4/16/13
Street Harassement!!
One topic that picked on my attention is street harassment. Street harassment is any comment or action that happened in a public place between strangers. These comments and actions are considered unwelcome and disrespectful. This topic is of particular interest to me because it limits women's ability to be in public. Women often feel uncomfortable dealing with those catcalls, kissing noises, leers, and whistles. Street harassment also include assault, public masturbation, murder, and touching someone sexually. Statistics reveal one in four women had experienced street harassment by the age of twelve. I remember walking down Jamaica avenue on a hot summer day and one guy commented on my breasts. "Those tits are big, take me with you and I will never need no comforter for the winter" he stated. I felt violated because a stranger commented on my body. This comment brought some king of fear that I still experienced until now. At this moment I felt like my body was a something men think they could own and explore. Another day I felt violated again was on December21 of last year. This guy was masturbating while looking at me in the lobby of the restaurant I work at. I call the police on him. This is what he deserved for being disrespectful to women. I even become more frightened. I think it is not fair for women to fight for freedom on the street. Women should have the liberty to walk the street without fear of being harassed.
In the video above, Maggie Hadleigh-West mentions that women should not just walk the street and ignore the comments that these street harassers make. We should tell them to stop harassing us. I also learned that many men do not care whether the women like or do not like the comments they make about them. This shows that our society is still dominated by men and they still see themselves as being in power. Thus we can conclude that we still live in a male dominated world. When will women ever get the liberty to walk the street in peace? I just wish that street harassment could end right now. I do hope one day my dream will come true. Street harassment will end and women will be in peace at last.
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I have never witnessed a woman harassing a man in the street, but I would assume it might happen here and there. However, do you think if women actually fought back consistently we might stop this from happening? It's worth trying, but I feel that we as woman would all need to commit to doing this. I don't quite agree that this point in particular truly illustrates that men have total control over women just because we don't fight back, but it definitely isn't helping the situation. The reason why I am commenting on your post so late is because I was recently "hollered at" 3 times in a single morning in Bushwick this afternoon on my way to the train. I was not scared of these men because there were a ton of people around and it was in broad daylight, but I was certainly annoyed and did not say anything back. I thought to myself, well why didn't I say anything back? I was thinking about this for a while, and I think that a lot of women are probably too scared to say anything back to these men. I think that I am scared of what could happen if I were to show anger towards them. Just a thought...
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