Stop Street Harassment

Making Public Spaces Safe and Welcoming

Muslims Belong Here: Marching in D.C.

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Via the Guardian:

“Thousands of protesters gathered and marched in cities and at airports across the US on Sunday, in opposition to the executive order from Donald Trump which imposed a freeze on refugee admissions and a ban on travel from seven Muslim-majority countries….

Around 100 people were held at airports on Friday and Saturday. Many were released as a dramatic court victory for the American Civil Liberties Union in New York on Saturday night saw a federal judge place a temporary stay on the order and rule that all those held should be released.

But by late afternoon on Sunday, travellers remained in custody at various airports, with attorneys reporting that some border agents were refusing to comply with the judge’s order.”

Myself and two of our DC-area Stop Street Harassment board members attended the Washington, D.C. protest. We also met up with Chai, the c0-founder of Collective Action for Safe Spaces.

We rallied at the white house and then marched down 15th Street, up Pennsylvania Ave to the U.S. Capitol and then back.  There was a huge pocket of people protesting along the route in front of Trump Towers. Basically waves of people marched from 1 p.m. until well after 4 p.m.; when I passed the white house en rote to my car around 4:45 pm, groups of people were still heading down 15th street, marching.

Trump has made a lot of executive orders that I’ve disagreed with during his first week in office, but this one is having an immediate, scary and unfair impact on people’s lives. Many members of congress have spoken out and even Dick Cheney, who I didn’t think could do anything but evil, has come out against this move by Trump.

No doubt Islamaphobia will be on the rise in public spaces in the USA by emboldened Trump supporters. This is not okay. Everyone should be and feel welcome in our country, no matter their religion or country of origin.

Chai

#NoMuslimBan #RefugeesWelcome #Resist

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Policing Women’s Bodies in France

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In France, police are literally policing women’s bodies.

Via Guardian:

“Photographs have emerged of armed French police confronting a woman on a beach and making her remove some of her clothing as part of a controversial ban on the burkini.

Authorities in several French towns have implemented bans on the Burkini, which covers the body and head, citing concerns about religious clothing in the wake of recent terrorist killings in the country.

The images of police confronting the woman in Nice on Tuesday show at least four police officers standing over a woman who was resting on the shore at the town’s Promenade des Anglais, the scene of last month’s Bastille Day lorry attack.

After they arrive, she appears to remove a blue long-sleeved tunic, although one of the officers appears to take notes or issue an on-the-spot fine.

The photographs emerged as a mother of two also told on Tuesday how she had been fined on the beach in nearby Cannes wearing leggings, a tunic and a headscarf.

Her ticket, seen by French news agency AFP, read that she was not wearing “an outfit respecting good morals and secularism”.

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Islamophobia Spreads – But Some Challenge It

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After the recent attacks in Paris and San Bernardino, California, which were both carried out by Islamic radicals, there has been an increase in Islamophobia. For example, in the U.S., we have seen support for terrible ideas like banning all Muslims from this country or rejecting Syrian refugees fleeing ISIS. This is despite that fact that around one billion other Muslims are perfectly peaceful and 70 thousand Muslim clerics have issued a fatwa denouncing terrorist organizations and attacks.

The rise is Islamophobia also plays out in public spaces. For example, NPR recently produced a story about an increase in backlash and harassment toward Muslim women who wear hijabs.

Other countries are seeing a rise in harassment, too. In the UK, the Independent reported “that there’s been a sharp increase in hate crimes towards British Muslims after the Paris attacks. In the week following the killings, there have been 115 incidents mostly towards girls and women aged between 14 and 45.”

Fortunately, various media outlets are speaking out against this behavior, like the Washington Post: “In communities across America, we are turning on each other, on the very neighbors who have been part of the fabric of our country for decades…The rhetoric dominating our nation right now is anything but civil. It’s time for all of us to put a stop to it.”

23-year-old Ruhi Rahman thanked passengers for the support in a Facebook post.
23-year-old Ruhi Rahman thanked passengers for the support in a Facebook post.

Two of my favorite stories of resistance come from the UK:

“23-year-old Ruhi Rahman said a woman sitting next to her jumped in to help after a man started to make racially threatening comments towards her. After the woman intervened, most of the other passengers on the Tyne and Wear Metro also stepped in forcing the man to leave the train…

Last week, a London commuter stepped in to defend a young Muslim woman after she was racially abused in a rant on the tube. 22-year-old Ashley Powys wrote in a Facebook post that he was travelling on a Victoria line train on Nov. 16 when he saw a man in his 30s shouting at the teenager and calling her a terrorist.”

I encourage everyone to stand up and speak out against Islamophobia! It is unwarranted and unacceptable.

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“A sad tale of harassment”

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I am a 23 year old Muslim black female student from the north west of England. I have been continually harassed on the street when coming home from work or university. The men are mainly of Asian or Kurdish descent from the neighbourhood I live in. Despite the fact that I am a confident woman and don’t dress up provocatively, I still get harassed by older who ask for my number and others who call me names. Although there is nothing physical about it, it is unbelievably destroying in terms of self esteem and makes me feel dirty and unsafe. the thing that drive me mad even more is the fact that the white population are unaware of the problem because they are the majority and everyone reveres them.

– anonymous

Location: NW England

Share your street harassment story today and help raise awareness about the problem. Include your location and it will be added to the Street Harassment Map.

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Shake your breasts

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In Mogadishu, Somalia, there are Muslim extremists patrolling the streets and whipping people acting “inappropriately.” For men, this means not having a beard. For women, this means wearing a bra.

Someone can look at a man and determine if he has a beard or not. To find out if women “have natural firmness or if there is assistance from a bra,” the extremists are making them shake their breasts and otherwise publicly scrutinize their breasts. The Australian Herald reports this is sometimes being done at gunpoint. The Daily Mail quotes a woman saying,  “

“‘Al Shabaab forced us to wear their type of full veil and now they order us to shake our breasts,’ a resident, Halima, told Reuters, adding that her daughters had been whipped on Thursday. They  are now saying that breasts should be firm naturally, or just flat.'”

While both reasons for whipping people are ridiculous, at least a man who wants to “play by the rules” can grow a beard and everyone will see that he has grown one.  But women who “play by the rules” and don’t wear a bra still risk being publicly humiliated by this invasive scrutiny to determine whether or not they are wearing a bra.

I’ve never heard of someone being made to shake their breasts because the oppressor viewed a bra as bad — have you? Has this happened or does it happen any where else?

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