By Britnae Purdy, SSH Correspondent

I have a thing for coincidences. The very same day that I accepted this role as a correspondent for SSH, my local newspaper posted a Facebook status asking for commentary from women who have experienced street harassment in the Fredericksburg, VA, area, to be used for an upcoming story. I was excited – until I read the quickly-accumulating comments below the status. The most-repeated sentiment was, “Don’t we have more important things to worry about than catcalling?” closely followed by “Why can’t women stop being so uptight and just take it as a compliment?”

It upset me, especially because equal amounts of these comments were coming from women as from men. I admit to being an overly sensitive person at times, and these comments bothered me, to the point where I briefly considered re-thinking this whole feminist-writing thing and staying in bed all day instead –I was having a bad hair day already, after all (thank you, Virginia humidity). But I couldn’t help thinking it through a little.

Start. Don’t we have more important to things to worry about than cat-calling? Let’s see – violent crime, corrupt governance, prime time television…Yes, it would appear that we, the collective, faceless “we” that make up our sense of modern society, do indeed have bigger things to worry about.

But let me ask you this – do I have bigger things to worry about than my own personal safety and well-being? No. I do not. As an individual being, keeping myself safe is my own top priority, and that is what is threatened when I am yelled at, followed by, or touched by strangers in a public place.

Expand. As an active member of my community, I am similarly concerned with the safety and well-being of my friends, family members, coworkers, and the super-friendly Starbucks barista who made my much-needed latte this morning. And as a contributing (financially and otherwise) member of my community, I expect my safety, health, and concerns to be just as respected and adequately addressed of those of my non-harassed male counterparts.

As for “taking it as a compliment” and “not being so uptight?” If you, as a self-assured, intelligent, confident woman can take a whistle or sexually-explicit comment and use it as fuel to brighten your day, then all the more power to you. I cannot. There are times when a “compliment” is actually the indicator of more aggressive behavior to come, and I need to be scared in order to stay safe – if I act a little too “uptight” about a whistle, it is because I am remembering that time I was followed home at night.

Regardless of threat level, a lewd, unwelcome comment is indicative of a patriarchal society that grants men verbal, visual, and physical access to my body with or without my consent. I fear that saying anything you want about a woman’s body with no consequences is only a few steps away from feeling like you can do whatever you want with a woman’s body. A society that does not equally value the safety of its women cannot be trusted to ensure the safety of any of its members that are not white, privileged, heterosexual males. Cue violent crime. Cue corruption and lack of morals. Cue media that perpetuates the image of women as weak, sexualized commodities meant for consumption.

Conclusion. We don’t have bigger problems because the mentality behind street harassment provides the basis for most of society’s “bigger” problems. I cannot just take it as a compliment because that would mean accepting a second-class version of myself, and even on the worst of bad hair days, that is not something I can bring myself to do.

Britnae is a graduate student at George Mason University, in Virginia, where she is pursuing a Master of Arts in Global Affairs with a specialization in Security and Conflict Studies. She also writes for First Peoples Worldwide and you can read more of her writing on their blog and follow her on Twitter.

By Natasha Vianna, Jan. – June 2013 SSH Blog Correspondents

For a chunk of my adolescence, I genuinely believed that sexual and street harassment were the ultimate forms of flattery. If a guy was willing to whistle, call out nicknames, or harass me, then hey… that must mean I am attractive. And heck, for most of my life, I was told to always appreciate a compliment; so I did.

At the time, part of me enjoyed the harassment because it meant I was sexy or pretty to someone else. In high school, there was an overwhelming pressure to look good, dress well, and “bring all the boys to my yard.”  There was jealousy, bitterness, lust, innocence, naivety, and tons of harassment. In fact, by the time I finished my freshmen year of high school, I already believed that if I wasn’t getting attention in the hallways of my school, I was boring and unattractive and needed to do something about it.

The guys in my school were so easily predictable. I knew that if I wore tighter pants or a shorter skirt, I may get a compliment here and there or a stare from the hot football player from across the room. It all seemed like a fun game and I liked having that type of power.

It wasn’t until the harassment quickly shifted from “Hey, you look cute in that shirt” to “You have a fat ass” to “Hey, come and suck my dick bitch,” that I realized I wasn’t enjoying this game anymore. The harassment began to escalate, quickly, and I began to hate walking through the hallways of my high school.

The hot football player would approach me regularly now to see if I wanted to have sex with him. And just like that, he would ask. I’d uncomfortably say no, but it didn’t matter anymore. “So why have you been eyef***ing me from across the room in that short skirt?”

Instead of standing up and shouting, “Because I can wear whatever the f***I want and stare at whomever the f*** I want without wanting to ever f***.” like I would today, I adopted this false belief that what I wear, how I behave, and what I say ultimately determines the treatment I deserve from men. And for years, I worshipped this idealogy.

School became uncomfortable but there was nothing I felt I could do about it anymore. Sexual harassment is rarely addressed in schools the right way. Instead of telling boys to keep their hands to themselves and respect women, girls were told to wear longer skirts and looser clothing. We were blamed when we were mistreated. We were asking for it or just begging for attention.

Here’s an example: My teacher once sent me to the office because my middrift was slightly showing and it was a distraction to the boys in the class. Pissed, I pulled my shirt down and walked down the hallway to meet with the principal. Standing uncomfortably in front of the male principal, who was now looking up and down at me, told to put on a sweater from my locker. For the rest of the day, I covered my 15 year old body in school so the boys could focus on their schoolwork.

When I graduated high school and walked away from those horrible hallways, it didn’t end. The voices of, “Hey baby” and echoes of whistling followed me down many streets… literally. But based on what I endured and learned in high school, I believed this was just normal treatment and how women were supposed to be treated. I trekked on and just tolerated the street harassment never once thinking I was a victim but believing that this is how I would eventually meet my husband.

Thanks to friends and social networking, I was able to talk about (and blog) about my experiences to people who could really help me understand the complexities of harassment. It was an eye-opening, and sometimes painful, experience but one that has changed my life for the better.

Natasha Vianna, a fearless activist and young feminist, is a freelance writer and blogger based out of Boston, MA. Follow her on twitter!