Stop Street Harassment

Making Public Spaces Safe and Welcoming

16 Days – Day 7: A Job for a Woman

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Each day across the 16 Days of Activism Against Gender-Based Violence, we will highlight a 2018 activism effort undertaken to stop street harassment or a personal story about stopping harassers!

Day #7: A Job for a Woman

Image via BBC

In Belgium, sexism in public places is illegal under a law passed in 2014. This year, the first charge was made using the law. A female police officer questioned a man after he jaywalked, and he said in response to her, “Shut your mouth, I don’t talk to women, being a police officer is not a job for women.” Apparently it IS a job for women (more than 30 percent of Belgium’s 40,000 police officers are women), and she arrested him. He was fined 3,000 euros.

Sexism, according to the law, is defined as “every gesture or deed” that is “clearly meant to express contempt of a person based on sex,” or considers a person inferior based on sex, or reduces a person solely to a sexual dimension, and which “gravely affects the dignity of that person as a result.”

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Day 5: International Anti-Street Harassment Week

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Hello Day 5!

Here are photos from the week  | Here are the media hits

Watch the Google+ Hangout Panel with activists from Kenya, Romania and USA.

There was a #CASSchats twitter chat with Collective Action for Safe Spaces and Me=You: Sexual Violence Awareness (MYSVA).

CASS Chats_

Here are examples of the events that took place today:

  • Bahamas: Hollaback Bahamas held a “Chalk ‘n’ Chat”

4.14.16 Bahamas

  • Canada: Women in Cities International and Interviewer Noémie Bourbonnais  and Sound Recorder Lucie Pagès did on-the-street interviews about street harassment and sidewalk chalking in Montreal.
4.14.16 WICI Montreal -Interviewee (left), Interviewer Noémie Bourbonnais (centre left), Sound Recorder Lucie Pagès (centre right), and Camerawoman Kathleen Ellis (right)) 4.14.16 WICI Montreal - Interviewer Noémie Bourbonnais (right) discussing street harassment with an interviewee (left) 4.14.16 WICI Montreal - chalking 3
  • France: Chalking in Lyon, flyering in Toulouse
4.14.16 Stop HDR Lyon France 6 4.14.16 Stop HDR Lyon France 7 4.14.16 Stop HDR Lyon France

4.14.16 Toulouse, France

  • Nepal: Youth Advocacy Nepal (YAN) – in partnership with various like-minded social organizations – organized an interaction on “Harassment and violence towards women in public spaces and legal issues” at National women commission hall, Bhdardrakali.
4.14.16 -2Youth Advocacy Nepal (YAN) in partnership with others organized 'Harassment and violence towards women in public spaces and legal issues' 2 4.14.16 -3Youth Advocacy Nepal (YAN) in partnership with others organized 'Harassment and violence towards women in public spaces and legal issues' 4.14.16 Youth Advocacy Nepal (YAN) in partnership with others organized 'Harassment and violence towards women in public spaces and legal issues'
  • Yemen: To Be for Rights and Freedom will host an event in connection with an anti-street harassment campaign. At the event, NGOs will display relevant survey results, films, and share stories. [RESCHEDULED DUE TO FLOODING]
  • Iowa: End Street Harassment – Iowa City will host a support group for individuals who have experienced street harassment to share their experiences in a safe environment. Participants can create posters and other art projects for display to raise awareness and protest street harassment. Meet in Room E on the second floor of the downtown public library, 123 S. Linn Street. [6:30 – 8 p.m.]
4.14.16 Iowa City support group 4.14.16 Iowa City support group 9 4.14.16 Iowa City support group 11
  • New York: Brooklyn Movement Center will host an event at which participants will use improv and storytelling techniques to reimagine ways they would have responded to harassment, with time travel and community support on their side [6:30 – 8:30 p.m., Friends and Lovers, 641 Classon Ave, Brooklyn, NY]
  • Pennsylvania: Students at Temple University in Philadelphia put up posters around campus.

4.14.16 Temple University signs - Philadelphia, PA

Virtual Efforts:

Afghanistan:

4.14.16 Streetharassment prevents women and girls and their families from getting an educationStreet harassment prevents women and girls and their families from getting an education Afghanistan “Harassing women is not entertainment. It is a crime.”“Harassing women is not entertainment. It is a crime. 4.10.16 Afghanistan - i have the right to go shopping without being harassed

Belgium:

Free Tai-Ji Movement Pepingen Belgium
Free Tai-Ji Movement Pepingen Belgium

Ecuador:

4.14.16 Hollaback Cuenca - Ecuador 2 4.14.16 Hollaback Cuenca Ecuador 4.14.16 Hollaback Cuenca - Ecuador 8

South Africa:

4.14.16 ActionAidSouth Africa 4.14.16 ActionAid South Africa
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Brussels Makes Offensive Speech Punishable by Fines

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Posing like the tourist that I was in downtown Brussels

Many verbal forms of street harassment are meant to humiliate, annoy or anger the recipient (e.g. sexually explicit language, demands for a smile, calling someone a bitch, dike, fag, or whore) and those forms should, in my opinion, be considered hate speech or, at the very least, offensive speech.

Maybe I should move to Brussels.

Officials in Brussels recently updated their “Regulation of Public conduct” to make offensive language spoken in public spaces in the city punishable by fines. This includes racist and homophobic comments and sexual harassment.

Via International Business Times:

“City officials in Belgium’s capital Brussels recently announced a set of new fines that target use of offensive language in public.

“Any form of insult is from now on punishable, whether it be racist, homophobic or otherwise,” Brussels Mayor Freddy Thielemans’ spokesperson quoted him as saying.

Authorities plan to impose fines of between 75 and 250 euros for using offensive language in public, including sexual harassment, in an attempt to not only deter potential offenders, but to encourage law enforcement to crack down on such behavior.

The mayor’s spokesman said the courts had previously been too busy to take on such cases, which resulted in police having “little incentive to take any action over such incidents,” the Daily Telegraph reported.”

I didn’t see it mentioned in any articles, but presumably now the courts will be able to take on these cases?

Visit Hollaback Brussels’ website to learn more about this change and their thoughts about it.

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Full Video: Street Harassment in Brussels

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Belgian Sofie Peeters created a documentary about street harassment in Brussels for her school project and it is generating a lot of online conversations and articles. One point of contention is how she says immigrant men are the main people who harass her  (perhaps because it’s a high immigrant area?).

What’s fantastic is how the film seems to be prompting substantial offline action. Hollaback Brussels told me that soon, “in Mechelen [near Brussels] there will be undercover cops handing out fines to harassers.”

I also read that, “A new law is due to come to force this fall in Belgium which will fight street harassment. Victims of leering, honking or whistling and sexual harassment, will have to report a violation so the police can investigate.” I’m researching this law, so stay tuned for more information.

MRC TV posted a video segment that includes an interview with Peeters and her whole video (up to this point, only a two minute preview has been available online). There are English subtitles.

What do you think?

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