spain Archives | Stop Street Harassment

Street Harassment Stops Here

April 4, 2017 By Contributor

This article has been cross-posted from Kaligraphy Magazine for International Anti-Street Harassment Week. You can read more stories about street harassment in Spain at Levanta La Voz! Madrid.

I started this webzine because I believe in the power of story sharing; in raising awareness, in connecting people, in promoting empathy, story sharing is one of the most powerful tools at humanity’s disposal for effecting change.

This is understood by Hollaback, a global network founded in 2005 of activists committed to ending street harassment largely via story sharing and mapping on their app and website.

Last year, I helped found one of these networks in Madrid, Spain, after I met an expat like me who was appalled by the pervasiveness of street harassment worldwide. With myself and five other strong, committed women, we founded Levanta La Voz! Madrid to help women in Spain’s capital find the support they need through sharing their stories.

Here are our stories.

Elena

67% of girls experience harassment before age 10. I was one of them.

When it happens to you at such a young age, it becomes a part of you. You get used to it, in a way, but you never stop being vulnerable. You flinch every time a male stranger talks to you, conditioned to expect harassment. You put up walls in the way you walk and the way you look, which often only elicits more harassment: “sonríete!” (smile).

So when I first moved to Madrid, I wondered if it would be different. After living there no more than a few weeks, I attended an event hosted by a group that showed films which passed the Bechdel test. After the film, I asked the group’s founder, a woman from England, what her experience of street harassment was like in Spain compared to back home. She directed me to another woman at the event, Debbie, who she said was interested in starting an organization to target that sort of thing.

Bingo! I love activism. Debbie and I talked, and I was immediately on board.

My personal experience of street harassment in Spain differs in some ways from that of the co-founders. I’m a short, curly-haired brunette who fits perfectly well with the description of a “typical” Spanish woman. In other words, I fit in.

In my view, street harassment in Spain centers largely on targeting the ‘other’, reminding those who don’t fit in that they don’t belong – exoticizing them, which is never a good thing.

But even though I’ve rarely had more than the occasional, uncomfortable “oye, guapa!” thrown my way, I’m still conscious of the culture of power and domination which exists as profoundly here as it does in the United States. And as long as it exists, I’ll be fighting to ensure it doesn’t.

Kate

I had been living in Madrid for a while and looking to be more involved with the local community and feminist activism.

Street harassment had been something I struggled with here since the beginning.

Whilst my home city, Brisbane, also has street harassment, it was usually people yelling things at me from cars or on public transport; whereas, here more often than not my harasser would be literally centimetres away – or less when they reached out and touched me!

As with most places in the world men especially target people that look different to the “typical” Spanish person. Hence, being blonde acts as a beacon for street harassment, ¡ya, yo sé que soy rubia!

I’d tried a few strategies for dealing with the street harassment – venting online and to my friends, doing something “daring” when it felt safe to do so – like giving them the finger as I walked away, or with one man who was in his 80s, I practically pushed him over.

Most the time the street harassment I’ve experienced has been on the annoying side rather than scary but not always.

When I’d been in Spain for just two weeks, I was taking Spanish classes in Santander, Cantabria. One Sunday morning, I was walking down from my host family to meet my boyfriend in centre of the town. Now Santander has a lift that you can take to get from the top to the bottom of the town. To get to the lift I had to walk next to an empty construction site. As I walking along, a man behind me called out “Hola guapa!” Not wanting to engage with him, I walked a bit faster and ignored him. He was furious, he called out after me “Oye, puta” and started running towards me. There were several flights of stairs next to the lift so I ran down a flight and decided he would either take the lift and I could go back to the top or if he started coming down the stairs towards me I would have a head start. He took the lift down and was out of sight. I waited awhile then walked down to the bottom of the stairs. It turned out the man was still waiting there and ran back up to start yelling at me. There was an old man waiting for the lift, so I stood beside him, hoping the other man would just go away. After a while, he moved away and walked up to a seat that looked over the lift and kept muttering things at me. I ran down the hill and met my boyfriend there. It was terrifying as the man just had so much rage, all because I’d ignored his “hola guapa” remark.

So earlier this year when I met a woman, who I now work with, who told me she was working with other women on a grassroots, community led response to street harassment, it couldn’t have been more perfect. I was being harassed daily and had had enough scary encounters to know it was a serious problem and one that left you feeling helpless and sometimes alone.

Jen

I moved to Madrid 2 years ago and I immediately began to notice that men would comment as I walked past. At first I wasn’t sure if I was imagining things. Then when it became more common I didn’t always understand what was being said and I certainly didn’t have the level of Spanish to retort. I felt frustrated and angry. I stopped making eye contact. I started listening to music all of the time when I was out and about so that my earphones would block out any harassment. I have since acquired a level of Spanish to tell my harassers off. Sometimes I just explain that I don’t like their behaviour and would like their respect. Sometimes I ask them if they think I am as insignificant to them as a dog. Thankfully I have never felt unsafe or threatened, but I panic if I leave my house without earphones, avoid certain streets and don’t make eye contact. I am also always mentally prepared with a comment. It affects how I feel at times depending on what I’m wearing. I am thankful the weather is cold again so that I don’t have any skin on display. The reason I got involved in Hollaback is because I don’t want to feel oppressed anymore and I envisage a future where no one feels like I do – regardless of sex, race, religion, sexual orientation, body type, ability, or age. We all have the power to try and make a change.

Debbie

Why did I get involved with fighting street harassment? Because I just couldn’t take it any more.

Harassment is something I think women notice and feel more when they live abroad. This leads me to believe that the prevalence and society’s normalisation of street harassment means women are more likely to think of their own country’s harassment as just part of being a woman, but it’s when we are abroad and experience another culture’s harassment that we really feel it.

So despite having experienced plenty of harassment in my native country of England the street harassment cultural shock I got from moving abroad to Spain was difficult to deal with. I hated it but as a young woman I knew that putting limits with complete strangers would get me called a ‘bitch’, ‘frigid’, ‘uptight’, ‘no fun’, ‘humourless’ and more. I tried to swallow it – it is of course, I thought, the price of being a woman. But years went by and as I got older I realised that, even though I’m a woman, I deserved a basic respect that was continuously being denied me in the street, and that’s when it got unbearable. That’s when I started noticing just how often it happened, started realising it had nothing to do with the clothes I wore, nothing to do with how I looked, realising that no matter how I reacted – angry, confused, polite, conversational, you name it – what I got back was aggression and all this led up to me one day running home, locking myself in and crying, wondering if my harasser might have followed me and now knew where I lived, and what he would do to me if he saw me again in the street. The power play became evident and I went online looking for support, support I desperately needed so I wouldn’t feel alone as if these things only happened to me.

What I found online is what has brought me to where I am now. I found that street harassment is a global problem, a cross-cultural problem, and that it happens to most women but that we simply don’t talk about it. I read up on it, worked through my own brainwashing and ideas of what it was and where it came from and I started talking about it with my friends only to find that almost all of them had silently been experiencing street harassment and felt just as I did. I wanted to do something about it and was so lucky to come across the section of Hollaback! which explains how they support anti-street harassment groups globally, and was so lucky again to end up forming a team with an amazing group of hardworking, dedicated women. Now we’re getting Madrid’s anti-street harassment movement off the ground and it’s the most exciting thing ever – the idea of a Madrid where women decide to stop and say ‘No. No more’ to street harassment.

Vicky

Within a few weeks of living in Madrid, I became aware that I was receiving a lot of attention from men on the street. The sounds of “oye rubia” seemed to follow me everywhere. I became tired of hearing it, although it didn’t really affect me. However, as my Spanish improved I started understanding more and more of the accompanying comments I would receive, and I started to become annoyed and angry with the situation. Not a week would go past where I didn’t have at least one particularly memorable experience, but I was frustrated by the responses I received from many of my Spanish friends when I told them my stories: “this is Spain, you have to get used to it”. “Why should I have to get used to this?” I asked my friends, and I asked myself.

I wanted to be able to change this attitude towards street harassment, so that people would realise it is a problem and not the way things have to be.

Being harassed became an expectation in my daily life. It affected how I now behave when I am out and about, causing me to always wear headphones so I’m more likely to be left alone as harassers don’t have the enjoyment of seeing their words register. I started mentally preparing myself if I was going out wearing more revealing clothing. It affected how I behaved with my partners in public, as even just holding hands with another girl can elicit stares and comments.

Having lived part of my life in a country where wearing “inappropriate clothing” in public would cause me to be arrested and my family to be deported, I really value the freedom to be in public spaces without fear of harassment, comments, judgement, or attack. By working with Levanta La Voz (Hollaback) Madrid, I hope to be able to bring this freedom to myself and to everybody, so that nobody fears being unsafe in a public space because of who they are or how they choose to present themselves.

Blanca

It was summer, I was on vacation at the beach with my family where we always went back then. It was 4 in the afternoon and my sister suggested going to the mall for the afternoon. It was a bit of a walk and although I was lazy I decided to accompany her. Five minutes after leaving the apartment we heard the honk of a car horn as the car passed by us. So my sister in turn proposed a new game: What if we count the times the cars honk at us or someone says something to us? It was more than ten cars which honked or said something to us, and two men who made some sort of comment. I was 13. My sister 16.

All my life I’ve experienced street harassment, and therefore all my life it was put into my head that it was something unique to men, and something inevitable for women. I had to be careful not to be harassed, assaulted, or potentially raped. All my life I’ve experienced the frustration of not being able to do anything against “what it means” to be a woman. “There are crazy men who you are going to know what they can do to you if you are careless. You have to take precautions and be careful.” That is what the world has taught me and all women since we were children.

All my life I assumed that these roles were established and I couldn’t do anything to change them, and that wasn’t the worst of all: It never occurred to me to think them over. But luckily they also made me see that a critical look and a thoughtful mind are the best form of liberty. And little by little that idea has kept me going until researching, self-analyzing, and seeing what is real and fair in everything around me. “Feminism ruined my life but also, and above all, it was my salvation and liberation.” For me, introducing myself to feminism and joining Hollaback was just that: liberty and empowerment. All my life I’ve experienced street harassment, and probably, and sadly, I will continue experiencing it, but never again will I let it silence me, shame me, and violate me. Now I can raise my voice, and make myself listen. And I can do it together with devoted, strong, and inspired women that work every day so that more than half of humanity can once again feel safe and free.

Photo by Levanta La Voz! Madrid.

Spain: Including Harassment and Sexual Abuse in Laws

October 24, 2016 By Correspondent

Alice C.R., Barcelona, Spain SSH Blog Correspondent

Recently, the Nottingham police in the UK decided to treat misogyny, ranging from street harassment to physical attack, as a hate crime. This marks a step forward in the fight against violence against women and stopping street harassment. Some initiatives had already been launched to tackle violence and harassment in public transportation in London in 2013. In Paris, street harassment is sadly common and considered as a “séduction à la française,” and a 2015 study shows that 100% of the women interviewed said they suffered at least one case of harassment. This “French lover” culture is so ingrained, accepted, valorized and glamorized that the decision to institute a plan of action has been virulently criticized and even rejected. Many voices, mainly male voices, raised against this plan arguing it was anti-male and even anti-social. In their arguments, the difference between harassment and even physical assault and an attempt to pick up is shockingly blurred and ignored.

This is especially alarming given how such harassment can escalate to violent crimes like physical assault and rape and even death. In December 2014, a woman was killed with a screwdriver for rejecting sexual advances in a Parisian street close to Bastille. There was also the case of a young woman being harassed, threaten and groped by a man in the Lille metro which has been widely commented on the media. The man admitted he hit on the woman. Cases like this are not unique at all and such frightening stories have been shared by women everywhere in France. Just have a look at Project Crocodiles for example.

Actually, I have to admit that my decision to leave France has been, among others reasons, motivated by the harassment I had to face on a daily basis from the age of 10. Harassment occurred by day, in crowded spaces and while I wrote large trousers and large shirts. Of course I am not saying that harassment is acceptable if we wear skirt or short or a bralette, I just want to emphasize that what we wear does not help to prevent harassment. I always carried a whistle, had my mobile phone ready for calling the police, and held my keys strongly between my fingers. At some point, it was so bad that I asked my boyfriend to come to pick me up at work. That was just unbelievable and such a restriction of movement which I never faced in others countries where I lived. I still feel very unsafe, uncomfortable and, somehow, scared when I have to travel there.

In Barcelona, I found a friendlier environment. I remember being positively surprised to see posters at the entrance of supermarkets indicating what to do in case of domestic violence, to walk down the street and discover new poster from a new public campaign, to get leaflets in the metro explaining how to recognize gendered violence and what to do. I never suffered the same level of harassment here as in France, even when alone at night and wearing a skirt.

I was not yet in Spain in 2004 when the organic law which integrated measures to prevent and fight violence against women was adopted, but I heard a lot about it as a model to follow. This law demonstrates a recognition and an awareness of the issue. But (unfortunately, there is always a “but”) it does not mean that everything is perfect here. It is not.

For too many people, gendered violence means physical domestic violence, but in reality, gendered violence is not limited only to this kind of violence, yet it seems that others violence are a bit excluded. As a matter of fact, if almost everyone agrees that it is not okay to hit someone, it seems that psychological violence, verbal harassment and sexual abuses do not provoke the same reaction. I say “almost” because some people still think it is okay to hit, especially women. This year so far, there have been 35 women killed by their intimate partner and there are 83 if we add women killed by non-intimate partner. And that is the point. A woman who is attacked by her partner is considered to be a victim of gendered violence. A woman who is attacked by a stranger is not and she won’t be allowed to benefit from some measure of protection.

Sexual violence and abuse neither. In fact, they are not included in the organic law of 2004 and associations and organizations like 7N, Stop Violencia Sexual and l’Aadas ask for its inclusion right now. The recent event of San Firmin rape case re-opened the debate.

This law is a good tool to fight violence against women but it needs to include all kind of form of violence. As long as something is not recognized, it is a bit like if it does not really exist or is not very serious. But we all know the impact of such kind of violence. And it is very serious.

Alice likes researching, analyzing and writing about Women’s Rights, gender bias, and intersectionalism with a special focus on sexual violence, rape, rape culture, the impact of street harassment and how the media deals with these issues. She is currently working on a new project focused on how some media participate in the revictimization of victims. Follow her and her projects on her Facebook page and via Twitter @Alyselily.

HABITAT 3: Safer Cities is a Priority

October 18, 2016 By HKearl

*Norti, Suneeta, Maria, Lakshmi, Luis, Powes*

Hello from day 4 at HABITAT 3 in Quito, Ecuador. The big event for me today was the UN Women panel on their Safe Cities programme.

UN Women could only host one high-level session at the conference and they chose this issue. My colleagues at UN Women have advocated for several years for this program on sexual harassment in public spaces to be recognized and included in these kinds of high level global events, so this was a big payoff.

The room was packed with about 150 people, including people standing in the back and sitting on the floor. It went really well.

First, here is an overview of what the Safe Cities programme is. This is essentially what was shared by the moderator, Lakshmi Puri, Deputy Executive Director and Assistant Secretary General of UN Women.

The flyer for the event today... that I designed! — *The flyer for the event today… that I designed!*

While the program is now in more than 20 cities, there were five flagship cities (Delhi, Cairo, Quito, Port Moresby, and Kigali) that started in 2011. Representatives from all five cities were invited to speak on the panel and representatives from Port Moresby, Delhi and Cairo were able to join (the rep from Cairo gave a pre-recorded video address). They spoke about their efforts and progress over the past five years. They were all incredibly inspiring, but I think that the governor from Port Moresby was my favorite.

In his opening remarks, Governor Parkop Powes did not shy away from sharing the problem of violence in Papua New Guinea. He talked about how tribes have been at war with each other for a long time and that violence is often seen as a means for solving problems. He noted that they are a patriarchal society where men are dominant. “Trying to change the violent culture is not easy. But we see it’s important. Violence is an impediment to women and also to the development of our city.”

The focus of the Port Moresby Safe Cities program has been to make marketplaces safer as they are not only economic hubs but also social hubs. They’ve had some successes so far, but they have a ways to go, he said.

“After being in the program for a while, we see that the interventions deal with the symptoms of violence and they alone won’t solve the problem. We’ve created a safe market to make it safe for women and girls, but we haven’t solved the problem of who is responsible for violence. The women vendors who leave the market and go back home still face threats of violence and fear of violence as they travel or even in their home. So we haven’t solved the problem of violence. Having a safe house for women facing domestic violence is symptom but doesn’t solve the problem. Same thing with the women-only buses – we’d rather have an integrated system where everyone is safe, but for now, we decided to have a women-only bus. Ultimately, it’s the behavior of men that’s the problem. They are violent. It’s the culture. We are working with UN Women to create behavior change.”

They are trying some creative methods. For example, doing yoga with men to help them start to respect themselves and then respect women. As another example, Governor Powes takes a walk every Sunday that anyone can join him in. He said sometimes a thousand people will join him, most of them women. This is really revolutionary because many women feel very unsafe walking in public. Rates of rape are very high, as are rates of murder. On average, every single person knows at least one person who has been murdered. So by walking in public for recreation, the women are claiming public spaces and demanding that they be safe for all.

A representative from the Spanish Agency for International Development Cooperation closed out the panel. This is the “mother donor” of the program. They continued to fund it, even when Spain was in an economic crisis. The representative shared that they will increase their support next year. This is huge as it is really hard to fund programs to end violence against women (as I know firsthand from my limited experience trying to fundraise for Stop Street Harassment). Having this support is really important and makes the program possible.

Later in the day, I also had the opportunity to join my boss in meeting with the Quito Safe Cities team. They talked about their work with transit officials to make public transit safer. They also have created a comic book about respect that they will be taking to five schools and training teachers on how to hold conversations around respect. They were very open about how Ecuadorian culture is full of machismo and how they have to focus on changing mindsets and attitudes before they can really see change. But they said they have support at the highest levels — and indeed, the wife of the mayor, Maria Fernando Pacheco, led the meeting as she is very supportive of the program — and so that is making their implementation process easier. Plus, they have alarming data that helps them more easily galvanize support: more than 90% of women face street harassment. More than 1 in 4 girls have been harassed outside their schools. Most women see public transit as unsafe. And most women try not to be alone in public after 6 p.m. when it gets dark.

These two events were inspiring and uplifting and it made me so so so so happy to hear from and meet people in various parts of the world who are committed to making public spaces safer and who understand that ultimately, we have to see cultures change before that will be a reality.

“I drew this comic in order to cope with street harassment”

December 12, 2011 By Contributor

“I drew this comic in order to cope with the street harassment I face nearly every day. This Thanksgiving was surprisingly bad. Unfortunately, one of my male coworkers told me, ‘Either you have really bad luck or your perception about what’s really happening is confused.’

I hope that sharing my experience will prevent other women from doubting what we already know to be true: it’s not our luck that causes harassment and we’re not confused.”

Liz Rush identifies as a radical feminist, an immigrant, and a pedestrian. She is currently working on a collection of comic short stories and keeps a graphic diary about her experiences in Spain called Sin Hemingway.

“How was the walk?”

“Don’t touch me. Leave me alone.”

“Whore.”

Harassment often keeps woman in Spain from leaving her house

July 9, 2010 By Contributor

Before starting to tell my stories, I’d like to say something. I’m Spanish. I say this in case I make any mistakes when writing. I usually read feminist websites or blogs often and I found out about this site. Thank you very much for your amazing work and to the people that share their stories, I’d like to tell them that I’m extremely sorry for them and let them know that they are not alone and I hope everything gets better in the future.

I don’t feel comfortable saying this, but I’ve been touched by strangers. I have experienced all kind of harassment (from light to heavy). I once was harassed even when I was 11/12 years old. I once was stalked by an old stranger in the street. Someone took a picture of me topless in a beach. (My brother laught at several of this things. I’ve realised how he is or was and I keep little contact with him. It’s painful.)

I don’t know if this is considered street harassment or plain humiliation. Many years ago I traveled to Liverpool alone. I felt so alone. I was having a hard time. A bunch of strangers came to me in the street (I was waiting for the traffic lights to go green) and threw me a bag of garbage while laughing hysterically. I went to the nearest phone box and I really had a hard time stopping crying and going back to the residence where I lived while talking to my family because it seemed like I could never stop.

Lately I’m really depressed. I almost never leave the house, but sometimes I want to go out, take a walk, clear my mind. Almost 80% of the time I’m street harassed. I insult them or show them the finger but I still feel powerless.

I wish people would talk more about this topic and raise awareness in my country too.

The following is a message for sexists, homophobes, and people who do this in general.

YOU’RE SWINE!!! I WISH YOU’D DIE!!!

EVERY REPLY TO THIS MESSAGE WILL BE SISTEMATICALLY DELETED AND IGNORED.

P.S.: It’s possible that I’m forgetting other stories. Unfortunately there have been a lot.

– Anonymous

Location: Mostly in Spain

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.