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Flashers, masturbators, and gropers beware

August 9, 2010 By HKearl

Guys who feel like masturbating, flashing, or groping people on the subway better think twice unless they want to get caught and charged with a crime. Thanks to cell phone cameras, it’s easier than ever for people to snap photos of perpetrators and report the crimes.

HollaBack NYC has long advocated for the use of cell phone pictures to shame harassers and report those who cross the line to criminal activity. In fact, the idea for the blog was born after a woman in NYC used her cell phone to snap a picture of a subway masturbator and report him.

[Update: If you’re in the Astoria area of NYC, look out for this alleged subway sexual assaulter and if you see him, contact the police. The woman snapped his picture and has reported him]

A few months ago in Washington, D.C., a photo of a metro station upskirter and groper posted on HollaBack DC! helped lead to his arrest.

Via CNN

And now in Boston, CNN reports that a MBTA rider’s cell phone picture posted on Twitter led to the arrest of a subway flasher.

“Rider Nay Khun was riding the train Wednesday afternoon when he spotted the suspect ‘fidgeting with his crotch area with his zipper open and his penis exposed,’ according to the MBTA.

Khun immediately posted to his Twitter account a photo of the man, saying ‘pervert on the 2nd car of the red line … help me report him.’

The man is a known offender, MBTA police told CNN affiliate WHDH.

He was arrested Friday for open and gross lewdness, according to a statement from MBTA police.”

Nice work Khun and a big thank you to the Boston transit authority and police for taking this issue seriously.

No matter where you live, if you can, take pictures of harassers and post them online. If they grope, stalk, threaten, or masturbate at you, report them! Let’s use technology to our advantage and put these creeps on notice. They should know there will be consequences for their actions.

(Thanks Violet Kittappa, Director of Research and Development for Hollaback NYC, for the CNN story tip)

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Filed Under: News stories Tagged With: CNN, groping, hollaback, masturbation, MBTA, Nay Khun, sexual assault, subway groper, subway masturbator, upskirt photo, using photos to report a crime

Welcome to 2006…or at least 2009, CNN

March 30, 2010 By HKearl

Warning – Possibly Triggering

On the CNN homepage is an article about the horrible Japanese video game RapeLay. In the game, players can grope girls on the subway and rape them in various locations. I covered this disgusting game twice last year, including linking to Equality Now’s call to action to write to various groups protesting the game. I also cover this game in my forthcoming book in the context of the outrageous problem of men groping women and teenage girls on the subway system in Japan.

I’m glad CNN is reporting on this issue because it’s a ridiculous, harmful game that should not even exist. But where were they last year when women’s groups and blogs were up in arms over it, or even better, in 2006 when it first came out? I get frustrated by how little or how late or how out of context (ie not addressing the context of misogyny and gender inequality these stories take place in) mainstream news tends to address egregious stories about men’s violence against women, usually taking place in real life, but also, as this story, shows, in virtual life.

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Filed Under: News stories Tagged With: CNN, japanese rape game, rapelay, sexual assault

The cost of living in a patriarchal society

October 27, 2009 By HKearl

On Saturday, a group of teenage boys gang raped a 15 year old girl for two-and-a-half hours outside a high school homecoming dance in Northern California. Police say as many as four teenage boys raped her and probably as many as 15 boys stood around watching, doing nothing to stop it or help her.

CNN is reporting that “The victim was found unconscious and ‘brutally assaulted’ under a bench shortly before midnight Saturday, after police received a call from someone in the area who had overheard people at the assault scene ‘reminiscing about the incident.'”

These boys brutalized her so badly that she was in critical condition and had to be flown to hospital. As of Monday, she is in stable condition. Everything about this incident and its outcome are upsetting and outrageous!! (Including CNN using the passive voice to describe the incident and engaging in subtle victim blaming by printing a quote from someone who said she ended up with the guys of her own free will.)

While one of the police officers investigating the case says he can’t believe not one of the bystanders did anything, I am not. Maddeningly, her damaged body, and likely damaged life, is the outcome of living in a patriarchal society where boys and men are encouraged and encourage each other to be aggressive and prove their masculinity through sexual “conquests.”

In my street harassment book research, I’ve learned a lot about this, including male homosociality, which is the idea that many men are socialized to be more eager to please other men than women and may use women as pawns to prove their masculinity and impress each other. Telling sexist jokes and harassing and assaulting women (particularly gang rape) are examples of this behavior. In the Macho Paradox, Jackson Katz discussed in great length how men may feel pressured to participate in or stand quietly by while their friends participate in sexist and even violent behaviors in order to be accepted and “manly.”

The definition of masculinity in our society is so narrowly defined that actions like showing compassion, standing up to “manly” men, and not engaging in sexist or violent behavior – and telling other men to stop – threatens it and what it means “to be a man.” Some men even harass and beat up other men who threaten the definition (most notably, male members of the LGBQT community). So it’s easier for most men to stay quiet and/or participate.

This all directly relates to street harassment, too. For example, the more than 800 women who took my informal, anonymous online survey last fall said they are more fearful when they are harassed by a man who is part of a group or by multiple men in a group than when a lone man harasses them.

If you ask girls and women how they would feel about encountering a group of guys while they’re alone in a deserted area, I bet the fear of gang rape and assault would be quite tangible, even if the men did not harass them. Why? Because even if we don’t know terms like “homosociality” or “hegemonic masculinity” and haven’t read the theories behind such terms, we know that most men are less like to stop or to listen to women when they are in groups. We know they want to impress their friends and many of them will do that at all costs. We know it’s best to book it out of there as fast as we can before they decide to do anything. And guess what, even if this isn’t true of all men, we don’t know which ones it will be true for. Our safety is not worth the risk of trusting a group of male strangers. (and if you say that’s unfair to boys and men who don’t hurt women, I agree, let’s do something about it!)

Katz and groups like Men Can Stop Rape work on bystander intervention with men, including brainstorming and role playing ways they can intervene when they hear sexist talk and witness gender-based violence. They discuss issues of masculinity and the importance of speaking out even if its scary and emphasize that chances, are there are other guys who feel the same way but are too scared to speak out. It’s very important work and I hope more and more groups will use incorporate bystander work in their efforts to make the world a safer place.

Also, working to ease gender socialization and the values given to each gender and their stereotyped traits is important work and it is something we can all do in our daily lives. We can help make sure men – and women – are not penalized for speaking out when they see something wrong. For example we can  eliminate language like “pussy” “wuss” and “girl” when talking about male behavior that is not “macho” and not make fun of boys or men who show their sensitive side. We can encourage people we know to always stand up for what is right even if they think it will make them unpopular. And we can do the same (This is something I struggle with. When I look back at my life, the times I feel most ashamed of myself are when I was too scared to speak up to someone bullying someone else).

Thoughts?

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Filed Under: News stories Tagged With: CNN, gang rape, gender socialization, hegemonic masculinity, homecoming dance, male homosociality, sexual assault

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