Activist Interviews Archives | Page 24 of 26

Snapshot of street harassment stories, news and tweets: October 2, 2011

October 2, 2011 By HKearl

Read stories, news articles, blog posts, and tweets about street harassment from the past week and find relevant announcements and upcoming street harassment events.

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Street Harassment Stories:

Share your story! You can read new street harassment stories on the Web from the past week at:

Stop Street Harassment Blog

HarassMap in Egypt

Resist Harassment Lebanon Blog

Hollaback West Yorkshire

Activism Shoutouts:

* Freeze the Tease campaign organizers in Mumbai, India

* Gawaahi in Pakistan

* Male allies Sean, Tim, and Jesse in USA

* “Adventures of Salwa” in Beirut, Lebanon

* Safe Slope in Brooklyn, New York, USA

In the News, on the Blogs:

* The 42, “Men of DC: Stop Harassing Women“

* Rookie, “First Encounters With the Male Gaze“

* The Riot, “TW: Street harassment“

* NOW Lebanon, “Why don’t women fight back?“

* Get Off My Soapbox, “My Street Harassment Journal“

* Radio Netherlands Worldwide, “Mumbai students hit back at eve-teasers“

* Yentha, “Essential Alternative: Rebel with a Cause“

* Baltimore City Paper, “The Best…and the Worst“

* There is No Fear in Love, “Coercion for a Good Cause? Consent in Everyday Life, Canvassing“

* The Times of India, “Flash mob tease for Bangalore“

* Girls who eat their feelings, “One Stone“

* The Times of India, “Cell to curb eve-teasing“

* Broad Recognition, “Street Walking: Sexual Harassment in Jaipur, India“

* Youth Activ8, “Steps to curb eve teasing“

* The Gossip blog, “Anti-Street Harassment Activism starts TOMORROW!!“

* Decording Dress, “Street Harassment (?) and Me || Why I Wore It“

* MSNBC, “NYPD’s warning about skirts irks Brooklyn women“

Announcements:

New:

* Congratulations to HarassMap in Egypt for winning the World Summit Youth Award from the United Nations for their anti-street harassment work!

* Last Monday, Stop Street Harassment launched a new weekly “Street Respect” series highlighting the type of stories we want to see instead of street harassment stories!

Reminders:

* Call for men to share views/stories about street harassment

* Sign Mend the Gap’s petition to address subway harassment in Delhi, India

* Are you in Egypt? Use HarassMap to report your street harassers

* Have an iPhone? Download the Hollaback iPhone app that lets you report street harassers

15 Tweets from the Week:

1. KimFoxWOSU Today was a milestone: walked through the Khan el Khalili by myself and didn’t get sexually harassed! A-maze-ing! #Cairo #Egypt #EndSH #wwpw

2. WomSocBangor wolf whistled, fat or slut shamed, told to “give us a smile, love”, “get your tits out” or “show us your legs” it’s still #streetharassment!

3. HollaBackBmore Had a good meeting with the mgmt of Canton Safeway – they are not ok with #streetharassment in their store! Don’t leer at their customers!

4. hollabackWY Driving in hot weather, saw many topless males. Didn’t feel urge to shout sexualised/derogatory comment once. Funny that #streetharassment

5. SPARKsummit 22 percent of girls have experienced street harassment by age 12, and 87 percent by age 19. What can we do to end this? bit.ly/mWw06L

6. BookElfLeeds I shitting HATE #streetharassment. I hardly get it but that’s not the point. If one of us is harassed we are ALL harassed. #solidarity innit

7. SpookSquad Try had his whole family with him. RT @hkearl RT @EngyG: A man can harass you, even if his 5 yrs old daughter is with him! #endSH #Egypt

8. thewholeplate catcall of the day: “i love you, jewish girl!” i am sick and trying to buy kombucha. go away.

9. RenPassion #LawsMenShouldFollow Not all women are going to want your attention. No, it’s not a compliment when you catcall us.

10. emilyhughes Guy passes me on the sidewalk, leans in close, whispers, “Nice walk.” Officially the creepiest catcall I’ve gotten in 6 years here. #ew

11. lillyheart It is 645 in the morning! I am buying breakfast! Can the #streetharassment at least wait until the sun is up?!? I’m mean without coffee!

12. MohammedY Fellow Egyptian men, as you walk through the streets, spare a thought for your fellow women who often can’t do that due to harassers #EndSH

13. thetrudz #somewhereInTheHood there’s a woman enduring street harassment while men pretend it’s acceptable & women tell her be glad for “attention.”

14. ElizabethOwens Langelan, Kearl say activism on #streetharassment can be a portal for other feminist activism & social change, here and abroad. #AAUW

15. gwssprof Have more to say about the #femd2011 issue of street harassment/Slutwalk? Post a comment on my open thread! rm34.us/719

Freeze the Tease!

October 1, 2011 By HKearl

India is a-buzz with anti-eve teasing (street harassment) activities, especially on college campuses. One of the most recent initiatives is called “Freeze the Tease.”

Six students at St. Andrews College in Mumbai, India, run the campaign—Perma Dsouza, Andrea Fernades, Digi George, Anishka Alvares, Rochelle Barrie and Valeska Reveredo—and they kindly agreed to talk about their work through an e-mail interview.

1. Stop Street Harassment (SSH): What is Freeze the Tease?

Freeze the Tease (FTT): It’s an anti-eve teasing initiative. The term “eve-teasing” sounds playful, but it is not teasing it’s harassment and today it has become a daily torment for most of the women. Our campaign asks, “Why be harassed by these lechers .. its time to react and FREEZE THE TEASE!”

2. SSH: What inspired the creation of Freeze the Tease?

FTT: It all started merely as an assignment as part of our curriculum as we are students of mass media, but as time passed we realised that this is a very prevalent problem girls have to undergo in their day- to-day life and a small effort by us can help create awareness.

3. SSH: What kind of activities and work does the project involve? Can you describe the “signature campaign”?

FTT: We started by creating a Facebook page as it was the best medium to create awareness amongst the masses. Also we started sending SMS texts of tips on how to tackle eve-teasing with a mere subscription fee of RS.3. In order to build awareness within our campus itself we began with a signature campaign where we motivated and encouraged girls to fight back for their rights through which students would come and sign on the scroll as a pledge to freeze the tease and not stay silent anymore. They were also given bands with the slogan, “I PLEDGE TO FREEZE THE TEASE” to wear as an indication of their support towards the social cause.

4. SSH: What is the goal of Freeze the Tease? Where do you hope to see Freeze the Tease in a year?

FTT: Our ultimate goal is to put a stop to eve-teasing however, it not as easy as it sounds therefore we hope that with this campaign we can create maximum awareness so that people fight back against this evil in our society. Our aim is also to encourage girls not to be silent and instead freeze the eve-teaser rather than get frozen during such situations. We hope that Freeze the Tease initiative can fulfill these goals. Presently being only in Mumbai, India, we’ d also like if the campaign is started in other parts of the country and around the world.

5. SSH: What has been the reception of the project at St. Andrew’s College and in the community around the college?

FTT: Our college has been supporting us from the very start. Also the community willingly accepts our campaign and shows immense support.

6. SSH: What advice would you give to a different college who may want to do a project around eve teasing issues?

FTT: Encourage and engage as many girls as possible to protect themselves and take a initiative against eve-teasing.

7. SSH: Anything else you’d like to say?

FTT: We are presently organizing some outdoor activities and events to engage women and encourage them to freeze the tease.

Since conducting the interview, Freeze the Tease undertook one of their planned outdoor activities.

Via CoolAge:

“On September 22, 2011 they distributed “Freeze the Tease” bands across the prominent hotspots in Bandra to spread the word among the general public about this social cause and to make girls aware that being a silent victim to such atrocious behavior is not a solution. This outdoor activity proved to be successful as people showed interest in attaining more information about the campaign and their online activity. They went to other public places too as an attempt to bring about widespread recognition and change the mindset of the entire society.”

Great work! You can view photos of their awareness and pledge campaigns on the Facebook page and contact them (FreezetheTease AT Gmail DOT com) if you’re interested in bringing Freeze the Tease to your campus or community!

The Advenures of Salwa (I need a red purse!)

September 23, 2011 By HKearl

Feminists from the collective Nasawiya in Beirut, Lebanon, are tackling sexual harassment—including street harassment—with a large dose of creativity in their empowering campaign “The Adventures of Salwa.”

Who is Salwa?

Cartoon character Salwa, the organizers say, is “an ordinary Lebanese girl that has been selected to be the spokeswoman for the campaign,” and through Salwa, they aim “to say to women who have been subjected to harassment, that the first step to combat it, is to break the taboo and start talking about it.”

The campaign is also meant to challenge the reasons behind the harassment. On the Salwa site, Farah Kobaissy, the coordinator of the campaign says that in Lebanon, “Harassment is used in order to remind women that …Hay! You are violating the barriers set by the patriarchal system by entering spaces that are considered ‘male space’ such as work, street, education, public spaces.”

Salwa challenges such notions and a red purse she always carries represents her empowerment and the empowerment of all women.

What does the campaign entail?

There are many components of the campaign, from PSAs and blogging to workshops and handbooks. You can learn about it all on their website.

My favorite part of the campaign revolves around Salwa herself. There are several short PSAs and companion comic strips in which Salwa stops sexual harassers by whacking them with her purse. (Yes, I know, the ideal is to stop harassers in a non-violent fashion, but I’m okay seeing a cartoon act out the emotion that I’m sure many of us feel upon occasion when dealing with harassers.) In this PSA, Salwa stops a taxi driver!

Throughout September and the first week of October, Cinema City, a well known cinema in Beirut, is airing one of the Salwa PSA before films! How amazing is that?

On September 30, the campaign organizers will launch a booklet called, “Salwa’s Guide to Fighting Sexual Harassment.” Salwa will be at the launch event to sign copies! Everyone who attends—and then people who attend later events—will receive a red purse like Salwa’s and the purse will contain the booklet, a whistle, a DVD of Salwa episodes, a brochure, and a poster and stickers. Fun!

There is a companion blog called “Qaweme Harassment” (“Resist Harassment”) that allows people to share their stories and strategies for fighting harassers. A map shows where all of the stories come from.

Last, the campaign organizers hold discussions and workshops in the community and in October they will start giving lectures at universities across Lebanon.

I know this topic is pretty heavy and can get depressing in a hurry, so I really appreciate that the campaign is able to tackle the issue in an empowering and humorous way while not downplaying the seriousness of it. Congratulations to them on such an engaging campaign, and one that offers people so many ways to be involved!

Interview: Flier Project

August 24, 2011 By HKearl

Autumn, a fourteen-year old trans woman and feminist who lives in New Jersey is working on an anti-street harassment flier project and she agreed to answer a few questions about it.

Stop Street Harassment: What inspired you to create and post fliers about street harassment?

Autumn: While I was in New York, I saw a very impromptu flier rebuking street harassers and misogynists in general. I thought this was a very clever idea, and a very easy way to start voicing my opinion in an open forum. So, I took a few nights of making very minimalistic, blunt posters on a number of issues that feminism focuses on.

Stop Street Harassment: What messaging is on the fliers?

Autumn: I made multiple fliers, actually. In my first, I tried to give the reader a general summary of feminism, dispelling stereotypes of feminists and trying to assert what actual feminism means. The second one was exclusively against street-harassment, and the third is against slut-shaming. I purposefully tried to make them very minimalistic and bare, with only text and such, as I felt if I put too much graphic decoration in them, it would take away from the message.

Stop Street Harassment: Where are you posting them and what do you hope the outcome will be?

Autumn: Luckily I live adjacent to Manhattan, so one of these days I am going to print and copy about one hundred and spend a day posting them in the subway, bus terminals, traffic light poles, really anywhere they will be seen. I also plan on taking them to Slut-Walk. I have them in PDF format, and I invite anyone who wants to download and post them in their respective city as well – it can’t hurt! I’m not really trying to get people to become radical feminists, but rather I just want people to realize that street harassment and slut shaming are not acceptable things.

Stop Street Harassment: Anything else you want to add?

Autumn: I’ll be attending the Slut-Walk in New York in October, and if anyone has a Tumblr, mine is autumn-and-gomorrah.tumblr.com. Though it’s not exclusively a feminist-dedicated blog, probably ninety percent of my posts are about feminist topics or anarcha-feminism.

Check back for a follow-post with an update on her project.

Art project: Give street harassers your best Medusa Gaze

July 12, 2011 By HKearl

Are you tired of street harassment and do you have access to a video-recording device or a camera? Then how about participating in the Medusa Gaze Project?

How to participate:

“Send us your 15 to 20 seconds video file or jpg of your gaze, no text, no name, no photo manipulation, just your icy stare. For uniformity, standing like I am, cropped like in our tumblr pic. We will add the text ‘I will not be intimidated’ to it and add it to the projection loop. We will accept images & videos throughout the Summer 2011. We plan projections beginning this Fall (US and Europe) and will document them online. Also called for are your harassment stories, in writing or an audio clip.

Send images, audio, written texts and video files to: seekingkali(at)yahoo(dot)com“

What is the project?

“The Medusa Gaze Project is an art project conceived by Artist Collective Seeking Kali (William Evertson, Susan Shulman, Ria Vanden Eynde), to rage against public sexual harassment of women. Whether it be catcalling, obscene gestures, sexually explicit comments, cornering, following women. We want to protest against this kind of bullying by men of women in the public space.

Literally and figuratively unseen by bystanders, this kind of threatening behavior leaves women feeling insecure to walk the streets. Society, men AND women often perceive it as normal, a small annoyance , as a way of complimenting the women or they hold the women responsible as a kind of victim blaming.

Seeking Kali wants to artistically speak out against sexual harassment and raise awareness that it IS a problem. We created this project as a way to empower women and confront society with its responsability. We aim to do this by sharing stories and showing images/video of women expressing their reproval and their determination not to be intimidated. We want to claim the right for women to walk freely and safely on our city streets.”

I made my own Medusa Gaze Project contribution. If only I COULD turn street harassers to stone with it! What does yours look like?

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