Stop Street Harassment

Making Public Spaces Safe and Welcoming

16 Days – Day 7: A Job for a Woman

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Each day across the 16 Days of Activism Against Gender-Based Violence, we will highlight a 2018 activism effort undertaken to stop street harassment or a personal story about stopping harassers!

Day #7: A Job for a Woman

Image via BBC

In Belgium, sexism in public places is illegal under a law passed in 2014. This year, the first charge was made using the law. A female police officer questioned a man after he jaywalked, and he said in response to her, “Shut your mouth, I don’t talk to women, being a police officer is not a job for women.” Apparently it IS a job for women (more than 30 percent of Belgium’s 40,000 police officers are women), and she arrested him. He was fined 3,000 euros.

Sexism, according to the law, is defined as “every gesture or deed” that is “clearly meant to express contempt of a person based on sex,” or considers a person inferior based on sex, or reduces a person solely to a sexual dimension, and which “gravely affects the dignity of that person as a result.”

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16 Days – Day 6: Women Allies on a Bus

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Each day across the 16 Days of Activism Against Gender-Based Violence, we will highlight a 2018 activism effort undertaken to stop street harassment or a personal story about stopping harassers!

Day 6: Women Allies on a Bus

One day in California, a man followed a woman for blocks. She boarded a bus to try to get away from him, but he got on too and continued harassing her. Another woman passenger stood up and asked her, “Do you feel safe?”

The harassed woman was so upset she can’t speak, so the other passenger guided her away and said, “We can sit together.”

The harasser tried to follow them, but other women passengers then stood up to block him. Soon “there were six or seven women creating this barrier,” said one of the women who stood up. “That man looked at us, yelled one last shitty thing, and got off at the next stop. Because he realized there was no way he could win against all of us.”

This woman who stood up wrote, “After I got off the bus, I started crying. I was sad because we have to deal with situations like this ALL the time, but I was crying happy tears because, for once, I felt like I wasn’t alone, and I felt how powerful we are when we stand together.”

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16 Days – Day 5: Indian Motorcycle Police Unit

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Each day across the 16 Days of Activism Against Gender-Based Violence, we will highlight a 2018 activism effort undertaken to stop street harassment or a personal story about stopping harassers!

Day 5: Indian Motorcycle Police Unit

A 40-person, all-female motorcycle police unit in Delhi, India, has reduced the incidents of street harassment by 30 percent, according to the police in the city. The women have intervened in many street harassment cases during 24-hour patrols.

“We keep an eye on girls in distress. In several cases, members of the woman squad have nabbed stalkers. They rescue girls and also ensure they reach their destination safely,” said Vijayanta Arya, Deputy Commissioner of Police.

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16 Days – Day 4: A Dad Stops a Harasser

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Each day across the 16 Days of Activism Against Gender-Based Violence, we will highlight a 2018 activism effort undertaken to stop street harassment or a personal story about stopping harassers!

Day 4: A Dad Stops a Harasser

When a dad in California noticed a 29-year-old man start videotaping his 15-year-old daughter in a Target and crouch by another woman to take footage up her skirt, he kicked away the phone and then, when the man ran, tackled him in the parking lot. Then the dad called the police and got a photo of the man’s license plate number as he drove away. The man was later arrested for “invasion of privacy.”

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16 Days – Day 3: UK Government Inquiry

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Each day across the 16 Days of Activism Against Gender-Based Violence, we will highlight a 2018 activism effort undertaken to stop street harassment or a personal story about stopping harassers!

Day 3: UK Government Inquiry

A nine-month inquiry into street harassment led by the Women and Equalities Committee caused some MPs to call for the government to address street harassment.

Via BBC:

“Committee chairwoman Maria Miller said: ‘Women feel the onus is put on them to avoid ‘risky’ situations – all of this keeps women and girls unequal.’

The report concluded that social attitudes underpinned sexual harassment, and the normalisation of it contributed to a ‘wider negative cultural effect on society.’

And while the government has pledged to eliminate sexual harassment of women and girls by 2030, the committee said there was ‘no evidence of any programme to achieve this.’

The report outlined seven key recommendations to tackle street harassment:

1. Force train and bus operators to take tougher action against sexual harassment and block the viewing of pornography on public transport.

2. Ban all non-consensual sharing of intimate images

3. Publish a new “Violence Against Women and Girls” strategy

4. Create a public campaign to change attitudes

5. Take an evidence-based approach to addressing the harms of pornography, along the lines of road safety or anti-smoking campaigns

6. Tougher laws to ensure pub landlords take action on sexual harassment – and make local authorities consult women’s groups before licensing strip clubs

7. Make it a legal obligation for universities to have policies outlawing sexual harassment.”

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