Making Public Spaces Safe and Welcoming
Our partner Safecity has just released their Safecity Mobile App! It offers resources, allows you to report sexual violence in public spaces and more. It’s available for free on the Google and Apple play stores and is available in English, Hindi and Spanish.
Watch this video to see the features of the app.
More recent news:
USA Today, “China introduces female-only bus service“
“A female-only bus service aimed at protecting women from sexual harassment launched this week in China, drawing praise and criticism.
The Zhengzhou 3rd bus company introduced the service on a popular route in the central city of Zhengzhou. It will run during busy commuting hours until early August.
“During the summer, women usually wear thinner clothes, making it easier for them to be harassed in crowded buses. … The all-female service will increase their convenience and safety,” said Kong Chaoping, the firm’s chairman, according to the Beijing Youth Daily newspaper.
The buses are recognizable by their big red signs that read, “Female-only.” They have stuffed animals and other kids’ toys suspended from the ceiling.
Sexual harassment is a common yet largely ignored problem on China’s public transportation system. More than 50% of women have experienced inappropriate touching or body contact while using the country’s trains and buses, a survey by the China Youth Daily newspaper found last year.
In 2014, the Women’s Federation of Guangzhou, a state-affiliated group, found that 85% of all sexual assaults in Guangzhou, a city in southern China, occurred while victims used the city’s public transportation network.”
Quartz, “Thousands of Mexican women are talking about sexual harassment for the first time“
“Rarely publicly acknowledged in Mexico, sexual harassment is being surfaced via Twitter hashtag #MiPrimerAcoso, or #MyFirstHarassment, by women posting their first experiences with male bullying and by others wanting to have an open discussion. Hundreds of thousands of posts have circulated in the last three days.
The drive, started by a Colombian columnist (link in Spanish) on Saturday, is reinforcing the issue after demonstrations Sunday (April 24) in Mexico City and other major cities attracted thousands of women. The Twitter record, a poignant collection of heartfelt confidences, will probably prove more powerful…
#MiPrimerAcoso reveals that many women first experienced harassment as girls, as young as five and six years old. The perpetrators of the abuse span a wide range, from relatives—older cousins and uncles are mentioned frequently—to policemen, to random strangers, and in one case, a therapist.”
Waging Nonviolence, “Mexican feminists declare a ‘violet spring’ on nationwide day of action“
“Tens of thousands of feminists protested across Mexico on Sunday, amid what they say is an epidemic of violence against women.
“We’re sick of suffering all kinds of abuse when we just walk in the street,” said Mari, a protester in the central Mexican city of Puebla, who was joined by hundreds of activists in Puebla’s city center, demanding justice for victims of femicide.
When the march reached the state government offices, activists accused local authorities of failing to bring perpetrators of violence to justice. One masked protester shouted, “The government here in Puebla lets them get away with impunity,” adding, “This isn’t just in Puebla, but all of Mexico.”
Declaring a “violet spring,” protesters called on women across Mexico to take a stand against sexism. One of the largest protests took place in Mexico City, where organizers railed against Mexico’s traditionally machista, or sexist, culture.
“It is evident that we need social re-education — to teach men not to harass, not violate, not hit, not threaten, not enslave, not abuse and not kill women and girls,” organizers said in a statement.”
The Verge, “India mandates panic button on all phones to help keep women safe“
“All mobile phones sold in India will be required to have a panic button as of next year, the country’s telecommunications ministry announced this week, as part of an effort to enhance safety for women. As Bloomberg reports, the order requires handset makers to implement an emergency feature that could be activated by holding down the numbers 5 or 9 on a keypad. The function will be mandatory on all phones by January 1st, 2017, while GPS navigation systems will be mandatory on all devices by 2018.
Women’s safety in India has drawn worldwide attention following reports of gang rapes and other forms of violence. There were more than 330,000 reported cases of violence against women in 2014, according to government statistics, up 9 percent from the previous year. The issue has spurred some companies to develop apps and services that make it easier for women to contact emergency services. India’s minister for women and child development, Maneka Gandhi, pushed for mandated panic buttons last year.”
‘Technology is solely meant to make human life better and what better than using it for the security of women,’ Communications Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad said in a statement.”
attn: “This Man’s Attempt to Take Upskirt Photos Just Backfired in an Extreme Way“
“A shocking piece of footage, in which a man eats his camera’s memory card after being caught allegedly filming upskirt videos, is gaining international attention.
According to the Chinese Publication People’s Daily, the video was filmed by a woman caught the alleged Peeping Tom in the act while riding the subway. The woman who shot the footage goes by the name Xiao Cha Cha A, Daily Mail reports. She posted the video on the Chinese social media service Weibo, with a caption reading, “I had tried to block his view a few times but he kept on taking them. I must expose him!”
In the video, the Xiao Cha Cha A is seen tugging at the man’s bag, and yelling, “delete the pictures, delete them. Look everybody, here is a pervert who takes upskirt pictures of women,” Daily Mail reports.
The man then eats his SD card. It is unclear if the woman forces him to do so, or if he eats the card voluntarily to destroy the evidence. In the final seconds of the 1:01-long video, the man can be seen fleeing the subway car.”
The Source, “[Los Angeles] Metro’s new anti-sexual harassment video“
“Metro launched its “Off Limits” campaign last spring in an effort to reduce sexual harassment on buses and trains. The campaign was a direct response to riders identifying this as an issue in Metro’s customer surveys.”
Here are two new initiatives to address street harassment!
Newsweek, “Female Entrepreneurs Launch Online Sexual Harassment Tracker in Beirut“
“Three female entrepreneurs have kickstarted a sexual harassment tracker in Beirut in the hope of combating crimes against women in the Lebanese capital.
A beta version of Harass Tracker—launched on Monday—will provide a three-month trial in the city after which, if successful, it will be expanded across the entire country.
The platform is essentially an online reporting tool where people who have witnessed or experienced sexual harassment can mark the location on a map of the city and provide information regarding the type of sexual harassment that they encountered, alongside a description of the event.
The three founders of the initiative—Sandra Hassan, who is based in France, Myra El Mir and Nay El Rahi, both in Lebanon—hope to “empower victims to report” these crimes and “raise awareness as to the frequency and severity of sexual harassment in the city,” Hassan, who developed the tracker, tells Newsweek by email.
“In the longer term, we hope to use the data collected to offer recommendations on how to tackle this issue practically as well as contribute to a shift in perception with regards to sexual harassment.”
Kera News, “Young women in Kosovo are writing code to fight harassment“
“Women and girls in Kosovo almost never report these incidents, which are exceedingly common. But a new mobile app called Ec Shlirë — Walk Freely in Albanian — hopes to change that.
Ec Shlirë, which launched on Thursday, is inspired by Hollaback, an American movement to report street harassment. The Kosovar app gives users the ability to discreetly report instances of sexual harassment of all types. The reports will be visualized on an interactive map and will be sent to the authorities.
While individual perpetrators won’t be identified, the data gathered by the app will allow Kosovars to actually see the full extent of sexual harassment and will also put pressure on the authorities to respond.
“In Kosovo a lot of women who experience harassment don’t go report it directly to the police, because the police may not take one incident of harassment on the street so seriously,” says programmer Albana Dulaj. “If we have more reports, I believe they’ll take it more seriously.”
Dulaj is among 30 young women who built the app as part of a group called Girls Coding Kosova.
The development of Ec Shlirë also is helping address another problem in Kosovo: the lack of women in the tech industry.”
Does street harassment really happen that often? Doesn’t it just happen in big cities? Doesn’t it just happen in “bad” neighborhoods?
Maps are an easy way to help SHOW that street harassment happens all the time and everywhere. Do you want to help raise awareness about street harassment? Consider doing so with maps.
1. When you share your street harassment stories for this blog, add the location so I can add it to my Global Street Harassment Map. You can do the same if you live in Washington, DC, and submit a story to HollaBack DC!
2. Donate to Hollaback NYC’s Kickstart initiative to launch a phone app that will allow anyone to map their street harassment incident in real time (they have until May 28 to raise $12k – please help now!).
3. Create your own map of street harassment incidents, just as the two women I will profile next have done.
Hannah’s and Valerie’s Street Harassment Maps
First up is Hannah, a cinema student at the University of Iowa who recently created her own street harassment map. I asked her a few questions about it.
Regarding the impact of street harassment on her life, she said,
“Street harassment, both what’s happened to me and what’s happened to other people, makes me afraid to walk down the street. I dress in a certain way to try to avoid it, though I think my map proves how ineffective that is. I also take certain routes, like avoiding downtown if at all possible, simply to avoid being harassed.”
As to why she created her own map, she told me:
“I think it’s really interesting how many things have happened to me, personally, and I feel that what has happened to me has largely been different from what people typically associate with street harassment. I feel like the myth is that women who dress ‘provocatively’ and/or are really pretty are the only people who are harassed. I’m evidence to the contrary. I’m pretty plain – I’m curvy, too, and a little overweight on top of that – and I like to dress comfortably, which for me is in loose-fitting clothing that covers my knees and my upper arms. I don’t like to show a lot of skin, and I don’t wear tight clothes. Another common misconception is that street harassment only comes from, say, construction crews, or truck drivers, men like that. I’ve never been harassed by a construction worker OR a truck driver. Plus I also think that people believe that street harassment only happens in big cities, which Iowa City (thought I love it) certainly is not. I guess the short answer is that I wanted to debunk myths and raise awareness.”
She has found that her map creates opportunities for very helpful discussions, but that she’s also had people tell her she is “getting worked up over nothing.” She plans to add every single incident that happens to her to the map, and that “I hope more than anything that I don’t have to add to it, but realistically I know that’s probably not going to be the case.”
Next up is Valerie Aurora, a software programmer and writer in San Francisco, who created her street harassment map a few years ago.
Street harassment has a similar impact on her life as it does on Hannah’s:
“I have very carefully researched routes to and from places I visit that have the lowest rate of harassment and I take those religiously. I just don’t take certain BART stations (like 16th and Mission) because they are so surrounded by people who harass me and instead take longer routes. I always sit near the driver on the bus or train. I take taxis if I’m out after 9pm at night – night buses are hell. Getting harassed pretty much ruins my day and reduces me to a 10-year-old level of emotion for several hours.”
Why did she start her map?
“Initially, it was because very few people believed me when I told them about what was happening to me. I wanted to prove that my reality existed – people were so disbelieving that I began to wonder if I were making it all up somehow. Then I realized that I felt much better when I had something to do when someone harassed me. I’d pull out my notebook and note down the time and place and what happened, and that distracted me enough that I’d only feel a little bit scared and bad. It was my way to prove that what was happening was really happening, and to get a little control back.”
Her map is having an impact. She said that some people who view it say, “Wow, I had no idea it was so bad!” and some others question whether individual incidents were really harassment. “Most people,” she notes, “are shocked.”
When I asked her about her plans going forward, she told me:
“I quit adding to this one after a while because I got used to it and I no longer cared whether my friends believed me or not – I knew it was happening, and that was all the reality I needed. But writing this has reminded me of the good parts of keeping the map. I may start doing it again, but keeping it on Global Street Harassment Map instead. And if the Hollaback iPhone app becomes a reality, then hell yeah, I’ll keep updating it.”
What would your map look like if you documented all of your street harassment experiences?
Cross-posted from HollaBack NYC:
Thanks to the 3,800 of you who voted for Hollaback 2.0, we made it to the second round of the Knight News Foundation. Now we are asking you to vote again.
If you want to stop worrying if you could run in those heels if you needed to, vote again.
If you want to slap the next man who tells you to “smile,” vote again.
If your head scarf, puffy coat, and winter boats still aren’t making you harassment-free, vote again.
Each story you submit is read by 1,000 people: now that’s leadership. Your stories, your vision, and your commitment got us here. Now it’s time to step up our game and build a platform that uses today’s technology to make even easier to Hollaback. We’ve never been able to do it without you, so we’re not going to try now. Vote again.
It’s your future. Make it harassment-free.