Stop Street Harassment

Making Public Spaces Safe and Welcoming

“I got my eye on the Asian right there”

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I was waiting at the bus stop this morning, when I heard three men cross the street and one of them saying loudly, “I got my eye on the Asian right there (referring to me)”.

I stood my ground and pretended not to hear. When they got closer, the one who spoke out loud sat down on the bench behind me and starting saying “hi” and “hello” to me. I continued to ignore them. Then the man said, “What is it with you Asian women?” and “Look like she got some shrimp fried rice in her bag”.

At this point my heart was beating and I was thinking about how I should react. I decided to stay quiet because I didn’t know if me responding could escalate the situation. The guy then said, “I’m going to dump that food all over your boobs.”

Luckily, the bus pulled up then, and the group of guys walked away and I got on my bus.

– YW

Location: S9 bus stop in Silver Spring, Maryland

Need support? Call the toll-free National Street Harassment hotline: 855-897-5910

Share your street harassment story for the blog.
See the book 50 Stories about Stopping Street Harassers for ideas.

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USA: Latinx Women: Our Experiences with Street Harassment

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Dee Rodriguez, Reading, PA, USA, SSH Blog Correspondent

I like to walk and when the warmer weather hits, I go for walks as part of my self-care routine.  I also walk to work and during work. As a domestic violence and sexual assault advocate, I sometimes have to respond to calls at our local services center or hospitals so I usually walk to these places to avoid wasting time looking for parking.

Being an advocate does not protect me from being harassed. In fact, I’ve been harassed literally walking out of work by a group of men driving by in a vehicle. Another time, I was walking back from a medical facility to my job and a guy said to me, “Why don’t you smile, ma?”

On both occasions, I did not respond. I’m actually less inclined to engage when harassed now that I am an advocate because of the violence I see every day. Many of the survivors that come through our doors are women. While the violence they experience is typically at the hands of an intimate partner, I know that women experience many forms of violence; I don’t respond to harassment due to the fear of what might happen if I do.

When I returned to the offices after being at the medical center, my coworkers asked me how my time there went. I cannot go without mentioning that many of my coworkers are women and women of color, particularly Latinx, and our organization is located in a city with a high Latinx population. While I told my colleagues about my work that day, I couldn’t stop talking about the guy that harassed me on my way back. It bothered me. My coworkers’ reactions were pretty blasé and that’s probably because they too have had their share of experiences with street harassment. When I think back to how I’ve reacted when women tell me of their experiences with street harassment, I was not shocked either.

So the day I was listening to Locatora Radio’s Capitulo 004: Femme Defense, where hosts Mala Muñoz and Diosa Femme discuss their experiences with street harassment and how they use femme defense to deal with it, I was blown away. I was blown away because never in all the times I’ve discussed street harassment did anyone talk about how to respond. Locatora Radio “is a Radiophonic Novela …. Las Locatoras make space for the exploration and celebration of the experiences, brilliance, creativity, and legacies of femmes and womxn of color. Each Capitulo of Locatora Radio is made with love and brujeria, a moment in time made by brown girls, for brown girls.”

As Mala states, femme defense is not just defending oneself but one’s community and you can be any gender and be femme.

The discussion between Mala (who is a fellow domestic violence and sexual assault advocate) and Diosa (who advocates for immigrant women) really struck a chord with me. They discussed having their bodies policed by their family (as way to prevent being harassed), being aware of their surroundings, and using techniques such as the eye gouge if one must engage in physical defense. One particular piece of the discussion that really resonated with me is the “Fuchi face.” The Fuchi face is your mean face, bitch face, mean mug, or whatever you call it, that you put on when you don’t want to be approached or messed with.  I used to call it my “train face” while growing up in NYC so I wouldn’t get bothered while taking public transit.

It’s funny that while out with my “Fuchi face” I was still harassed but I felt less angry about it after listening to the Locatoras because I am not alone and learned useful tips for what do in situations of street harassment.

While we are 3,000 miles apart, we share many of the same experiences. To know that there are other Latinx women out there dealing with this and talking about it, makes me feel like I have a community.

Editor’s Note: Here are suggestions for dealing with street harassment from the SSH site, in Spanish and English.

Dee is a volunteer coordinator and domestic violence/sexual assault advocate for a non-profit social services agency and works on a project to better serve Latinx women survivors. She has a bachelor’s degree in Global Studies with a focus on Latin American Culture from Penn State University. She originally hails from New York City and is a proud daughter of immigrant parents from the Dominican Republic. You can follow Dee on Instagram at @missdeerodriguez.

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USA: Street Harassment Looks Different For Women of Color

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Dee Rodriguez, Reading, PA, USA, SSH Blog Correspondent

If you’re reading this, you may already know that street harassment is a big problem. For people of color, particularly Black and Latinx folks, street harassment is an even bigger issue. According to Stop Street Harassment’s national survey in 2014, Black and Hispanic people more likely to experience street harassment. While the survey uses the term Hispanic, I will be using the term Latinx throughout this blog.

The results are not surprising seeing as how sexual violence in its many forms, including street harassment, is a tool of oppression. It is estimated that 40% of Black women report coercive contact of a sexual nature by age 18 and 1 in 3 Latinx women report sexual violence other than rape. Black and Latinx people experience oppression in society due to their race and/or ethnicity and women that identify as such experience an added layer of oppression due to their gender. Street harassment is a gender-based harassment. Therefore, it’s important to note gender and race and/or ethnicity when discussing street harassment because the harassment may have racial overtones but also that Black and Latinx women are experiencing this at a higher rate.

Even more alarming, is that the Stop Street Harassment survey found Black and Latinx people were more likely to experience physically aggressive street harassment. Since street harassment is a way to exert control, it seems that the harassment escalates in cases where women of color are the targets. The graphic below shows how violence intensifies in rape culture and where street harassment falls. Following, catcalling, and whistling all fall under street harassment. Whistling and following can escalate to threats and then to rape and/or murder.

11th Principle- Consent

Sadly, we have seen cases in which street harassment became very violent towards Black and Latinx women of color. In Detroit, Mary ‘Unique’ Spears was murdered for saying no to a man who approached her and asked for her phone number. She left behind a fiancé and 3 children.  In Brooklyn, NY during J’Ouvert, the celebration prior to the annual West Indian Day Parade, Tiarah Poyau was killed for telling a man to stop grinding on her. Tiarah was a college student with a bright future ahead of her. In Florida, a 14 year-old Latinx girl, was strangled, kidnapped, and ran over with a car for refusing to have sex with a man who approached her. He offered her $200 to have sex with him. Fortunately, she survived. All of these women are Black or Latinx. These stories serve as a reminder that street harassment continues to be a pervasive problem in society and can be lethal, especially to Black and Latinx women of color.

Dee is a volunteer coordinator and domestic violence/sexual assault advocate for a non-profit social services agency and works on a project to better serve Latinx women survivors. She has a bachelor’s degree in Global Studies with a focus on Latin American Culture from Penn State University. She originally hails from New York City and is a proud daughter of immigrant parents from the Dominican Republic. You can follow Dee on Instagram at @missdeerodriguez.

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End of May News Round-Ups

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LeDajrick Cox. Image via The Grio

It’s with a heavy heart that I open this edition of the monthly news round-up with tragic news:

  • In Dallas, Texas, LeDajrick Cox, who just graduated from high school, and two male friends and a female friend were out celebrating. In a 7-11 parking lot, three men in another car started street harassing their female friend, and Cox intervened to defend her. Eventually, Cox and his friends left but the three men followed them and shot into the car. Cox and the two other young men were all injured and Cox died from his injuries. A young life is needlessly over. I applaud him for doing the right thing and am so saddened he is dead.
  • In Portland, Oregon, a white supremacist began harassing two young women on a train, using anti-Muslim slurs. One woman was wearing hijab. When three men intervened to help the young women, the man attacked, killing two of them and injuring one. Again this is just unbelievably horrific and sad. There have been many news stories about the tragedy and praise given to the three men. I glad they intervened but feel so saddened that for two of them, it cost them their lives. That never should have happened.
  • In College Park, Maryland, a white supremacist seemingly randomly stabbed and killed a recent African American college graduate near the University of Maryland campus.

Everyone should be safe in public spaces, and clearly we have a long, long ways to go until that will occur. I hope these stories don’t deter people from speaking out and helping people facing harassment and I hope that those who have committed these crimes face consequences and that perhaps those consequences will deter others from doing the same.

Here are highlights of other news from around the world this month:

The first mandatory legal mediation in the first ever street sexual harassment case in the country took place in Buenos Aires, Argentina.

A woman in Adelaide, Australia, wrote about being scared to walk the streets of her own town after dark.

A study found that 23% of female commuters in Dhaka, Bangladesh, faces sexual harassment on the buses.

Men in Egypt are working with other men to discuss their role and actions as bystanders, perpetrators and victims of violence, including street harassment.

Outraged women in an eastern Parisian district of France staged demonstrations and launched an online petition over a “male den” where women are subject to harassment and sexist remarks.

A woman in Hong Kong spoke out against people who victim-blame women facing street harassment.

In India, the Alwar police formed an all-women team to crack down on people harassing women and girls on city streets.

School girls in India went on a hunger strike to protest the men who harassed them on their way to and from school and the lack of action by local officials to stop them.

In an informal survey conducted in Myanmar, more than 80% of women had faced street harassment.

Three women’s groups urged Panamanian President Juan Carlos Varela Monday to sign a bill meant to prohibit and punish sexual harassment, stalking, sexism and racism in all areas.

The penalty for taking non-consensual upskirt photos increased in Thailand.

In the UK, a bar posted a sign to deter male customers from harassing the female bartender.

A new report from Harvard Graduate School of Education found that 87% of women in the U.S. have faced sexual harassment. Among 18 to 25 year olds, most said they had faced sexual harassment, including 41% saying a stranger had touched them without permission.

Prior to the Lightning in a Bottle music festival in Los Angeles (USA), there was a class offered for fans and staff about sexual harassment at festivals, “Creating Safer-Braver Spaces: Consent Culture & Social Care”.

Most U.S. cities were designed around men and it’s time for that to change.

In the U.S., Feminista Jones began responding to strange men who “complimented” her by agreeing… and then the men get mad. She said in an interview:

“For a man to be comfortable sending an unsolicited comment about your body via text or Tinder or Bumble or whatever, or to feel comfortable yelling some shit at you on the sidewalk, he has to feel — at least in some small way — like you exist for him. If you take those compliments in stride instead of blushing and cooing and being the Good Modest Woman he hopes your mother raised you to be, you’re proving you don’t exist for him at all. Your “great body” belongs to you, and of course that’s gonna piss this exact type of dude off.”

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These Acts Must be Condemned

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At the start of Ramadan, a white supremacist verbally harassed two Muslim women on the Portland (Oregon) light rail train. When bystanders intervened, he attacked them, killing two men and injuring a third. Our hearts go out to these brave men’s families and also to the harassed women.

The rise in crimes like this (like the seemingly random killing of an African American college student in Maryland by a white supremacist), are indicative of just how widespread racism, Islamophobia, sexism, etc, are in the USA. These acts must be condemned. Everyone should feel and BE safe in public spaces.

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