I have been street harassed for as long as I can remember. I am now 41. As a kid and teenager, I was usually stunned and just tried to ignore it.

In my twenties, I angrily yelled at harassers and was even known to keep small rocks in my pocket and throw them. NOT recommended. (My ex used to call me her “stone-throwing urban warrioress.”)

Lately, inspired by the kick-ass, global, anti street harassment movement, I have become more confrontational in what I think are productive ways, I finally get that this is not OK. Instead of feeling eternally powerless, because “this is just how life is,” I feel clear that this is illegal and a violation of my human rights. I NEVER let an instance of harassment pass without doing something. And I’ve learned a lot in the process.

What do I do?

I just confront, talk back, even if just in passing. Often by making a public declaration that others can hear, the harasser ends up being shamed (which is appropriate.)

Here are some recent examples: a guy keeps trying to talk to me at an outdoor cafe. I let him know that I do not want company, but I feel uncomfortable because he continues to look at me from his table. Finally, he gets up to leave, and as he passes my table, whispers something (I don’t even remember what.) At that point, I yell, loudly, after him, “Stop harassing me!” Yes, people turned and looked, and he hurried away.

Often, guys do the quiet, gross whispered thing as they pass, and I always exclaim loudly, “What did you say?” They always deny they said anything, so I continue to make a point (in front of others, of course) that he’s lying and is a street harasser. Again, I am clear that the shame is on him.

Society is changing, awareness is growing, and each instance — even just the super-ignorant kissy or clucking sound someone makes from across the street — is an opportunity to help educate another misguided human being. And that is what they are: human beings. Just like me. Not all-powerful. Not entitled to more freedom on the streets. Human beings, capable of being embarrassed, capable of change.

Do you have any suggestions for dealing with harassers and/or ending street harassment in general?

– Anonymous

I live in a great city for walking, so I get honked or hollared at on a fairly regular basis. The worst are the guys that pace me in their cars, especially when I’m with my kids.

Once, I was walking home from the grocery store with my 7-year-old stepson and my infant daughter. This guy slowed down and said, “Hey” or “hi” or whatever.

I said a quick, “Hey” and literally scurried across the next cross street. I was hesitant to confront the guy because I was worried about the safety of my children and you never know how a guy is going to react.

Instead of driving off, he pulled up a bit and paced me again asking, “How are you doing?”

I stopped and said, “I’d be a whole lot better if you weren’t doing this.”

He responded with, “I understand,” and drove away.

At first, I was relieved and thankful that he left without incident, but then I got angry. If he understood that pacing a woman with his car to hit on her could make her uncomfortable, then why in the hell did he do it?

At least I got an opportunity to educate my boy on how this sort of thing affects woman and hopefully he’ll grow up into a respectful man.

– Robyn

Location: Portland, OR

The first time I experienced street harassment (that I was aware of), I was 14.

It was around 7:30 p.m. I was walking back to the car with my mother and my brother after having dinner at a favorite cafe. We were enjoying the nice night – until we neared our car. A group of young men, obscured in the shadows of a tree, had a megaphone and began shouting at me through it.

My unusually long hair seemed to be their chosen target. They shouted through the megaphone for the whole street to hear that I looked “like a horse or a cow or something,” that they wanted to pull on it while they did me from behind. One of them ‘asked’ if he could cum on my hair.

I was shocked, confused, humiliated, angry, ashamed, and frightened. I was a very sheltered child and I had no idea how to deal with the fact that these strangers were yelling these things at me, in front of my family no less. We hurried to the car and left.

My first experience with overt street harassment was the most blatantly sexually aggressive incident I’ve experienced to date.

To this day it comes to mind and I wish I had done something to confront my harassers, or called the police to alert them of the men harassing passers by, or anything in addition to leaving.  As soon as we had left and I was safely away from them I started wishing I had shouted back at them, that they were losers, were pedophiles, anything – once the fear was removed, the anger simmered.

I hate that they got away with it with no reprimand, no confrontation. I wonder what I would do if I was put in the same situation today.

– TN

Location: Noosa, Qld, Australia

Here is a blog entry I wrote about a time when I was street harassed:

I write to you tonight as a VERY PISSED OFF WOMAN. I’ll just go ahead and tell the story before I start ranting.

So…Every Thursday I attend meetings for a university organization called PAGE- People Acting for Gender Equality. Basically, we are one of many student organizations on the Ohio University campus fighting for open-mindedness and equality when it comes to all genders, sexual preferences, body types, yada yada yada all that good stuff. Anywayyyyysss, as I walked out of my building I noticed a group of boys (yes, I’ll call them boys, not men) drinking on a balcony above me. One noticed my t-shirt and yelled, “Hey, red shirt,” and mumbled some other comment that I ignored. I kept walking, writing him off as just another guy trying to get a girl’s attention. I was wrong.

He followed his little comment with, “Let me lick that pussy!”

UMMMMMMM, many of you probably don’t know me that well, but if you do you can probably guess that I didn’t let him get away with that. I am so tired of just walking away from comments like this, and I know other girls are too. Too often we just let it slide, but if we ever expect to make this world at least a little better we have to put people like this in their places. Needless to say, I turned around and gave him quite a large piece of my mind.

I started off pretty calmly and said, “I don’t know who just said that, but you should rethink ever saying that to another woman again, especially not as she’s walking down the street.”

They hated it. There were about five guys on the balcony, and not only did they deny saying it but also got completely defensive. They started with the excuses and saying how I’m just mad because I’ve “never gotten laid.”

They also seemed to think the words “bitch” and “dyke” offend me; little did they know that those words only empowered me further. I’m proud that I can be a bitch because that just means that I stand up for myself. If being a bitch means that I’m not a pushover then so be it. And who gives a SHIT if a girl is a dike. MORE POWER TO YOU. GIRLS ARE BEAUTIFUL, AND SEX IS GREAT! I hate closed-minded people more than I hate salmon patties, and that’s a lot– ask my mom.

I went on with many more comments; you can probably imagine them, so I won’t go on and on about it. But this is just one example of the millions of idiotic statements that are made every day.

PLEASE help put a stop to it. If you hear anyone making comments like this, tell them they’re wrong. I’m pretty surprised that not even one of the guys on the balcony stopped the other ones. They all thought it was acceptable to go on screaming at me. It’s one thing to make a joke. It’s one thing to use the word “bitch” or others like it; I do it all the time. But that guy had absolutely no right to say that to me.

You can preach free speech all you want, but when he opened his mouth he infringed on MY rights– my right not to be sexually harassed by some drunk dumbass.

Those guys were just pissed that I stood up to them. Instead of giggling and smiling and taking it as flirting, I said exactly what they would say if a gay guy said to them, “Let me suck that dick!”

It’s unwanted attention and a ridiculously disrespectful comment.

“A woman should be proud to declare she is a Bitch, because Bitch is Beautiful. It should be an act of affirmation by self and not negation by others…If taken seriously, Bitch is a threat to the social structures which enslave women and the social values which justify keeping them in their place. She is living testimony that woman’s oppression does not have to be, and as such raises doubts about the validity of the whole social system.” – Joreen (Jo Freeman), The BITCH Manifesto

– Taylr U

Location: Outside of my apartment on a college campus, Ohio