Stop Street Harassment

Making Public Spaces Safe and Welcoming

New Egyptian Harassment Law?

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Two high profile street harassment cases and the publication of a major report on street harassment issued by the Cairo-based Egyptian Center for Women’s Rights in 2008 may bring about positive change this year for ending the harassment of women.

According to Women’s E News, when Egypt’s new parliament meets this month, it’s anticipated that some members will propose a law to strengthen penalties against sexual offenders (including street harassers) by increasing jail time and fines and it will put more pressure on police to stop incidents and take the concerns of targets seriously.

“I am optimistic the new year will be better for women, especially with a new law expected to be passed.” – Nehad Abu Komsan, head of the Egyptian Center for Women’s Rights.

On the flip side, and not unlike elsewhere in the world, some people in Egypt are determined to disbelieve or downplay the high levels of street harassment.  Notably, in November, women’s rights supporter first lady Suzanne Mubarak said on TV:

“Egyptian men always respect Egyptian women…This gives the impression that the streets in Egypt are not safe. That is not true . . . the media have exaggerated…Maybe one, two or even 10 incidents occurred. Egypt is home to 80 million people. We can’t talk of a phenomenon. Maybe a few scatterbrained youths are behind this crime.”

Right, a few scatterbrained youth are behind the frequent harassment of 98 percent of foreign women and 83 percent of Egyptian women in a 2,000 person sample…

But the good thing is that there is a dialogue occurring on this topic and people are becoming more aware that it’s a problem to the extent that parliament may introduce and pass an anti-harassment law. We’ll see what happens!

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Groper on Wall Street

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I was walking to work on Wall Street, it was a crowded narrow sidewalk. I noticed that someone hit me almost right between the legs. I thought it was strange but could have been an accident. I didn’t see exactly who it was. A few mornings later walking to work it happened again, this time i knew it was no mistake. This man was walking to work and grabbing women’s vaginas on his way. I started screaming at him. Calling him a freak and pervert. People were staring at me yelling at this huge man dressed in a suit and tie. It’s no longer the route i take. I still think of going back and waiting for him but this time i would be ready to take a picture. I also carry mace. I felt so angry after i had been violated. I seriously wanted to injure this man. I hate him and he makes me sick. It’s scary he was doing this to a grown woman of 27 years. It’s hard to imagine he’s not doing it to young girls on the streets.

– anonymous story from my street harassment survey

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When your harasser is a customer or client

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After the Rose Bowl, football player Rey Maualug went up behind Erin Andrews, a sideline reporter for the ESPN College Football Saturday telecast, and did a sexual sort of dance – without touching her – before walking on past.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4ds-Mrp0wl4]

Reading comments in the blogosphere, it is clear that (like lots of other kinds of harassment) many people saw nothing wrong with this behavior. I disagree because she obviously didn’t know it was happening and he wasn’t about to inform her, thus it was in no way a mutual sort of celebration, but one he enforced on her without her permission or awareness.

As both individuals are known to each other, I wouldn’t exactly classify his actions as street harassment or public harassment, which I tend to define as harassment between strangers in public, but I don’t know that it quite qualifies as workplace sexual harassment either.

This example illustrates a very pervasive kind of harassment that many women deal with in their jobs — harassment by customers or clients (and in this case, the people being interviewed or reported on for a story). What can someone do about a sexually harassing customer s/he is supposed to be serving without jeopardizing her/his job?

I worked in a few retail jobs as a teenager and I had my fair share of getting “hit on” by male customers (most of whom were years to decades older than me).  What could I do but giggle nervously and just hope they would go away soon? The customer is always right, right?

I just did a quick online search for any information on sexual harassment by customers, and among the few webpages I found included this: “Q: Does sexual harassment law apply to harassment by customers? A:Yes, as long as the employer knows about the offensive behavior and has a chance to fix the problem. Customer harassment is a lot like co-worker harassment. Until you speak up, the employer may not have enough reason to suspect that the company’s client is harassing you and making your job miserable.”

But how many employers are in the position to regulate customers? Unless someone is threatening or stalking an employee, in which case I could see an employer banning that person from the area, what would an employer do? Tell the customer to stop “flirting with” or harassing its employees? Will they risk losing a customer when they can probably easily find another hourly worker who won’t complain?

Have you experienced sexual harassment from customers, clients & non-coworkers/supervisors while on the job? Do you know about legal remedies for dealing with it or is it in the same realm as street harassment and is something we’re all supposed to “live with”?

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Got a Harasser Kicked Off the Bus

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I’ve had some pretty horrible experiences even in my (relatively) nice neighborhood. This one isn’t too bad, but it ended especially well. Once I was wearing a strapless dress on the bus. The guy behind me was obviously drooling over me and he kept saying, “boy is it ever HOT in here, WOW!” while blowing on the back of my neck. After the 3rd time (3 times too many) I turned around, smacked him across the face and told him to keep his distance. The bus driver noticed the commotion, and stopped the bus to ask us what was going on. I told him, and he took down the guy’s information, kicked him off the bus, and told me he’d report him. Yay!

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Drive By Masturbator

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My freshmen year of college, I joined a sorority. Every week, the new members would have a meeting at the house where we would get to know each other and learn about our chapter. One of the girls in my pledge class had a car, and would pick a few of us up each week and give us a ride to the house. We often had to park on the next street over, and walk a block.

One evening, three of us were walking. It was about 8 o’clock at night, and pitch black. We were laughing and joking; we were all excited about the meeting. We heard a car coming up from behind us. We didn’t think anything about it, because we were on a residential street with many houses. Then we realized the car was driving extremely slow and keeping up with our walking pace. We looked over, and saw a man in the car. He had his dome light on so we could see inside the car. The man had one hand on the wheel, and was masturbating. He made eye contact with us and then looked down at his penis, so we would be sure of what he was doing. His car was about three feet from us. I can’t remember ever being so shocked in my life. I froze, I didn’t know what to do. One of the other girls yelled something at him; I can’t remember what. He sped up and drove away.

Everybody started to laugh and make jokes about the “pervert”. I laughed too; but inside I was shocked and hurt. Why would someone do that? Had he done that before? Was this a daily thing for him? We came to the house and went inside. We never really talked about it. I know that it’s something that I will always remember. I’ve been vocally harassed before. But this was something completely different. I remember wondering if this was something he did to other girls on our campus. He could have just as easily stopped the car and assaulted us. I’ve shared this story with only my boyfriend. I’m embarrassed to tell anyone else.

-Kristen

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