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Harasser uses sexually violent language in front of cop, cop laughs.

July 18, 2011 By Contributor

Last Thursday evening around 5:30 pm, I was involved in a fender bender. Once the policeman arrived on the scene, he asked me and the male I accidentally hit move our cars from the busy intersection to the gas station about 30 feet from the scene.

As I am pulling into the gas station parking lot, I see a truck full of four redneck men eyeing me. While I felt extremely uncomfortable with their stares, I believed they wouldn’t say anything outright because a policeman was on the scene.

However, this is not what happened. As I am walking over to the police car to deliver him my license, registration and insurance card the truck full of misogynists drive about ten feet in front of me and the cop and start to yell at me, while making jacking off hand gestures to me. As they are driving off one yells, “HEY BABY I WANT YOU TO CHOKE ON MY DICK!”

And see, I am actually getting my Masters in Women’s Studies at a local Women’s College, so you would think I would have known what to say to the truck of shit heads, but I was so embarrassed and shocked that I didn’t know what to do.

I looked at the cop and said, “Aren’t you going to do anything??!” and he just laughed and said he had to fill out too much paper work because of the wreak. HE JUST LAUGHED AND DID NOTHING.

I was in shock.

Everyone in the gas station lot was looking at me. I was no longer looked at as a human, but as an object. Because of my vagina, I deserved to be degraded.

The only thing that even mildly helped is that the male I hit said, “Please forgive my gender. We are a bunch of dumbasses.”

I am catcalled at least twice a week in Roanoke, VA, and no one does anything about it. I ask the animals to stop and it just makes them take it further. I’ve even had firemen at the local fire department catcall me.

I’m angry and upset because the Cop, who stands for what is just and whose job is to protect others, did nothing. Even worse, he laughed like it was no idea. Men have no concept of what it is like to be objectified by males. I literally black-out and have to “reboot” when I’m catcalled.

Does that make sense?

I feel hunted and no one does anything to defend me. It baffles me to know that men can objectify women in broad fucking daylight, in front of a police officer and nothing is done.

I’m at a loss for words.

– Logan Lambert

Location: Roanoke, VA

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Filed Under: Stories, street harassment Tagged With: roanoke, sexual violence, street harassment, virginia

Street Harassment Snapshot: July 17, 2011

July 17, 2011 By HKearl

Read stories, news articles, blog posts, and tweets about street harassment from the past week and find relevant announcements and upcoming street harassment events.

Street Harassment Stories:

Share your story! You can read new street harassment stories on the Web from the past week at:

Stop Street Harassment Blog

Hollaback

Hollaback Berlin

Holla Back DC!

Hollaback Delhi

Hollaback France

Hollaback Israel

Hollaback London

Hollaback NYC

Hollaback Philly

Street Harassment in the News, on the Blogs:

* The Hairpin, “Snappy Things to Yell Back at Construction Workers“

* India Today, “Bhopal girls organize ‘slut walk‘”

* The Times of India, “Special teams to combat eve-teasing“

* Al Jazeera English, “Afghan women fight back against harassment“

* MSNBC, “Afghan women rally, turning men red-faced with anger“

* Women’s Views on News, “Afghan women march against street harassment – today“

* Relando Thompkins, “It’s Not a Compliment, It’s Harassment“

* Bangalore Mirror, “Mapping city’s mean streets“

* Clutch, “Ladies, Sometimes We All We Got“

* Daijiworld.com, “Students Protest Against Private Bus Operators, Allege Harassment of Girls“

* Tentacles of doom, “Rape, privilege, and stupidity“

* Al Masry Al Youm, “The Sexual Harassment File: Foreign women in Egypt and harassment“

* Al Masry Al Youm, “The Sexual Harassment File: Men overlooked“

* Feministing Community, “What do Slut Walks have to do with street harassment?“

* Feministing, “Afghan women fight for safe streets“

Announcements:

New:

* Do you have a stare that can turn #streetharassers to stone? Then participate in the Medusa Gaze Project! http://tinyurl.com/6fhh3tz

Reminders/On-Going:

* Sign Mend the Gap’s petition to address subway harassment in Delhi, India

* College students, enter the Hollaback essay contest, entries due August 1.

* Are you in Egypt? Use HarassMap to report your street harassers

* Have an iPhone? Download the Hollaback iPhone app that lets you report street harassers

10 Tweets from the Week:

1. neversent Is today National Street Harassment Day and no one told me?

2. jmcgivering Afghan women just staged first protest against harassment in the street – from insults to sexual assault. Even when wearing burqa.

3. femmeniste Seriously, have ya never seen a pretty lady before? Must you gasp and say “Damn.” GAWD. #StreetHarassment #KeepItToYourself

4. tanyasnarks Creepy dude following me down the street told me he wanted to eat me- in French and English. Double points for dual language harassment?

5. RobynAnnie Prefers White Sox to Cubs based solely on the level of street harassment I’ve incurred from each type of fan.

6. DeeshaPhilyaw Just experienced street harassment while walking w/MiniMe (12). “Mom, is that guy drunk?” “No, he’s just an idiot w/a sense of entitlement.”

7. musingvirtual Does anyone else think it’s weird when people bring God into street compliments and harassment? God didn’t pick out my outfit. #hollaback

8. ryssiebee: I want to write a book about street harassment called “Fuck You” and then…just flash the cover.

9. Leacyyy Whenever guys catcall me I pretend I’m deaf. Not working so well on the car of guys slowly following me. Oh jersey city

10. sassmasterdeane Street harassment is The Worst. I always feel like a sucker if I smile but a bitch if I don’t. #cantwin

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Filed Under: News stories, Stories, street harassment, weekly round up Tagged With: Afghanistan, eve teasing, sexual harassment, slutwalk, street harassment

Fake wedding ring as tactic to deter hararassers

July 17, 2011 By Contributor

I’m a Black female living in Oakland’s Lake Merritt area. Having a Caucasian boyfriend makes my walks and bikes with him very uncomfortable at times. For example, this evening we were half a block from biking into our home’s entryway. I was about 10 meters in front of him and I could see these two guys were checking me out with those stupid little smirks some of them give, urg! I end up stopping at my entryway just as I pass the two of them and my bf immediately stops behind me. I didn’t realize but as we walk in I’m told they said, “Why would she be with someone like him?” Urggg!!

First of all this is annoying as hell because I go through it all the time being in an interracial relationship. Funny that I don’t hear about Black guys getting harassed for dating White women these days.

Back on track – secondly this was annoying because these two guys were dirty, I mean they look like they were normal guys (meaning not crazy like many around my home) but damn were they unattractive and flat out raggedy looking!! For real?! My bf is a handsome and super successful guys and you’re telling me that because he’s White I’m better off being with someone like you?! Think before you open your mouth to make a stupid comment like that dumb ass! The same goes for the one, two other guys that holla’d at me earlier in the day.

Why do you idiots think we women want to hear your comments? The funny thing is they often aren’t even talking directly to us, but rather they decide to think aloud. Why?! Why do you think I want to hear what you’re perverted mind thinking about me? Granted, I understand some girls do respond to these actions, we’ve all seen it. Unfortunately, they are the ones who allow these ignorant men to believe it’s okay to act this way. These men are like bad children who are resistant to understanding how to treat women with respect.

I don’t think I can possibly express the fullest extent of my frustrations, it’s that deep. The absolute worst thing is when these men are so rude as to disregard the fact that my bf is with me and they speak their minds as if to taunt him. F*@!in’ rude ass pigs!

Let me tell you what this has brought me to: I’ve purchased a fake wedding band and engagement ring. When I actually feel like wearing them it feels amazing to simply flash them and wha-la, it’s like some kind of magic wand, no more lingering, creepy eyes. In college I got so overwhelmed one semester that I decided to commit a whole semester to wearing sweat clothes (because I couldn’t walk around with a bag on my head) in order to repel them. Guess what? It totally worked! I remember being ecstatic when I would walk by a group of guys and only hear silence. Aaaah, music to my ears! The next semester I decided to perk myself up. While out one night a guy even referred to me as the “sweats girl”. He said he’d thought I was cute but couldn’t understand why I always dressed so…humbly! I thought it was hilarious.

I’m rambling but have lots of stories that make me hate these men with a passion! They seriously disgust me and I wish I had a good one-liner for them without getting called a bitch or something else in return. What can I say to stop them in their tracks once I spot those sickening grimaces? I swear, sometimes I just feel like yelling and screaming at them like a banchie. I imagine myself flailing my arms and chasing them down like a crazy person, hahaha!

– Anonymous

Location: Lake Merritt area, Oakland, CA

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Filed Under: Stories, street harassment

Followed in Morocco

July 15, 2011 By Contributor

While walking around, it isn’t uncommon to have men follow you for blocks, either walking, or following you in their cars.

– Anonymous

Location: Meknes, Morocco

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Filed Under: Stories

Fifty people marched against street harassment in Kabul today

July 14, 2011 By HKearl

Members of Young Women for Change at a June meeting

History was made in Kabul today when the first-ever public action against street harassment occurred.

An hour ago, Noorjahan Akbar, one of the organizers, wrote on her Facebook Wall:

“Today was so wonderful! Thanks to over fifty men and women and over fifteen media members who walked with us and the police that provided us with so much support in every step of the campaign. I am so moved and proud of being such a movement. Bravo Young Women for Change and Hadia-“

Congratulations to Akbar and the other organizers and participants! Way to share your voices and views and take action! I’ll be interviewing Akbar and another woman who participated later, so check back for more info.

For background, here’s why the young women decided to organize their action:

“The main reason we are holding this campaign is that despite the fact that women’s harassment is a serious problem that discourages many women from active participation in the society, it is not recognized as a problem. Women often remain silent when they are harassed and men believe it is normal to assault women, just like drinking water.

Harassment of women has gotten worse in the last couple of years as more women have started going out of their houses for schooling or jobs. However, that is not the only reason harassment has increased. Governmental regulations to restrict women’s behavior and clothing, for example the proposed wedding law that requires women to dress “modestly’ in weddings, encourages the people who think like the Taliban and believe women should remain in their homes to harass women as they exit their houses and use women’s “inappropraite” clothing as an excuse.

Through our campaign, we hope that sexual harassment will be recognized as a problem, discussed in the Afghan media and men, rather than the victims who are women, will be held responsible for their disrespectful behavior.”

For more on the march and street harassment in Afghanistan, see Akbar’s article for Al Jazeera and her interview for UN Dispatch.

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Filed Under: Stories, street harassment Tagged With: kabul, march Noorjahan Akbar, street harassment

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