Amsterdam Archives | Stop Street Harassment

New Research, Campaign & Photo Project

July 23, 2017 By HKearl

Research conducted by experts at the University of Melbourne in Australia demonstrates how common sexual harassment is in the lives of women and documents the possible impact this can have on how women think about themselves. The full results were published in the British Journal of Social Psychology.

Two key findings are:

1. Women reported being the target of a sexually objectifying event once every two days.

2. Both being personally targeted or witnessing others being objectified was associated with a “substantial increase” in “self-objectification”, proving that instances of sexual harassment can have a negative impact on the way women think about themselves.

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In the Netherlands, Stop Straatintimidatie launched a new campaign against street harassment. Campaign founder Gaya Branderhorst shared, “The message to the public is clear: everyone should be able to walk the streets without harassment,” and “street harassment will be fined in Amsterdam and Rotterdam from 2018 onwards, and other cities are planning to follow soon.” Great!

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In the UK, photojournalist Eliza Hatch created a new photo series called Cheer Up Luv to raise awareness about street harassment. An article for the Guardian states, “Hatch found her female friends had all experienced harassment regularly, while her male friends were shocked by how frequently it occurred. Her photographs often feature women in environments in which they have been harassed, alongside their accounts. ‘I really wanted to capture the woman in her surroundings,’ says Hatch. ‘Instead of it being somewhere where she felt vulnerable, I wanted to make it a stage for her to speak out from. And I wanted you to actually look into her eyes as you’re hearing her story.'”

See more at: instagram.com/cheerupluv

Amsterdam Considers an Anti-Street Harassment Law

February 22, 2016 By HKearl

A member of Straatintimidatie speaking at an event with the Amsterdam mayor. Image via their Facebook page.

Our friends at Burgerinitiatief Boete op Straatintimidatie in the Netherlands (read an interview with founder Gaya Branderhorst) told me that they recently had a discussion on street harassment and swayed the mayor of Amsterdam to address it, including by crafting legislation.

Via Dutch News, here is more info:

“One in three women reports being hassled, spat at or insulted while out in the Dutch capital but this is not currently an offence. Now the local branch of the right-wing VVD wants to change this by amending local laws to cover street intimidation.

The city’s mayor, Eberhard van der Laan, told councillors on Thursday: ‘This sort of behaviour goes against the key values of our society.’

‘And it happens a lot,’ the mayor said. ‘However, there are practical implications because it is difficult to prove and there are often no witnesses.’ Nevertheless, the mayor said he would ask the police and pubic prosecution department to look into the options.

The issue was first raised in Amsterdam by VVD councillor Dilan Yesilgoz at the end of last year. Labour MP Ahmed Marcouch is already working on draft legislation to make verbal harassment of women a criminal offence.”

Portugal just passed a law against street harassment.

Mid-January 2016 News Roundup

January 18, 2016 By HKearl

Here are some recent stories I thought were interesting and good:

“When Taking a Nap Is a Political Act,” Broadly

“What is it like to sleep under a blue sky? To stretch out on the grass and feel the earth under you? To close your eyes and hear the quiet hum of traffic or the chirp of a sparrow?

I have no idea.

The freedom to rest or sleep in a public space is one that women in India don’t enjoy—being idle in public is not something we do. Not because it is illegal, but because we are vulnerable wherever we go. This is increasingly true in recent years,when the country has seen a spate of violent rapes and street harassment.

This weekend, small groups of women across the country (and in neighboring Pakistan) will fight their fear and vulnerability and head to a local park to do nothing but take a siesta. They will carry a mat, a bottle of water, perhaps a snack or a book to read. Then, they will then take a nap. Or try to.

Hosted by the Blank Noise Project, an all-volunteer collective that campaigns against street harassment, this seemingly subtle protest event is called “Meet to Sleep,” and it asks citizens to come together to reclaim public spaces and make cities safer. Started in 2003 by Jasmeen Patheja as part of her graduation project, Blank Noise mobilizes citizen “action heroes” through its projects, events, and campaigns, and it has played a major role in the snowballing discussion surrounding street harassment in India. The organization has been hosting Meet to Sleep events in cities across India since November 2014.”

“The Politics of Being “Ugly”: Between Being Catcalled and Erased,” For Harriet

“….There is a hierarchy of deservingness put on women, girls, femmes, and non-masculine bodies that delegate a culture of misogyny on a violent spectrum. Women who are categorized as beautiful should expect to be sexually harassed, while those who are categorized as ugly should be grateful for the attention and consideration. In addressing this spectrum of violence, we need to complicate our understandings of street harassment and catcalling. Erasure is an equally violent form of misogynistic brutality against our bodies.

We are affected everyday when our safety is based upon someone else’s sexualization or beauty positioning of our bodies in order to determine our worthiness and humanity. Let’s challenge spaces to include narratives and experiences that speak to being ignored, marginalized, or violated for not being “pretty enough” to be humanized. We must demand that our value as human beings—whether we identify as woman, girl, or femme—exist outside of the dominant scope and gaze of rape culture. Our humanity is not currency for survival. We deserve to exist free from fear, free from expectation, and free from misogynistic violence. “

“Uber Says It’s Fighting Sexual Harassment In Egypt But The Causes Aren’t Going Away,” BuzzFeed News

“This October, Uber Egypt partnered with Harassmap, one of the country’s pioneering anti-harassment organizations, to train drivers to fight against sexual harassment — a rarity in Egypt, where sexual harassment of women in Cairo’s chaotic and neglected public transportation is rampant.

“We know that there are big problems here,” Anthony Khoury, general manager of Uber Egypt, which provides only privately-owned cars, a service known as UberX, told BuzzFeed News. “We want to be the safest drivers around.”

Uber Egypt, based in Cairo, committed itself to a zero-tolerance policy against sexual harassment — a phenomenon criminalized under Egyptian law only in 2014, the same year Uber opened here. The move was also savvy branding for the popular car-hailing app, a more than $62 billion franchise, which worldwide has faced waves of legal cases and protests over drivers preying on female passengers and the company’s worker practices.

For Uber users in this megacity — where traffic is notoriously bad and taxis often a hassle — the app is a much-welcomed upgrade to safely navigate daily life. Since October, Khoury said his team has implemented the short anti-harassment training and even suspended and deactivated a few drivers for incidents of verbal harassment, follow-through unheard of with regular taxis, and had no reported cases of physical harassment.

In Egypt’s struggle against sexual harassment, it’s also still a drop in the bucket.

Uber is largely a luxury of the elite — most people in Cairo can’t afford private taxis — and the barriers preventing women from reporting and prosecuting sexual harassment remain terrifyingly tall.”

“‘Make a Grown Man Cry’ Pepper Spray CTA Ads Upset Women Commuters,” DNA Info

“While riding the CTA Blue Line on Tuesday, Jessica White, a Logan Square resident, spotted the ad for Sabre pepper spray.

White said she was “struck by the casual way the ad seemed to make light of violence against women, by not only cracking a joke about making ‘grown men’ cry, but also implying I would be interested in a powder blue keychain attachment as a form of necessary self defense.

“Considering how many assaults occur on and around CTA property, I would think the CTA wouldn’t post ads reminding women not only how dangerous it is to use their services, but also that they’re on their own when it comes to personal safety,” White said…

Kara Crutcher, an Uptown resident whose Courage Campaign tried to raise money to pay for ads to discourage harassment on public transit, said she is “very disappointed” to hear about an ad that makes light of having to use pepper spray.

“Nothing about a person, male or female, carrying mace as a form of protection in public spaces is comical,” Crutcher added. “I’d much rather see an ad that aims to move us past the existence of violence in public spaces, not an ad joking about mace sales, which is counterproductive to the goals of the ‘Courage Campaign: CTA’ and functions solely as a Band-Aid for the greater issue at hand.”

Good work Courage Campaign: CTA for speaking out.

“NYC police boss urges ‘buddy system’ for women in cabs,” AutoBlog

“14 of the city’s reported rapes last year, and two already this year, were committed by for-hire cabbies. And Police Commissioner William Bratton raised eyebrows with comments on the phenomenon that some felt blamed the victims.

‘One of the areas of concern that we have is particularly young women coming out of clubs and bars,’ Commissioner William Bratton said during a radio interview on WNYC. ‘They’re by themselves and intoxicated getting into a cab … and we’ve seen an increase in assaults in those instances. So we’re encouraging women to adopt the buddy system.’

Some women who spoke to The Associated Press about taxi safety said Bratton’s suggestion smacked of sexism.

“It’s the idea that somehow we have a hand in this,” said Jamie Lopez, 20, who works in retail and often takes cabs late at night because she finds them safer than the subway. “It’s not the victim’s fault.”

“Amsterdam men to don miniskirts in support of Cologne women,” NL Times

“Male members of the PvdA, D66, SP and GroenLinks’ youth movements will be protesting in mini-skirts on the Spui in the heart of Amsterdam on Saturday afternoon. They want to show support for women’s rights and their displeasure with Cologne mayor Henriette Reker’s statements following the large number of sexual assaults in the German city over New Year’s…

On Facebook the youth movements invite men, and women, to join their protest on Saturday, wearing miniskirts. “Not women, but men must keep away at arms length. Too often sexual violence against women is put down as a woman-problem: don’t wear short skirts. That is never the solution. Short skirts are not at fault.” they write.

“Therefore we are reversing the rolls and we celebrate the skirt and the freedom that goes with it. We deploy our hairy knees for a free society in which women can walk the streets undisturbed, day and night, on short-skirt day or in the middle of the winter.”

“One in three people in south east bullied in street over looks and weight,” Chichester Observer

“A third of adults living in the south east have received negative comments about their weight or appearance in the street, reveals a survey released this week.

The shocking results come from the survey “Fat Shaming Britain 2016”, for diet company LighterLife – which reveals the scale of the epidemic faced by those with weight issues, and the damaging impact this is having on their live.

The poll, which looked at 1,000 adults, revealed that more than a third of people (39 per cent) lack confidence due to their weight or appearance, which is made worse by the negative comments they have endured from strangers – face to face, via social media, by text and in the street.

And the accusers are closer to home than you might think. An alarming 78 per cent of people abused by strangers had also received derogatory comments, face-to-face, from someone they knew.

Weight was overwhelmingly the main subject of comments – good or bad – confirmed by two thirds (67 per cent). And almost one in three (31 per cent) felt the comments they had received were “maybe” or “definitely” street harassment.”

“This Is What A Feminist Cat Call Sounds Like,” Bustle

“Ubiquitous and nasty, street harassment is an experience most women are intimately acquainted with. Now, thanks to the incisive folks on Twitter, feminist cat calls are a thing, revealing the true absurdity of this misogynistic practice as only humor can. Although it’s unlikely real men out there will start yelling informed and intelligent twists on the usual sexist garbage talk, with enough support, maybe, just maybe, these tweets will start a revolution.”

The Netherlands: Demystifying Dutch Tolerance

October 26, 2015 By Correspondent

Eve Aronson, Amsterdam, the Netherlands, SSH Blog Correspondent

Have you heard of the Dutch Myth of Tolerance? It’s not a myth in the mythical sense, and it’s not a fairytale, though it does sound admittedly magical.

Since the 17^th century, the Netherlands has been a smorgasbord of races, ethnicities and religions and has continuously championed itself on what are known as “pillars” of tolerance.

The Dutch Myth of Tolerance is reflective of the disintegration of these pillars towards what has become an increasingly harsh critique of the narrative of ‘acceptance and multiculturalism’ in the Netherlands (or the lack thereof).

At first, the presence of this myth throughout my research was subtle. People told me about their experiences of street harassment and may have thrown in some (racially) identifying characteristics of their harassers. But after several months, it became evident that a more solid smokescreen lurked, and that the notion of Dutch pluralism and tolerance was not always as strong as it presented itself to be.

When people talk about street harassment in Amsterdam, it is not uncommon to highlight the race or ethnicity of one’s harassers, particularly if they are of Moroccan or Turkish decent, two of the largest minority populations in the Netherlands. Often times, the harasser is also tied to a particular neighborhood. For example, one person I talked to said: “In my experience, harassment was worse in neighborhoods with a lot of immigrants from cultures…Moroccans for example.” Another echoed: “A lot of catcalling, primarily from members of black communities”.

A report released in March of this year by the city of Amsterdam also highlighted particular minority-populated neighborhoods and communities as being more affected by street harassment, which arguably worked to further emphasize the link between street harassment and race or ethnicity.

Many of you might also recall the October 2014 video of a woman walking through the streets of New York in the US. The video heavily criticized for selectively showing a disproportionate number of men of color harassing the (white) woman in the video. Emphasizing connections between street harassment, race and location is not only completely inaccurate; it also strips accountability from a significant proportion of harassers who fall outside of these stereotypes and who are harassing women in Amsterdam just as often.

Below is a map of locations tagged by 48 respondents of a recent street harassment survey that I conducted in Amsterdam. Take a good look at where the majority of incidents are reported:

(Source: BatchGeo 2015)

The majority of the geotagged incidents were reported in the center of the city, mostly around touristy areas and not in areas of the city known to have large minority populations (Biljmer, Zuid-Oost and Oost, for example). What this data does then, is encourage a revisiting of stereotypes of street harassment in Amsterdam, albeit from a purely geographic perspective. And this is just a start. The more stereotypes are checked—particularly using visual tools and visualizations—the more people are realizing that street harassment extends beyond race, ethnicity and geographical area.

What kind of impact does this have on the ground? Understanding street harassment as part of broader power structures does not mean that everyone gets this memo, and in this vein, individuals’ lived experiences are critical to take into account. But without denying individual experiences with street harassment, it is important to underline the implications of making generalized statements about races or communities.

Starting up a Hollaback! in Amsterdam is one way to work towards exposing exactly what happens on the ground and where. Geotagging experiences of street harassment not only confronts the Dutch Myth of Tolerance but it also provides an important starting point for conversations about street harassment and race in the Netherlands. Coupled with other awareness-raising initiatives and campaigns, addressing racial stereotyping in conversations about street harassment through such visual tools also encourages a look at street harassment through a much broader lens—one that unfortunately does not make the fight against street harassment easier but who said this was going to be easy? Ultimately, what taking a more comprehensive approach to street harassment does, is it makes the work more strategic and more effective in the long run.

You can find the full analysis of the Amsterdam survey results here or by contacting Eve at evearonson@gmail.com. Follow Eve and Hollaback! Amsterdam on Twitter at @evearonson and @iHollaback_AMS and show your support by liking Hollaback! Amsterdam’s Facebook page here.

Hollaback! Amsterdam: Starting, Launching and Sustaining a Movement

April 14, 2015 By Contributor

Guest Blog Post for International Anti-Street Harassment Week 2015

In December 2014, I was sitting in front of my computer scanning for resources for research I was conducting on street harassment in Amsterdam. What I found was a few scattered blog posts about individuals’ experiences being catcalled or groped throughout the city and their frustrations with the lack of attention and action around the issue.

I kept searching and came across a current campaign by a local group called Straat Intimidatie (Street Intimidation). Their goal is to demand legislation against street harassment from Dutch politicians. This seemed very promising. I reached out to the founder of the group, Gaya Branderhorst and as we spoke, it became clear: Amsterdam has a big problem. A problem that many of its residents, including women, people of color and LGBTQI people, don’t feel safe or comfortable in public spaces.

I put out a feeler through local activist circles and social media networks. Within just a few months, the Hollaback! Amsterdam was team was formed. There are five of us of four different nationalities, including Dutch, German, Honduran and American. Some of us identify as LGBTQI, some as feminists, and all have at least a handful (if not several handfuls) of stories of experiencing street harassment. These experiences are what inspired us to join the movement in Amsterdam and are what motivate us to fight street harassment in our city.

Because we are an all-volunteer group, launching a brand new site and preparing for a major launch event this week (April 14) has been incredibly rewarding, but also not without challenges. We have met some amazing and dedicated people through this process who are working on issues of street harassment, domestic violence, gender equality, humanitarian response and human rights. We have had a lot of interest in what we are doing expressed through our Facebook page and Twitter feed. However, every one of us, besides launching Hollaback! Amsterdam, is also working full-time, a full-time student or both working and studying.

Despite each of us juggling Hollaback! with our busy lives, it has been truly inspiring to work with a group of people so committed to such an important cause. As we approach our launch event in April, we are motivated by all of the support, engagement and inspiration we’ve received from residents of Amsterdam, communities within the Netherlands and supporters worldwide.

Eve Aronson is the Co-director of Hollaback! Amsterdam