Stop Street Harassment

Making Public Spaces Safe and Welcoming

2014: The Year of the Tipping Point (Part 1)

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Safe City Nepal

This is Part 1. See Part 2. Read about SSH’s Top 10 Achievements in 2014. 

I feel strongly that 2014 has been a turning point year when it comes to raising awareness about street harassment. No longer is it an obscure term describing something that most people see as normal. Now, many more people have some familiarity with it, and a lot of them find it violating and wrong.

A few indicators of this shift:

* There are at least 100 sites where people can share their street harassment stories, plus people’s individual blogs, Tumblrs, and Facebook pages. And people do share their stories every single day.

* I’m emailed more articles per day in my Google Alerts for the term street harassment than in prior years

* Twitter hashtags like #YesAllWomen, #NotJustHello, #YouOkSis?, #Grabbed, #DudesGreetingDudes and #IllRidewithYou were used by tens of thousands of people to talk about street harassment.

* Videos about street harassment in the Chile, France, Peru, and the U.S. each went viral and were viewed by at least 1 million people. The Rob Bliss Creative film “10 Hours of Walking in NYC as a Woman” has been viewed by more than 38 million people to date.

* Stop Street Harassment – particularly because of our new national study of street harassment in the USA – received more than 200 media hits during the year, more than in previous years. Our website traffic was the highest of any other year and we’ve almost reached 20,000 on our Facebook page and 10,000 on Twitter.

* In the U.S., from The Daily Show to Playboy, from Inside Edition to the Today Show, a lot of surprising places did an excellent job of covering street harassment.

* After the New York Post published an article about street harassment being flattering (and women should just deal with it), major outlets like USA Today, Time and Salon.com all ran pieces this afternoon disagreeing, as did sites like Bustle, the Frisky, This would never have happened a few years ago. This is an incredible shift in how street harassment is viewed!!

* Anti-harassment laws passed in countries like Belgium, Egypt, and Peru, and in Kansas City, Missouri, USA.

* The United Nations launched a “He for She” campaign letting men know that they should care about gender equality, too, such as ending street harassment.

There are so many news stories, campaigns, tweet chats, and community efforts that I had to give up trying to track them. I still wanted to write this an annual report blog post, but please know that this is very incomplete. It is just a sampling of all of the news, videos, campaigns and efforts but I think it still provides important documentation for some of what happened this year.

You can also visit the sites of global organizations like UN Women, ActionAid, Huairou Commission, Everyday Sexism, and Hollaback! to read about the important work they are each doing to address street harassment in cities where they have chapters, networks, and programs.

This year has also been very important in the U.S. regarding discussions about racial equality, police profiling and police brutality against persons of color. The conversation and protests gained more traction after the shooting of unarmed teenager Michael Brown in #Ferguson, Missouri in August. After the officer who shot him and the officer who killed another unarmed man (this time caught on video), Eric Garner, were both not indicted by grand juries in December, a tipping point was reached. There have been scores of protests – even around the holidays – die-ins, “Hands Up Don’t Shoot” gestures, and much needed conversations around the country.

While this is not a core issue for SSH, we are allies in this movement. We support justice for all, safe public spaces for all, and police reform so that all (or at least most) police officers will one day take the complaints of sexual harassment, rape, racism, homophobia, transphobia, and hate crimes seriously. We also support the efforts of organizations like Girls for Gender Equity to make sure girls and women of color are included in discussions and initiatives addressing racism.

Okay, on to some highlights and examples of news, activism, and government-led efforts to address street harassment this yea

IMPORTANT NEWS STORIES:

Street harassment is NOT a compliment and it’s not harmless. This was evident this year in many tragic news stories.

* In Brazil, between January and August 2014, 12 young women aged 13-29 were shot and killed by a motorcyclist as they stood in public spaces. The reason? They were young and female.

* A woman in Detroit was shot dead by a harasser after refusing to give him her phone number.

* In India, two teenagers committed suicide because young men in the area kept following them.

* A man in New York slashed the throat of a woman who refused to go on a date with him.

* A man in Seattle pulled out a gun after a woman ignored his repeated invitations to “hang out.”

* A man in England put a woman in a hospital after punching her when she told him to stop touching her.

* Men harassed and violently attacked two transwomen in Atlanta  in a subway car, prompting them to move from the city.

* In Chicago, a man put a woman in a headlock and tried to steal her phone after she refused to give him her number on the subway.

Bystanders have experienced violence and murder by harassers this year, too.

* A Chicago man was killed by a harasser in front of his 15-year-old daughter after he confronted the man for making “inappropriate gestures” at her.

* An Egyptian teenager was stabbed to death while stopping to help young women experiencing harassment.

* In Germany, Tugce Albayrak, a 23-year-old student died at the hands of a street harasser when she spoke out to protect two teenage girls.

* A San Francisco man sustained life-threatening injuries after asking a harasser to leave his girlfriend alone.

* A Philadelphia man was hospitalized after he told a harasser to watch what he was saying to women nearby, and the harasser got out of his vehicle and attacked him.

Their stories matter.

Also relevant: UC Santa Barbara student Elliot Rodger ranted about all the hot women who owed him sex before he went on a killing spree in Santa Barbara, California in May. His feelings of entitlement to women’s attention and bodies launched important conversations about men who can’t take no for an answer that included discussions about street harassment.

 

NEW RESEARCH:

A number of studies helped document the problem of street harassment and helped us better understand various aspects of the social problem.

Global: The World Economic Forum released their annual Global Gender Gap Report in late October. Yet again, no country has achieved gender equality. Street harassment perpetrated by men against women is one more indicator and manifestation of this inequality.

Global: YouGov polling conducted in 16 major cities worldwide asked participants about how safe they feel at night, their experiences with verbal harassment and physical abuse, the public response to abuse, their confidence in authorities, and their overall feelings of safety in the city. They then ranked the 16 cities safest (New York City) to least safe (Bogota).

Global: For one full week in September, Medium asked women from 10 different cities around the globe to keep a diary record of any kind of unwanted attention they received, including every untoward advance from a stranger, every leering stare and smile and “Hey baby” directed their way.

Bangladesh: A survey, jointly conducted by the Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics and United Nations Population Fund and covering all seven divisions of the country, found that 43% of the 12,600 women cited public spaces as the most common spot for experiencing sexual harassment.

Chile: In an opt-in survey, the newly-formed Organization Against Street Harassment (OCAC) “found in its first study that almost 40% of Chilean women are harassed on a daily basis, while 90 percent of women reported having been harassed at least once in their lives.”

India: In a new survey, around 60% of women said they faced harassment and discrimination in the four metros — New Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata and Bangalore.

Nepal: The World Bank released the report Gender and Public Transport in Nepal that found sexual harassment is a big problem, especially for young women ages 19-25 years old. Among women ages 19-35, one in four had been the target of inappropriate touching during the previous year on public transportation, usually by middle age men.

Saudi Arabia: “A study conducted by a female Saudi researcher about “sexual harassment of women” on a sample of women aged between 18 and 48 has shown that 78% of respondents claimed to have experienced sexual harassment directly, while 92% said that sexual harassment is on the rise. The study found that 27% of them have been subjected to verbal harassment; 26% were subject to “tarqim” attempts, which is the attempt to pass on a phone number; 24% were subject to harassment by looks; and 15% were physically touched.”

USA: SSH commissioned the survey firm GfK to conduct a nationally representative survey of 2,000 people, ages 18 and older, across the country. Nearly two-thirds (65%) of women and 25% of men reported experiencing street harassment. Nearly 1 in 4 women had been sexually touched, 1 in 5 followed, and nearly 1 in 10 forced to do something sexual. Homophobic comments was the most common form of harassment for men, and straight men experienced the least harassment of any group. Men were identified the most often as harassers of both women and men, half of harassed people said the harassment began by age 17, and most harassed persons – especially women – were negatively impacted by the incidents.

USA: The results of the Gallup’s annual Crime survey, conducted Oct. 12-15, found that 37%, of U.S. adults say they would not feel safe walking alone near their home at night. Nearly half of all women, 45%, felt this way. Lower income and younger people were also more likely to say they feel unsafe.

USA: “Adolescent boys who bully peers and engage in homophobic teasing are more likely to perpetrate sexual harassment later on, suggests a new study of middle-school students conducted by researchers at the University of Illinois and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.”

USA: Research shows that men are not “naturally” sexual predators.

USA: A new study found that most young women assume that being harassed, assaulted, and abused is simply something that everyone experiences. Further, the belief that it is normal dissuades most victims from reporting those crimes.

USA: New research provided evidence that sexual harassment is traumatizing for women—especially for those who have experienced sexual abuse.

USA: “A Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority survey of nearly 20,000 passengers…asked whether they felt unsafe during the last month while riding Metro due to “unwanted touching, exposure, comments, or any other form of unwanted sexual behavior. About 21% of rail passengers and 18% of bus passengers said yes. About 17% of bus riders and 13% of train riders said they felt unsafe while waiting at bus stops or train stations.”

Vietnam: ActionAid Vietnam and the Hanoi-based Research Center for Gender, Family and Environment in Development surveyed 2,046 people in Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City in December and 57% of women (aged 16 and up) said sexual harassment is most likely to occur on the street, while 31% of female students said they have been harassed on public buses.

 

GOVERNMENT-LED EFFORTS

Global: In April, there was a coordinated campaign to address harassment on transit systems called Global Guardian that included British Transport Police (BTP), Transport for London (TfL), Metropolitan Police Service (London), Metro Vancouver Transit Police, Bay Area Rapid Transit Police (San Francisco), Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority (Boston), and the DC Metro Transit Police Department (MTPD).

Belgium: Sexual harassment in Belgium, including in public spaces, became punishable in the spring by either hefty fines or up to one year in prison. In October, it was reported that “Brussels police write up an average of two fines a day for verbal abuse, mostly targeted at women and gay people. Verbal abuse, such as cat- or name-calling, is prohibited in the capital since a law against street harassment was passed earlier this year.

Canada: In Vancouver, Transit Police launched a text hotline where transit users can send messages about harassment. The text number to report an assault on transit in real time is 87-77-77. They also launched an app to make it easier to report incidents.

Egypt: Egypt passed a law against sexual harassment. It states that a sexual harasser is one who “accosts others in a public or private place through following or stalking them, using gestures or words or through modern means of communication or in any other means through actions that carry sexual or pornographic hints.” The penalty is prison sentence, a fine or both.”

The Egyptian Interior Minister Mohamed Ibrahim ordered a new department formed to combat crimes of violence against women in collaboration with the ministry’s department of human rights. The Egyptian State Council for Women operated a sexual assault hotline during the October Eid al-Adha festivities

Peru: In June, Carmen Omonte, Peru’s Minster of Women and Vulnerable Populations, announced her intention to include sexual street harassment in the penal code as a crime. In August, Peru’s Council of Ministers approved a bill amending Criminal Code to punish street harassment.

UK: “In September 2013 London launched Project Guardian, a collaborative effort by the British Transport Police, the Metropolitan Police, the City of London Police and Transport for London, to boost levels of reporting of sexual offences….2000 officers receive special training and 120 officers – both in uniform and plain clothes – carry out daily patrols on the transport network. Since the launch of the initiative, there has been a 20% increase in the reporting of sexual offences, and a 32% increase in the number of cases where offenders have been charged or summoned.”

USA: In March, the Massachusetts legislature moved swiftly to fix a law that resulted in the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court ruling it was legal for a man to take photos up women’s skirts in public places.

USA: In New York City, in October the Metropolitan Transit Authority said it would add cameras in new trains, release new PSAs focused on bystanders, and create improved reporting systems for victims and witnesses as ways to better address sexual harassment and assault.

USA: BikeWalk KC worked with various Kansas City, Missouri groups and the city council to pass an anti-harassment ordinance in October.

PART 2

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2013: 30 New Resources

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Not only were there important efforts to stop street harassment and memorable stories from individuals who stopped street harassers, but there were also many new resources!

Here are 30 of them:

1. A new study by the European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights (FRA) shed 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.

2. “Put Yourself in Her Shoes” PSA from UN Women’s Egyptian office.

3. A PSA from Whistling Woods International, a film school in India, that forces men to consider how creeping and inappropriate their leering is. No one is entitled to another person’s body!

4. “Conceptual understandings and prevalence of sexual harassment and street harassment,” a new publication by Bianca Fileborn, a Research Officer with ACSSA at the Australian Institute of Family Studies.

5. The Brooklyn Movement Center‘s “Street Harassment Spectrum” chart.

6. Estelle Freedman’s book Redefining Rape: Sexual Violence in the Era of Suffrage and Segregation, which includes a chapter about street harassment from around 1880-1920.

7. The Fight Harassment 101 (FH101) workshop curriculum – It allows you to host your own workshop about harassment and the use of self-defense.

8. The Don’t Harass Me, Bro and Design Action Collective campaigns. You can order stickers form the first group or download them from the second and then post them around your town to bring attention to street harassment.

9. Hollaback!’s updated smartphone app that allows people in New York City to “upload, in real time, information about where they experienced harassment on the street. It creates a map of pinned locations where harassment occurs, providing near-instant feedback to the city council’s and mayor’s offices. The app collects demographic data, too, to help officials better understand the details of where harassment occurs and who it happens to.”

10. Sex educator Laci Green’s video about street harassment.Funny and informative.

11. Miri’s article about why you shouldn’t tell that random woman on the street she’s hot (lots of great talking points).

12. Our social media volunteer Julie Mastrine’s infographic about street harassment.

13. A video interview from Quiet Lunch Magazine with artist Tatyana Fazlalizadeh, the person behind the amazing “Stop Telling Women to Smile” project. You can bring her art work to your community!

14. “Do Not Trust My Silence,” a powerful short film about street harassment in Afghanistan (English subtitles), directed by Afghan filmmaker Sahar Fetrat. She won the first prize in Italy’s “Universocorto Elba Film Festival” for her “extreme courage of reporting the Afghan women’s condition in the streets of Kabul and for the technique of shooting with a hidden camera.”

15 The Talk 2 Q radio show segment on street harassment that gives a lot of good talking points for addressing this issue with men, especially men of color.

16. A list of 5 resources for talking with boys about sexual violence, including street harassment.

17. Jarrah O’Neill’s senior thesis for Princeton University examining the policy frameworks that sustain street harassment.

18. The University of Southern California college students’ video about street harassment, which focuses on why it’s a serious problem.

19. Kelly Gallagher’s video “I AM THE MACE,” which is about identifying herself as a weapon against street harassment.

20. Virginia high school student Julia Romero’s song about street harassment.

21. Kara Lieff‘s video “Meet Us on the Subway” about Philadelphia’s International Anti-Street Harassment Week campaign. Check out Part 1 & Part 2.

22. A new billboard-based anti-street harassment campaign in Libya.

23. Qahera, a veiled superhero who addresses issues like street harassment in Egypt, created by Deena, an Egyptian artist.

24. The report “‘It’s Dangerous to be the First’: Security Barriers to Women’s Public Participation in Egypt, Libya, and Yemen,” which includes a portion about street harassment.

25. Hollaback! Philly‘s 24-page comic book, called Hollaback: Red, Yellow, Blue, written and drawn by Erin Filson (one of the current leaders of HollabackPHILLY, along with Rochelle Keyhan and Anna Kegler) and features characters who deal with street harassment.

26. Alyson Macdonald’s Internet game that allows people to see what life is like for many women when they walk outside.

27. Amy West’s video that provides viewers with “a two minute glimpse of something that happens literally every day. I hope this inspires open dialogue about the culturally accepted ways women are treated and the real consequences of those actions.”

28. SSH’s toolkit Know Your Rights: Street Harassment and the Law

29. A list of companies whose products or ads support street harassment – find out how you can take action to stop them & suggest your own campaigns.

30. My new book 50 Stories about Stopping Street Harassers, easy to read, accessible, and empowering.

DONATE — All donations are being matched through the end of 2013!

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2013: 16 Memorable Stories about Stopping Street Harassers

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I wrote this for the Pixel Project in early December and am cross-posting it here.

Image by Amy & Julie Mastrine

Empowering Response #1:  When a man began openly staring at EM’s friend’s breasts, she said really loudly to him as they passed him on the New Jersey street, “You should look where you’re going or you might fall.” He looked at her and she repeated, “Look where you’re walking.” Her friend laughed and he looked embarrassed.

Empowering Response #2: Photographer and Yale School of Art MFA student Hannah Price made international news this year with her series of stunning photos of the men who harassed her on the streets of Philadelphia, turning the lens and attention on them instead of her.

Empowering Response #3: Phillip in San Francisco, California, observed a man harassing every woman in the area. A few construction workers suggested the man stop, but he didn’t. So Philip got in his space and began making remarks about that man’s body and returned his misogyny. He said the harasser took off, almost running, while the construction workers high-fived Philip!

Empowering Response #4: Penelope lives in Sydney, Australia, and when construction for a new apartment building began next to where she lived, the constant harassment by the workers made her feel ill. She tried lots of tactics to avoid harassment but finally, she wrote a letter to the development company. It worked. She said, “I was stopped by the foreman and he politely let me know that he spoke to the men and have them stop the harassment and that if it happens again to seek him out or contact the company again.”

Empowering Response #5: Nayana was walking down a very busy road in Delhi, India. Suddenly, she felt a man “feeling up her front” with his hand. She said she was shocked! When she saw him smirking because he felt he was going to get away it, she grabbed hold of his collar and screamed at the top of her voice, “Police! Police! Help!” People gathered around her to help. The police arrived and she reported him. He ended up spending the night in jail.

Empowering Response #6: A woman was at the Metro in Virginia when she saw two guards harassing another woman. That woman cringed and walked quickly away. One of the guards then told the woman who observed it, “Let me see a SMILE on that pretty face.” She made eye contact and told him firmly, “Mind your business.” He giggled nervously and shut up.

Empowering Response #7: One day Irem was riding a city bus with her sister in Izmir, Turkey. A man would not stop staring at them. She stared back to try to make him feel uncomfortable and stop, but he just kept staring. So then Irem stood up and said to him, “Do you know us from somewhere else because you’ve been looking at us for ten minutes.” She said he was very embarrassed and that the other passengers, especially the women, laughed at him. He looked down at the floor for the rest of the ride.

Empowering Response #8: Emily pulled up beside a pickup truck at a traffic light in Sarasota, Florida. Her windows were rolled down and the two men in the truck whistled at her, laughing. She turned off her radio, turned to them and said, “You know, it’s really offensive when men whistle at a woman like she’s an animal. I don’t appreciate that. What you’re doing is called street harassment and it is unacceptable.” The driver apologized saying, “I’m sorry, ma’am. I’ll stop tonight.”

Empowering Response #9: A woman was harassed by a man in an SUV while she wanted to cross the street in Minnesota, and then he drove away before she could respond, she wrote an open letter to him in the “Missed Connections” section of Craigstlist.com. Her amazing letter was shared all over the Internet and it ended with this good advice: “If you really find a woman beautiful, don’t choose the juvenile selfish route that makes her feel weird and you look like an asshole. Just take a deep breath, commit the image to memory, and get on with your life. Or, if it’s really that great of an ass that you can’t possibly survive without commenting on it, post about it on CL missed connections after the fact and let her decide what to do about it.”

Empowering Response #10: Sarah was visiting a friend in Buffalo, New York. As she walked through a parking garage to meet her friend, two men sitting in a truck rolled down their windows and shouted inappropriate sexual remarks at her. She turned around and walked up to the window, looked them both in the eye and calmly said, “I just wanted to let you know it is really rude to shout at someone like that, and most women do not appreciate it.” They apologized to her and said they were just trying to be nice and say hi. She told them how that behavior can be perceived as threatening. She says she “walked away feeling so positive and empowered, and I hope what I said had some impact on those men and their future behavior.”

Empowering Response #11: Robyn lives in Portland, Oregon. She was walking home from the grocery store with her seven-year-old stepson and her infant daughter when a man slowed down in his car to talk to her through his window. She felt hesitant to confront him with her kids there.  Instead of driving away, the man followed and then paced his car alongside her and her kids. “How are you doing?” he asked. She stopped and said, “I’d be a whole lot better if you weren’t doing this.” He said, “I understand,” and drove away.

Empowering Response #12: A woman in Harrogate, UK, was harassed in the morning by a fundraiser. It bothered her all day that he’d done this and when she went home that evening, she confronted him. She wrote, “He turned out to be a very nice guy who was very apologetic- he hadn’t realised how intimidating his behaviour was and was glad that I had gone back to speak to him. Being the older brother of 4 sisters he was keen to express his abhorrence of men that harass women. I was pleasantly surprised at his attitude- he was happy to listen and learn. It gave me hope!

Empowering Response #13: Each time Maria’s sister walked from the bus stop to her home in Colombia, a man across the street yelled sexual comments at her. His harassment upset her a lot. Maria was worried that since the man knew where she and her sister lived, it could be unsafe for her to talk to him, so she talked to her sister’s boyfriend and he said we would talk to him. The boyfriend asked the man to please show respect for the women walking on the streets and to consider their safety. His admonition worked and the man never harassed Maria’s sister again.

Empowering Response #14:  Christine was at a nightclub with a friend in Maynooth, Ireland, when a man groped her friend’s breast, then smiled as he walked away. Her friend froze in shock, but Christine “saw red.” She ran after him, matched his pace, and then reached around and grabbed his balls. She said, “He doubled over and I held on as I leaned in and spoke directly into his ear: ‘It’s not so nice when someone touches you without your permission, is it?’” She said she walked away and when she turned back, he looked very confused and uncomfortable.

Empowering Response #15: When D was street harassed by two different men in a short distance, she said, “No!” loudly to them each. A woman nearby saw both interactions and said, “Thank god for you!” and said something about how more people need to speak up against this. “I have to,” I said. “It [street harassment] is ridiculous.” D wrote, “I didn’t get a chance to thank her for supporting me in standing up against harassment. Usually when people see me standing up to harassers they either ignore it, think it’s funny, or tell me that I bring this stuff upon myself for taking harassment too seriously. So when I do encounter people who support standing up against street harassment, it feels great to know that there are people who think that this is a problem.”

Empowering Response #16: Fern was dressed up for an interview when two men on the street commented about her looks. She ignored them and one of them yelled, “What, you can say thank you?” She felt angry that a man expected her to thank him for his unsolicited and unwanted comments and asked him, “Why do I need to thank you? Did you do me a favor? Did you help me?” He was surprised and told her not to be uptight. She said, “I didn’t ask you to look at me. In fact, I wish you wouldn’t.” She then left.

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2012 #EndSH Successes Part 2: Creative Initiatives

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At the end of every year, I like to look back, document and reflect on everything that has transpired in the global movement to end street harassment and assault. Yesterday I wrote about 10 of Stop Street Harassment’s achievements. Today, I’m posting a five-part series about the highlights of ALL activism that happened this year (PDF format). WHAT A YEAR!

Post 1: New anti-street harassment campaigns, new initiatives within existing campaigns, and protests.

Post 2 (this one): Creative anti-street harassment initiatives.

Post 3: Government initiatives/collaborations

Post 4: New studies, reports, and significant news articles.

Post 5: Stories from 25 people who stood up to street harassers this year.

1. Afghanistan: Young Women for Change released two short films about street harassment.

2. Afghanistan: Talalo, an Afghan graffiti band, fought street harassment by putting messages on street walls.

3. Azerbaijan: Jake Winn, a Peace Corps volunteer and a youth development facilitator in northern Azerbaijan helped his male students make an Anti-Street Harassment video. The title, “Ay Gardash! Kishi Ol!”, can be translated to, ‘Hey man, be a gentleman!” Peace Corps is working on distributing the video throughout the country, along with a lesson plan and discussion questions for other volunteers to use with their own students. Download the lesson plans: Street Harassment Lesson Plan (English) | Street Harassment Lesson Plan (Azerbaijani)

4a. Belgium: For Meet Us on the Street, Hollaback Brussels held a chalk walk where they visited places they’d been harassed and reclaimed those spots by telling their stories aloud and writing in chalk that they reclaim the area. They’ve held additional chalk walks since then.

4b. Belgium: Over the summer, college student Sofie Peeters’ documentary about street harassment went viral, launching an international discussion about the topic and leading the government of Brussels to pass legislation addressing it. View the full video with English subtitles:

5. Canada: METRAC released a free “Not Your Baby App” to provide responses you can use when experiencing harassment

6. China: After a subway company in Shanghai, China, blamed women for “causing” sexual harassment in June, two young women went to a subway station and wore a “black veil over their face, stepped into a crowded subway station with signs that read, ‘I want my coolness under the sun, but not the pervert in the subway,’ and ‘I can reveal myself, and you cannot bother me.’”

7. Egypt: Anum Khan created the Egyptian version of the video “What Men Say to Men Who Harass Women on the Streets” in Egypt.

8. Egypt: Youth in Egypt created a short movie about street harassment and verbal abuse.

9. Germany: Because soccer/football is so popular in Germany, the group ProChange decided to use the concept of “red cards” as a creative way to speak out against street harassment. In the spring, they distributed 2000 “Red Card” against sexism, “Pink Card” against homophobia, and “Purple Card” Courage. They also distributed special coasters in pubs, bar, from clubs in Dortmund, Germany.

10. India: In early 2012, male ally Dhruv Arora launched the website GotStared.At where people can post photos of the clothes they were wearing when harassed along with their story. What really went viral though were graphics with clever messages against victim-blaming, which, once posted on Facebook, were shared widely. In the fall, GotStared.At won the prestigious UN World Summit Youth Award in the category Power 2 Women!

11. India: Mumbai Boss asks, “What’s the best way to deal with eve-teasers? A full body wax, one tight slap and flour grinding are some of the many punishments suggested in this video survey of Mumbai women.”

12. Israel: In response to ultra-Orthodox Jewish men who called an 8-year-old a whore as she walked to school in Israel, in January, a group of 250 women from  Bet Shemesh held a Flashmob dance in the city square, protesting women’s exclusion from the public domain and the harassment of women and girls who do go in public.

13. Istanbul: When Hollaback Istanbul launched the Hollaback! Green Dot Bystander Campaign, they created a companion video with male allies letting harassed persons know they “have their back.”

14. Lebanon: The Adventures of Salwa Campaign released a video about Salwa taking on harassers at a club. She also reports the harasser to the police and then has to stop the police officer who harassed her!

15. Pakistan: In Karachi this spring, students at university SZABIST hosted a “How to respond to harassment” session, a self defense class, and they created a PSA about harassment.

16. Pakistan: Naveen Naqvi created a powerful PSA video about street harassment for gawaahi.org.

17. South Africa: Filmmaker Pascale Neuschäfer created a powerful short film about street harassment in her community last year and in January, she created a new PSA against street harassment. It was filmed during the SlutWalk in Capetown last year.

18. UK: Those Pesky Dames posted this video: “Look at the legs on that” – street harassment needs to stop

19. UK: Isobel Williams created an amazing design project to address street harassment for school. She designed a booklet about the issue that includes a card which women can carry and give to a harassing man as a decoy. The card lists a website and if they visit the site, they can view a short film offering them a chance to gain a reality check on their actions.

20. UK: Hollaback Edinburgh created a humorous, “Said No One Ever” Tumblr. Read an interview with the creator.

21. USA: Bix Gabriel and Joe Samalin are part of the NYC team that created the viral video “Shit Men Say to Men who Say Shit to Women on the Street” for International Anti-Street Harassment Week. In September, the video won the US government’s “Seeing My World through a Safer Lens Video Contest“

23. USA: One woman launched a Tumblr where she records everything men say to her on her way to the train.

24. USA: Aqueelah Grant wrote a practical book about how to deal with crimes on the street, including street harassment called HoodRules. Here’s an interview with her.

25. USA: There’s a new tumblr called Street Harassment Fashion that challenges victim-blaming. Read an interview with the founder.

26. USA: Tatyana Fazlalizadeh is an oil painter/illustrator whose work focuses on portraiture and social/political themes. She’s the artist behind popular anti-street harassment fliers found in Philadelphia, New York City, and Washington, DC. Read an interview with her.

27. USA: Earth Angel created a petition to tell Planet Fitness Gym to deal with harassers at their facility after they ignored her complaints about harassment.

28. USA: Jennifer Phan made a video about street harassment for a sociology class assignment.

29. USA: HappRat is posting her street harassment experiences on a map to show all of the places and times she’s harassed. Read an interview with her.

30. USA: In June, Queerocracy, a New York City-based grassroots organization, presented QRASH Course: Queers Resisting All Street Harassment, an afternoon-long training event for people who witness and experience street harassment in the NYC area.

31. USA: The FX show Totally Biased with W. Kamau Bell covered street harassment!

32. USA: In April, Mary wrote a summer street harassment poem.

33. USA: Collective Action for Safe Spaces & Voices of Men rode the Washington, DC, Metro and collaborated to perform a skit about harassment to bring attention to the issue. They performed it several times on several cars and received positive feedback.

34. USA: You can now view the full anti-street harassment documentary “War Zone” online.

35. USA: During the spring semester, San Jose State University’s Women’s Resource Center did a lot to address gender violence. They created a mural, they put on a production of the Vagina Monologues, created a Tunnel of Oppression (800 people walked through it) and they made several videos about street harassment.

36. USA: Council Member Julissa Ferreras and Hollaback! led an historic community safety audit on Saturday, May 5th in Queens, New York.

37. USA: Denice Frohman, Poet, performs “Dear Straight People” and takes on people who harass lesbians.

38. USA: FAAN Mail and Hollaback Philly created a video where teenage girls “draw from personal experience and testimony to illuminate what gender-based street harassment sounds like.”

39. USA: High school students in Chicago created a 30-second anti-street harassment PSA through Free Spirit Media

40. USA: Hollaback Bmore talked about street harassment with the girls from St. Francis Community Center and helped them relieve their frustration with street harassers with….a water balloon fight!

41. USA:  Ines Ixierda in the Queer Women of Color Media Arts Project created a film about street harassment through the stories of Woman of Color and their strategies for self-defense and self-determination.

42. USA: CATCALLED is a collection of women’s stories about street harassment in New York City. For two weeks this August, eleven women in the city kept a log of their harassment experiences, and how the presence (or absence) of catcallers affected their actions.

43. USA: A woman in the USA has recorded more than 50 of her experiences of street harassment over the past few months.

44. USA: SlamPow! Production use humor + anti-street harassment messaging in their creative video “Meat.”

45. USA: Students made this video for their college class HONS201: “Feminism, New Media and Health.”

46. USA: Watch Chescaleigh talk catcalls.

47. Yemen: The Safe Streets campaign released a video about street harassment.

48. I am Not an Object Tumblr’s founder developed a series of 600 “catcalling cards.” They are tiny letterpress cards with a fake number that women who are being followed / aggressively harassed by catcallers can give away so the perp will leave them alone. Once the perpetrator calls the number, he will hear a recording of women telling their harassers exactly what they think of them.


 

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2012 #EndSH Successes Part 1: Campaigns & Protests

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At the end of every year, I like to look back, document and reflect on everything that has transpired in the global movement to end street harassment and assault. Yesterday I wrote about 10 of Stop Street Harassment’s achievements. Today, I’m posting a five-part series about the highlights of ALL activism that happened this year (PDF format). WHAT A YEAR!

Post 1 (this one): New anti-street harassment campaigns, new initiatives within existing campaigns, and protests.

Post 2: Creative anti-street harassment initiatives.

Post 3: Government initiatives/collaborations

Post 4: New studies, reports, and significant news articles.

Post 5 : Stories from 25 people who stood up to street harassers this year.

Girls from A Long Walk Home in Chicago organized a march around their high school.

1. Global: In March, Stop Street Harassment organized more than 100 groups in more than 20 countries (on five continents) and tens of thousands of people to collectively speak out against street harassment during Meet Us on the Street: International Anti-Street Harassment Week. This is what happened, including rallies, marches, sidewalk chalk messaging, workshops, film screenings, viral videos, safety audits, report releases, street theater, passing out fliers, art exhibits, and more.

2. Global: Hollaback! now has chapters in 60 cities worldwide, and this year they launched an “I’ve Got Your Back” Bystander Campaign in partnership with Green Dot to show bystanders who to intervene, educate them about their options, and allow them to document their successes online. Green dots on the Hollaback! maps show intervention stories. (Read their State of the Streets 2012 report for more information.)

3. Australia: People Against Street Harassment launched in December. Their mission is “confronting street harassment in Sydney via stickering, leafleting, social media and other such sweet guerilla action.”

4. Australia: Cat Calls: Called Out is another new Sydney-based anti-street harassment campaign that works to bring attention to the issue and spread ideas for stopping it.

5. Belgium: In the fall, ELLE launched a Touche Pas à Ma Pote! (Don’t Touch my Girl friend) campaign with the support of local government agencies in Brussels and it includes signs plastered on trams for the next six months.

6. Canada: Women in Cities International is part-way through a multi-year project to conduct a Blueprint project on the theme of “preventing violence against women and girls and improving their security in Canadian cities.” This year, they worked with adolescent girls in the greater Montréal area and held workshops, focus group discussions and training sessions with them. Participants also conducted women’s safety audit walks and they had the opportunity to creatively illustrate their findings and recommendations.

7. Egypt: HarassMap collects street harassment stories on its online map. During 2012, they organized more than 500 HarassMap volunteers who went outside once per month to talk to shop owners, police, doormen and others with a presence in the street about street harassment and to let them know they need to not harass and to stand up if they see harassment happening.

8. Egypt: On June 13, activists in Egypt led a day of online action to speak out against street harassment and sexual violence using the hashtag #EndSH.

9. Egypt: After several mass sexual assaults of women at Tahrir Square and after a woman was murdered by a street harasser, there were numerous protests in the summer and fall (and one protest ended because men swarmed, attacking the protesters).

Photo by Yumna Al-Arashi.

10. Egypt: There were many campaigns against street harassment in Egypt ahead of the Eid holidays. In August, volunteers organized by the Imprint Movement patrolled the streets and subway stations, watching out for harassers and helped police arrest several. In October there was a “Catch a Harasser” initiative, men spray painting harassers, and special harassment reporting hotlines.

11. Egypt: Because there are so many instances of sexual harassment and sexual assault during political protests in Tahrir Square, during political protests in November and December, people volunteered their time to serve as patrollers, working to make the area safe for women. One of the groups is called Tahrir Bodyguard.

12. India: College students in Mumbai organized a Chal Hatt Tharki campaign asking women to raise their voices against sexual harassment and street harassment.

13. India: In April, thousands of women in Kannur, a district in Kerala, gathered in the city center to ask for the right to travel safely at night and in October in Chandigarh, college students and staff of Government College Sec 42 took to streets to protest street harassment and sexual violence.

14. India: In December, the Patiala-based organization Punjab Today Foundation launched a major awareness movement against what it called the “collective guilt of society” against girls and women called SMASH (Society’s Movement Against Street Harassment).

15. India: The organization Breakthrough launched a bystander campaign for the holiday Diwali in November, because everyone deserves a safe Diwali.

16. India: In July, Blank Noise curated a series of stories about people’s first recollection of experiencing street harassment called Recall. In December, they launched the #SafeCityPledge campaign.

Image from I Stand for Safe Delhi

17. India: After a 23-year-old college woman was brutally gang rape and nearly murdered by six men on a bus (and her male friend was also beaten up by them) in mid-December, tens of thousands of people in Delhi have protested and marched daily, calling for an end to street harassment, rape, and all forms of sexual violence. For a time, they clashed with police who forbad people from gathering in groups larger than five people.

18. Jordan: In July, youth in Jordan formed a human chain from Al Hussein Sports City to the Interior Ministry Circle to protest various gender-based crimes, including street harassment, the practice of forcing rape survivors to marry their rapist, and honor killings.

19. Lebanon: Hundreds of people rallied in Beirut, Lebanon, in January to protest rape and sexual harassment and the weak laws against such crimes. The rally was organized by Nasawiya, a feminist collective that also runs The Adventures of Salwa campaign against street and sexual harassment.

20. Myanmar: In February, a new anti-harassment campaign launched called “whistle for help.” As part of the campaign 150 volunteers distributed whistles and pamphlets to women at eight busy bus stops in Yangon each Tuesday morning that month and they’ve continued to do so for nine months. The pamphlets tell women to blow the whistle when they experience sexual harassment on the bus and advises them to help other women when they blow the whistle.

21. Malawi: Women’s groups organized a protest in January, demanding the right to wear pants and mini-skirts and to demanding an end to sexual violence. Their actions were prompted by a series of attacks from gangs of men who targeted women wearing pants and short skirts.

22. Nepal: In April, 500 youth participated in a Walk for Respect against street harassment/sexual harassment in Kathmandu.

23. Nepal: After a 2011 ActionAid Report showed that street harassment is a big problem in Nepal, numerous groups came together to launch the Safe City Nepal campaign. It includes a public transportation component. Already, they have conducted a safety audit (evidence collection), held forums, and are now working on policy advocacy initiatives.

24. Peru: In February, university faculty and students launched the anti-street harassment initiative el Observatorio Virtual contra el Acoso Sexual Callejero. They have 20 volunteers who conduct interview and research on the topic, share information on their website and social media, meet with government officials, engage in awareness campaigns, and speak out against groups/people who dismiss street harassment (e.g. in September a radio show talked about street harassment as compliments and they protested it, issued a statement, etc).

25. Russia: This year the feminist group RosNahal tackled street harassment. They made a video about it (it has over two million views) and engaged in lobbying and activism that has led the Russian government to take notice.

26. Sri Lanka: Sri Lanka Unites organized the “S.H.O.W You Care” project. After receiving training, hundreds of young men boarded more than 1000 buses across a week and, according to a previously formulated strategic plan, apologized to women in the buses for any harassment they encountered in the past and provided them with information on legal recourse available to them. They also told men to take responsibility and not harass.

27. South Africa: After two teenagers wearing miniskirts were harassed and groped by a group of 50-60 men at a taxi rank, around 3,000 South Africans marched through Johannesburg in protest. The ruling African National Congress Women’s League organized the march to emphasize “that women had the right wear whatever they wanted without fear of victimization.”

28. South Africa: A new campaign against street harassment in Cape Town launched this year.

29. UK: Laura Bates launched the Everyday Sexism Project in the spring, in part because of her own street harassment experiences and other ways she faces daily sexism. In September she wrote, “The project is an ever-increasing collection of thousands of stories of sexism experienced by women around the world. In just over 5 months, the project has received nearly 6500 entries, with the last 5000 flooding in in just the last month as the momentum has gathered and word has spread.”

30. USA: Halloween in Isla Vista, the college town where University of California Santa Barbara is located, is a huge party every year. Unfortunately, some people use this as an excuse to street harass and assault people. In October, two student groups teamed up to organize a campaign against street harassment.

31. USA: Members of Penn State’s TRIOTA, the Women’s Studies Honor’s Society, held an anti-street harassment demonstration on a busy Friday afternoon in downtown State College in October. They held signs proclaiming their anti-harassment message, and even included specific remarks that had been yelled at them during their time at PSU.

32. USA: In March, Sarah Harper launched the Little Bird project to raise awareness about street harassment through the arts in San Francisco, California.

33. USA: Since January 1, 2012, at least 63 transgender individuals have been hatefully murdered, often by strangers in the streets, and many of the recent murders have been in Washington, DC. In September the DC Office of Human Rights launched a groundbreaking Transgender and Gender Identity Respect Campaign to improve the treatment of transgender and gender non-conforming people.

34. Yemen: This year, the Safe Streets campaign has encouraged women to report their stories to their website and highlighted the issue through social media and articles like this one, published on Open Democracy.

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