Stop Street Harassment

Making Public Spaces Safe and Welcoming

Take Action To End Gender-Based Hate Speech on Facebook

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UPDATE 5/28/13: The campaign was a success! Facebook is changing their policy.

Stop Street Harassment is proud to support a campaign by Everyday Sexism; Women, Action & the Media; and our friend writer/activist Soraya Chemaly to get Facebook to stop allowing people to post content that depicts or supports violence against women and girls.

They write, “Facebook has long allowed content endorsing violence against women. They claim that these pages fall under the “humor” part of their guidelines, or are expressions of “free speech.” But Facebook has proven willing to crack down on other forms of hate speech, including anti-Semitic, Islamophobic and homophobic speech, without claiming such exemptions. That’s why we’re calling on Facebook to make the only responsible decision and ban gender-based hate speech.”

Read the open letter and take action by contacting companies whose ads appear on offensive content to let them know and to ask them to do something. It’s very easy to contact the companies using the mechanisms the campaign provides. On Twitter, use the hashtag, #FBrape.

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Digest of Street Harassment News: May 19, 2013

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** Sign up to receive a monthly e-newsletter from Stop Street Harassment ***

Street Harassment Stories:

Share your story! You can read street harassment stories on the Web at:

Stop Street Harassment Blog

Collective Action for Safe Spaces

HarassMap in Egypt

Bijoya in Bangladesh

Resist Harassment in Lebanon

Ramallah Street Watch in Palestine

Name and Shame in Pakistan

Safe City India

Safe Streets in Yemen

Street Harassment in South Africa

Many of the Hollaback sites

Everyday Sexism

Street Harassment In the News, on the Blogs:

* FRA, “LGBT persons’ experiences of discrimination and hate crime in the EU and Croatia“

* Left Standing Up, “Harassed at the Corner Store: the Men and the Milk“

* HuffPost Live, “I was groped on the subway“

* Ms. Blog, “The Next Step In Fighting Street Harassment? A Comic Book.”

* Gender Focus, “New Apps Tackle Dating Violence, Street Harassment”

* Care2, “Nearly 100% of Women in Egypt Face Sexual Harassment“

* Slog, “It’s Spring! Who’s Ready for Street Harassment?“

* Blisstree.com, “Would You Like Some Perversion With That? My Worst Street Harassment Experience Yet“

* Ravere EduBlogs, “Street Harassment and Catcalling“

Announcements:

New:

* SSH is hiring our first summer intern! Info.

* Read the report about the activities that took place for International Anti-Street Harassment Week 2013!

* If you live/work/place in Washington, D.C., take this survey for Collective Action for Safe Spaces.

* A new study of 93,000 LGBQT individuals in the European Union countries reveals that street harassment is a pervasive problem for them.

Reminders:

* If you’re in the Washington, DC-area, come to the five-year anniversary Stop Street Harassment Happy Hour on June 5, 5-9 p.m. Info.

* “Cat calls” aren’t benign. Words can lead to violence. Support the documentary that tells that story: http://kck.st/XUZPmq

20 Tweets from the Week:

1. @Dara_212 “Sometimes I forget that, by virtue of being a woman, my body is constantly up for appraisal by strangers” time to end #streetharassment.

2. @charitydash Nothing makes me prouder to be a woman than enduring street harassment on my way to work!

3. @msjoyluckclub old man on the street just leeringly said “konichiwa” to me as i walked past him to catch my train // #gross #stopSH #streetharassment

4. @SaraLang Hard to listen to the two women on this train talking about street harassment they’ve experienced this week – it’s just so pervasive.

5. @thetrudz @one_wyz_womn No point. I deal with street harassment and racial microaggressions ALL DAY. Why go home to “comedy” that’s all insults?

6. @MissBethMyer The next guy to give me street harassment will take the fall for all the ones who came before him. Hope it’ll be worth it, buddy.

7. @MiaLWS @EverydaySexism Today, while walking home some dude honked, whistled, & shouted “Imma dick you down and wife you up!” #StreetHarassment

8. @DreuxD @WrittenbyBene Street harassment pisses me off to no end… Like I should be happy to be told go smile. Fuck off.

9. @WrittenbyBene I don’t have time to go on a #StreetHarassment rant, but it’s real. And guys need to cut it out. Seriously.

10. @AquafarE @and1grad @Aftashok We live in the same society where parents panic when daughters grow breasts because of street harassment.

11. @brittanclaire I just had a dream in which my response to street harassment was to push off the ground and fly, soaring over the trees/interstates/haters.

12. @juneylynne @BestPatricEgan Of course. I’m making a list this summer of each incident of street harassment I encounter. I anticipate it to be lengthy.

13. @iasshole “Hey despite 100s of people in this thread telling me street harassment is real and bad I still think you should be flattered.” #headdesk

14. @tessaquarium I miss my home in SF but I do not miss the crazy amount of street harassment i get.

15. @MarieSwartz My first experiences being ‘perceived’ as a woman were all street harassment in high school

16. @KaylinSnailin Socialization is fucked up. I experienced #streetharassment twice in 2 minutes and -I- feel guilty because I was riding my bike in a dress.

17. @stitchesofspace going outside means an 80% chance of being made uncomfortable. fuck street harassment.

18. @SuzanEraslan I am so fucking sick of street harassment I could tear someone’s eyes out.

19. @etoilee8 Nothing like a little bit of #streetharassment to make me want to punch a grown man. Lemme ask you something. Has it ever worked?

20. @SaraLang  Yesterday while walking down U street, I averaged one incident of street harassment per block. #hollaback

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Half of LGBT Members in the EU Avoid Public Places Because of Harassment

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A new study by the European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights (FRA) sheds light on the levels of discrimination faced by LGBT members of the EU community, with important findings related to how this demographic experiences street harassment.

According to the FRA’s website, the results of the online survey of more than 93,000 LGBT individuals “provide valuable evidence of how LGBT persons in the EU and Croatia experience bias-motivated discrimination, violence and harassment in different areas of life, including employment, education, healthcare, housing and other services.”

A video on the FRA YouTube page illustrates that one-half of all respondents avoid public places, two-thirds avoid holding hands when in public, and four-fifths frequently overhear jokes being made at the expense of LGBT individuals.
In all countries, when asked “Where do you avoid being open about yourself as L, G, B or T for fear of being assaulted, threatened or harassed by others?” respondents reported the highest levels of fear in public spaces (restaurants, public transportation, streets, parking lots, parks, and other public premises) and lower (though still significant) levels at home, work, and school. Similarly, respondents overwhelmingly identified the “street, square, car parking lot / public place” when asked where their most recent incident of physical/sexual attack or threat of violence occurred.
The most serious incidences of harassment occur, in all countries, when there is more than one perpetrator, and these perpetrators tend to be male and often strangers to the harassed individuals (an indicator that many of these “most serious” incidences probably happen in public). A notable portion of this harassment (second only to ‘someone else you didn’t know’) was perpetrated by teenagers or groups of teenagers, a reminder that, while we tend to think of younger individuals as more accepting of non-normative identities, there is still a culture of intolerance that circulates globally.
This study underscores the importance of Stop Street Harassment’s and other organizations’ goal of educating the public about how critical this issue is to the lives of so many women and LGBT individuals (and women who identify as LGBT). While folks across all identity categories experience street harassment in unique ways, we are united in our goal of research, education, and mobilization so that surveys like these are no longer needed.

This is a guest post by Patrick McNeil. Patrick is finishing his master’s thesis at The George Washington University in Washington, D.C., where he is pursuing his Master’s in Women’s Studies. His work focuses on whether and how gay and bisexual men experience street harassment and how this form of harassment intersects with and diverges from the gender-based street harassment of women. Follow him on Twitter at @patrickryne.

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Art Campaign: Don’t Harass Me, Bro

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I recently discovered a new anti-street harassment campaign based in San Francisco, California, called Don’t Harass Me, Bro. They post stickers in cities to bring attention to street harassment. I reached out to co-founders Angel Quicksey and Erick Orantes and they shared more about what they’re doing:

Why and how the campaign started:

After experiencing street harassment first-hand many times, co-founder Angelica (Angel) Quicksey, decided to create this “sticker crusade” across the city to raise awareness about the abuse of street harassment. Coming up with the name “Don’t Harass me, Bro” she posted them all around the city, sometimes getting harassed on her way. While on a networking trip in Washington D.C,, co-founder Erick Orantes learned about the stickers and decided to take a campaign approach with the message.

Don’t Harass Me, Bro then created its Facebook page, Twitter account, and webpage and has continued to spread the word to end street harassment.

What they believe:

We believe that women should roam the streets freely, without the lingering burden and threat of harassment. We acknowledge that women are not objects to shout at on the streets and should not undergo inappropriate name calling, unwanted sexual innuendos, and/or crude bodily/fashion comments. We know that this type of harassment runs rampant in the daily lives of women. We seek to drastically reduce street harassment, particularly in urban areas through raising awareness about these issues. Our goal is to have “harassment free” streets where women are not faced with constant discomfort and sometimes physical trauma from these so called “compliments

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