expressing he was impressed by my curves. I turned, looked at him, shook my head with disgust, and started to walk away again. He followed me and continued his harassment. “Keep walking baby, I wana watch it bounce.” I was so embarrassed, and so angry that I told him, “If you ever speak to me like that again, I will BOUNCE YOU into that telephone pole!” His response, “Oh, baby, be cool, I just wana get to know you.” My response, ” Well, I don’t want to know you.” And I kept walking. As I walked away he yelled, “You’se just a dumb white ho, any damn way.” I felt so angry, and hurt. In hind sight, I probably shouldnt have threatened him, but I felt scared when he kept following me. I just felt dirty and violated.

-Angela

When I was living in Cincinnati, OH, I frequently walked or biked everywhere. On several occasions I was harassed, hollored at, whistled at, and at times grabbed. On one particular occasion, a young man yelled at me as I was walking by. I ignored him. The he yelled, ” Damn baby- You thick. Mmm” I guess this was his eloquent way of expressing he was impressed by my curves. I turned, looked at him, shook my head with disgust, and started to walk away again. He followed me and continued his harassment. “Keep walking baby, I wana watch it bounce.” I was so embarrassed, and so angry that I told him, “If you ever speak to me like that again, I will BOUNCE YOU into that telephone pole!” His response, “Oh, baby, be cool, I just wana get to know you.” My response, ” Well, I don’t want to know you.” And I kept walking. As I walked away he yelled, “You’se just a dumb white ho, any damn way.” I felt so angry, and hurt. In hind sight, I probably shouldnt have threatened him, but I felt scared when he kept following me. I just felt dirty and violated.

-Angela

My name is Shay and I live in southern Indiana. I have experienced street harassment since I was at least 12 years old. I’m 22 years old. I have many situations to share but I have one experience I found quite odd. While I was 8 months pregnant with my daughter I was shopping at the mall. My pregnancy was very obvious. My belly was huge, round, and I had my little pregnancy waddle. I had on a T-shirt and sweat pants. I guess the fact I was carrying a child inside of me didn’t bother this particular guy. While I was waiting for my boyfriend to come out of a store I noticed a guy looking me up and down from a distance and I didn’t pay any mind. I went over to a bench area to sit down for a while and this guy followed me over there. “Aye shawty cum hurreee….. cum on over here… aye, aye, AYE!.” I decided to walk over to another part of the mall to sit, but low and behold this guy followed me there too. I kept ignoring him. “Aye sexy lemme holla atcha” “You gotta man???” I really wanted to cuss him out, but I was so disgusted that I decided to just go into the store my boyfriend was at. We both came out looking to confront him, but the dude was no where to be found. I don’t know if this guy was trying to holla at me as a joke or not, but I felt pretty disturbed by the whole thing.

A few years ago I was riding my bike by a Wendy’s and a construction crew started “Oooo Baby”ing me. It was certainly not the first time I had been harassed, nor the most serious, but I was fed up. I turned my bike around and went back. I looked up at the men on the roof and said, “I would have more respect for you if you were ever alone when you catcalled, but no, you have to have six or seven buddies around to have the balls to open your mouth. It makes me sick!” As I was turning around I heard, “Sorry Ma’am.” and “We’re sorry.”

-ls