disabilities Archives | Stop Street Harassment

Our Latest Research is Out Now!

April 30, 2019 By HKearl

To close out Sexual Assault Awareness Month, on April 30, 2019, SSH, UCSD Center on Gender Equity and Health (GEH), RALIANCE, CALCASA and Promundo released a new joint national study.

NORC at the University of Chicago conducted the nationally representative survey of 1,182 women and 1,037 men across February – March 2019. They used the using the AmeriSpeak Panel. UCSD’s GEH did the data analysis.

READ: Full Report | Two-Page Executive Summary | Press Release | Survey Questions | Street Harassment Factsheet

Our findings include:

81% of women and 43% of men reported experiencing some form of sexual harassment and/or assault in their lifetime. This graph shows the breakdown of the main categories:

The most frequently was listed location for sexual harassment is a public space, while most sexual assault takes place in private homes or residences.
- 68% of women and 23% of men experienced sexual harassment at a public place like a street, store, park or restaurant. When you include mass transit and nightlife venues, that statistic rises to 71% women and 28% men. In other words, nearly all women who had experienced sexual harassment and/or assault had experienced it in public spaces (as well as perhaps other locations).
Sexual harassment and assault cause people, especially women, to feel anxiety or depression and prompt them to change their route or regular routine.
While experiences of sexual harassment and assault are highly prevalent, accusations of sexual harassment and assault are very rare.
Most people who said they committed sexual harassment also said they had experienced sexual harassment.

While we repeated a few questions from our 2018 survey, we chose to add new questions around false accusations this year in light of the Kavanaugh hearing and Betsy DeVos’s efforts to change Title IX guidelines.

We broke down differences by demographics and included the findings that were statistically significant. For instance:

35% of Black women had experienced sexual harassment in the previous six months.
35% of women with disabilities experienced sexual assault in their lifetime.
95% of lesbian/bisexual women experienced some form of sexual harassment in their lifetime.

Check out the full report!

Thank you to all of our donors who made this report possible!

Two Efforts to Document and Map Hateful Acts, Post-Election

November 18, 2016 By HKearl

Here is an update on places where you can report discriminatory harassment in the USA, since we know there has been an uptick since the Presidential election.

FIRST:

The Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) is collecting reports of hateful and harassing acts.

On November 18, they wrote:

“This is the second update from the Southern Poverty Law Center’s effort to collect reports of hateful incidents of harassment around the country. This report covers the full week (Wednesday Nov. 9 to Wednesday Nov. 16) since the presidential election.

The SPLC collected reports from news articles, social media, and direct submissions from the #ReportHate intake page. The SPLC made efforts to verify each report but many included in the count remain anecdotal.

While the total number of incidents has risen, the trend line points to a steady drop-off. Around 65 percent of the incidents collected occurred in the first three days following the election.

SECOND:

“In the wake of the 2016 US elections reports of harassment and hate crimes directed at minority groups of all kinds have been widespread. The purpose of this multi-team effort is to collect and map reports of harassment and hate crimes against [discriminated against] communities. We also seek to collect and map reports of [discriminated against] communities being helped.

Important: This is not an emergency response system. If you are the victim (or an eyewitness) of harassment/attacks, please call 911.

This project is a collaboration between CrisisMappers, Harvard University, MIT and UCLA.
Contact: contact@harassmap.us”

New Transit Ads in Boston Focus on Persons with Disabilities

November 4, 2016 By HKearl

Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority (MBTA) has launched a new wave of ads! 800 posters will be on public transit until February.

Via Boston Globe:

“The campaign is explicitly inclusive of people with disabilities, both as people who may experience sexual harassment and as people who can intervene to prevent sexual violence,” Yen-Ewert said. “National and state studies show that people with disabilities experience sexual violence at two times the rate compared to people without disabilities.”

Karen Schneiderman, the senior advocacy specialist at the Boston Center for Independent Living, said the campaign “raises awareness about the issue of sexual violence against people with disabilities and the importance of having services that are accessible to all. I also appreciate that this campaign highlights people with disabilities in the role of assisting others, not just as people who are victimized.”

Learn more at MBTA.com.

Way to go, Boston! I also appreciate how they say they can be people who intervene, as well people who experience sexual harassment, recognizing they can have agency and take action.

MBTA has a nearly nine year history of anti-harassment ads. The first wave of ads went up in 2008, the next in 2009 and then the next in 2013. I’m glad to see them continue tackling this issue. Kudos also goes to the Boston Area Rape Crisis Center for their partnership on the ads over the years.