Rocío Andrés, Spain, SSH Blog Correspondent

Every time I have to write about a male harasser, a stalker, a molester, I would like to see just a neat crystal point to make it easier. Often, black over white – cross over tick, no over yes. But, instead, I see moiré.

I would like to be firm and forceful. And sure. I would like to be not contaminated by the whys. I strictly repeat “unjustifiable, inexcusable”, as if the human being couldn’t allow himself to spare any empathy for the violence and its acts, as if the violence were not human. However, after the impromptu furiosity and fuss, there is sadness and powerlessness and I, deep in me, see a sack of pretexts that a harasser might find to legimitate his actions, the long ache. Pretexts that, as in many other cases, turn into motives, like when you are in the middle of a sky dark black and, after a while, your blind eyes start to see tenuous lights.

Trying to be in another´s mind is often hardly difficult, but the work is far more complicated when we talk about being in a man´s who inferiorises your economic, social or living status because you are a woman, subordinates your rights to his self-interested understanding of your rights, doesn´t respect your body and your person, violentizes your mind, insults your human dignity, humiliates or mocks at your corporal strength, looks at you in the eyes and doesn’t see a woman, but a bitch or doesn’t find a connection in the fact that “excuse me, you and me – naked-, have arrived here at the same time”.

1) “What does your cunt like?”, a man in his sixties, maybe seventies, asked me recently just at the moment I took my seat during a flight from Spain to Scotland (obviously, no matter the age to be offensive, and however it provides with information to show the variety of harassers around the world). As I don´t like to turn everything into a drama, I threw to his nose a ball of paper that I always keep in my pocket just in case, which, somehow due to Murphy´s law, ended up landing back on my hair (how to predict a rubbery nose!) and so, I went straight to Facebook, where I updated my status as “critical”.

Minutes before, in the queue to enter the plain, another man at the same age, while his (I believe) wife was naively entertained reading a magazine, had obscenely been sticking his tongue out at me, as if he were eating an ice-cream of air.

2) “Hundreds of rapists and sex offenders are roaming the streets of Cairo, according to a leading human rights claims. The shocking International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH) report found that 250 reported cases of sexual assault and rape took place against female protestors during political demonstrations. None of the cases were ever prosecuted sparking fears than hundreds of sexual predators are still roaming Egyptian streets.” According to www.scoopempire.com, Egyptian street children is one of the most vulnerable groups exposed to sexual violence. “A study conducted by Lipincott Williams & Wilkins Inc. rounded up 857 homeless children in Cairo and found that 93% were sexually assaulted or raped (mostly by police officers and other homeless children) – 50% of whom were females”. In order to reduce the chances of being harassed or assaulted, girls stop showering or cover their bodies to hide their gender. http://scoopempire.com/violence-street-children-egypt/#.U1uYfxarPIf

3) “Dear Harvard: I am writing to let you know I give up. My assailant will remain unpunished, and life on this campus will continue its course as if nothing had happened. Today, Harvard, I am writing to let you know that you have won”. This was the beginning of an anonymous open letter sent to Harvard Crimson by a woman who had been sexually assaulted by “a friend.”

After all this, point at which the amount of violence traumatises the mind and your mouth becomes mute of adjectives, how can I possibly understand harassers? or, how can I possibly want to understand them? (Not to mention today, laws, measures or tools to eradicate these crimes).

Well, presuming that I am a common-sense person, I do. Here there are a few reasons why I think women should try to understand a harasser (not the same as to agree on the violence):

1. because they are human beings. And that includes dads, granpas, brothers, cousins, uncles, boyfriends, neighbours, sons…
2. because they have ability of thinking, which technically works in the same way as mine – not inferior, not superior-, and that raises hope for Indentification-Acceptation-Remorse-Change?
3. I know a respectable amount of men who look for women´s equality (if you are one, click here https://stopstreetharassment.org/resources/male-allies/). Thus, equal gender is possible.
4. Just by being acknowledged of the causes, I can help to solve them.
5. I really yearn for our rights to be given and respected by men. And, whether I want it or not, that involves my effort in understanding harassers.
6. We are partly responsible for education and the culture we live in. It is worthwhile to watch these videos of boys and girls giving their reasons why they think harassment happens in Egypt.

Of course, there is a huge exercise in wanting to understand a harasser, especially when you get used to suffering from harassment in the first place or even if you just read the deplorable news on the papers. On many occassions, I have to stop my readings, not before saying Objection! in order to calm down and start again.

Harassers, however, aren’t normally the focus of the news or academic studies, where, contrarily, the informative weight mostly falls on the woman´s presence, sensationalizing and highlighting her victim status and where, consequently, the harasser´s figure is pushed into the background, almost forgotten, deleted, or just presented as if it were lack of social or human roots.

Indeed, harasser´s representation is mainly characterised by de-humanization – the monster´s myth-, and depicted by the litres of blood shed – gory, pure predators (see the article I mentioned before referring to harassers/rapists as sexual predators). I wish it were that plain, so then we could just limit ourselves to call them animals and we  didn´t need to ask: what are we doing wrong?. But, as far as I know, being a man and lacking humanity (understood as part of the human race and not positive human attributes) cannot be separated. And here it is where I consider the bulk, the impact rests, in our acceptation of them as people, as men.

Once this is assumed, the writings of violent/harassing behaviours can go deep and spread, prioritising the social, economic and political components in which the harasser cohabitates over the innate ones, prioritising the man over the monster and understanding that behind such behaviours, it resides a greed of power, traditions, miseducation, a macho parade – in fact, all plastic, a fake.

Rocío Andrés holds a Bachelor´s degree in Audiovisual Communication, History of Art (both Universidad Complutense de Madrid, Spain) and a Master´s in Education (Universidad Rey Juan Carlos, Spain, 2010). She has six years experience as a TV and advertising producer.

By Pallavi Kamat, Mumbai, India, SSH Correspondent

While people talk about and highlight street harassment, primarily amongst women, does anybody wonder about the reasons it happens?

One of the main reasons, according to me, is that women are considered the weaker sex. Men feel that they need to control women in order to show that they are powerful. And one of the ways they can do this is by harassing innocent and gullible women who are simply walking down the street. In fact, experts believe that warped social beliefs and psychological problems are responsible for men indulging in such harassment.

Unfortunately, instead of helping stop it, society tends to worsen the situation. When a woman is harassed, society tells her that she must definitely be at fault. Maybe she was wearing the wrong clothes or had stepped out at a wrong time. Or maybe she had ventured into an area where she should not have. This only encourages the men further.

In cities like Mumbai, it is often alleged (and rightly so) that the police do not take the street harassment complaints of women seriously enough to file an FIR. And passers-by try not to interfere fearing they will get unnecessarily caught in the legal rigmarole. In fact, in October-2011, two youngsters were stabbed to death for trying to stop some goons from harassing their girlfriends.

So, what can be done about this? Nothing? Are women destined to face street harassment and continue pretending as if nothing happened? Sadly, such questions lead to more questions. But, I am an eternal optimist. According to me, women need to come out and speak more against such instances. These need to be highlighted and not shoved under the carpet. Perpetrators of such acts should be named and shamed by citizens groups. This is the thinking behind the ‘Chappal Maarungi’ campaign [literally meaning to hit with a sandal/shoe].

Some experts are also seeking a change in the way cities are modelled in their bid to fight street harassment. Changes such as bright lights and wider pavements are some of the suggestions being considered in Mumbai.

Such solutions need to come from within local people and societies – an external person/organisation cannot provide better answers. Also, buy-in for such solutions needs to be obtained; one needs to emphasize that it is not a woman’s personal problem when she is harassed on the street but a social problem – one that needs to be taken seriously and dealt with like any other crime.

Pallavi is a qualified Chartered Accountant and a Commerce Graduate from the University of Mumbai, India, with around 12 years of experience working in the corporate sector. Follow her on Twitter, @pallavisms.

Kriti Khatri, Nepal, SSH Blog Correspondent

Some people who participate in disrespectful behaviors towards women in public spaces also commit severe crimes like rape, attempted rape and sexual violence.  How a person develops physiological enhancement to commit sexually oriented crime can be answered based on his moral boosting from past behaviors towards women. What he learns from his upbringing and from the society where women are objectified for their dressing, body images and social presence influence him to develop his way of understanding woman’s role as a person. Once a guy can pester a woman in public and no one takes any action to stop it, he may get encouraged to develop his culprit activities into more severe crimes.

Globally we have seen various forms of sexual violence against woman. We try enforcing hard legislation against the perpetrators  to ensure justice to survivors of sexual violence. However in the long run, what we need to consider is that if a person is discouraged from his harassing behavior in the first place, many violence incidents against women can be prevented. Anyone involving in activities like eve teasing, whistling etc, if discouraged to do so, he might not excel his activities. The growing environment and person’s upbringing has to do a lot to determine his social attitude. One who has seen women disrespected and treated as object will develop similar attitude towards the female gender. If a person is encouraged to respect women through social behaviors, then it will set moral code for every social component to treat women with respect and equality.

Today’s harasser might not turn to be a rapist always, but there is a chance. Our society have never taken street harassment as a serious crime. Even more, street harassment is not even listed as one  among the various “forms” of violence against women.

The impact of street harassment might be considered nominal in comparison to brutal rape and other physical violence; however, harassing activities impart long term consequences to women.  Moreover, street harassment activities are a big question mark to gender equality. How can it be a gender friendly society where women get easily victimized by any one in the street? She is abused verbally, physically and sexually as if she is an object. In such social trend, can true respect be ever experienced by women? Again, while we are trying to end violence cases against women in global scenario, can we avoid street harassment considering it as a common social pattern?

What I believe is that, without taking significant step with participatory social input to abolish harassing street behaviors towards women, respectful presence of women will never be possible in our society. A woman should be respected both inside and outside her house to ensure a gender friendly environment. True equality only comes when woman are treated with equal respect which is only possible when we ensure an environment of social justice.

Holding the same message, Atitwa foundation organized a wall painting themed on the slogan “Today’s Harasser, Tomorrow’s Rapist” in cooperation with National Alliance of Women Human Rights Defenders (NAWHRD) and 35 other NGOs working on gender issues. The program was organized as part of National Anti Rape campaign on the precious occasion of women’s day at March 8^th.The aim of the program was to raise awareness about how street harassment can be preliminary steps to all kinds of sexual violence against woman that occurs in public places.

With successful completion of the program, the campaign against street harassment has got more attention and support from the people. Such awareness campaigns is bound to make positive impact on our society which will help abolish street harassment.

Kriti Khatri is student of MSc chemistry. She is engaged in different social organization in Nepal and currently she is working on anti-street harassment issues with the Astitwa Foundation. Find more of her writing on her blog.