I'm Not Special
Thank you to my wonderful and adoring friends, but there's nothing about me so striking that it could possibly cause men to completely lose control of themselves. Arguing otherwise gives men too little credit. Men are responsible for their own behavior; this is why we have laws that dictate that people who harm others should be punished. Even if it were true that I am just so beautiful that people can't resist, this is a problem. There are a whole lot of beautiful women in the world, and they shouldn't have to feel afraid to leave their homes.
Street harassment is an everyday occurrence for women of all body types, ethnicities, and walks of life. One study, for example, found that 68 percent of women of color and 55 percent of white women experience street harassment "often or every day." And in another (admittedly outdated) study, Carol Brooks Gardner found that 100 percent of her sample -- that's every single woman, people -- reported experiencing street harassment at least once.
I'm friendly and I weigh less than my dog, so I probably look pretty vulnerable. And I generally meet our society's standards for attractiveness. Some women experience street harassment less frequently than I do; others get it even worse than me. This is not about me, or how noble I am for writing about it, or how brave I am for putting up with it, or how much I deserve sympathy, though. I'm lucky to have awesome friends who are willing to offer me these things. But if we make this too much about me, then it becomes Zawn's Special Problem. It's not. This is a social problem that millions of women cope with every day.
It's Not Just "Bad Guys"
We live in a society that bases so many beliefs on racist, classist ideas. We think that if someone looks "normal," (read: white, professional educated) they're safe, and if someone looks like a "thug," we should stay away from them. I have been harassed by men from every walk of life. This is not a result of a bad upbringing, being poor, not having a job, being a member of a particular demographic, or anything else. The only demographic theme I see with the men who harass me is that they are all men.
"I'd Handle it Differently"
Fortunately, I didn't get this reaction from any of my friends when I posted my earlier entry to Facebook. But I've posted on enough message boards to see people claim that they would somehow do better. These people are often men, but occasionally they're women who claim they've never been harassed. I used to volunteer at a rape crisis center, and we always emphasized to victims that they did something right because they survived. Street harassment is similar.
Street harassment is also paralyzing. You do not know how you would react until you are in that situation. Women are socialized to be friendly and compliant. This makes it challenging for many women to react in an assertive way. Further, reacting to harassers frequently escalates the harassment. I have tried a broad variety of strategies (walking away, enlisting the assistance of a bystander, stomping on the guy's foot, interrogating the guy about why he's harassing me, telling him to fuck off, pretending to call the police...), and not strategy one has caused the harassment to stop.
Men who harass women are not looking for dates. They know that women don't like it. I take great pains to make it clear that I am dissatisfied with the harassment. This is about controlling women, and specifically using sexuality as a method of control. It's about punishing women for simply existing in the world. And it works. Women are more likely to be afraid to go out alone than men, and I personally dread going to certain locations because I know I'll be harassed. Street harassment is a tool of sexism, not a problem an individual woman encounters because she's too weak/too pretty/too compliant/in the wrong place.
It's easy to tell yourself that you'd handle a bad situation differently than someone else. We all have to tell ourselves these lies to live in one of the most violent countries in the world. We live in the country with the highest rape rate of all countries that publish rape statistics. If we want to be able to function, we have to engage in some degree of victim-blaming. I tell myself my house will never be robbed because I have two big dogs and live in a safe neighborhood. I insist that I won't be killed in a car accident because I'm a good driver. But I'm wrong, and so are people who claim that their choices prevent them from being victims of harassment.
On Calling the Police
Calling the police is a great idea, and it's something I'm ashamed to admit I've only done once (and it did not go well the one time I did it). But if ending street harassment were as simple as calling the police, our society would be doing a lot better than it currently is. There are innumerable reasons calling the police is not only not always a solution, but sometimes a really bad idea:
- If I call the police on a street harasser, the very most he will be charged with is disorderly conduct or some other small misdemeanor. He's not going to go to jail. He's not being "taken off the street." Instead, all that happens is there will be a formal police report of the incident, and the harasser will get a copy of that report -- complete with my full name and contact information. That's not really something I want a creeper having.
- There is absolutely no guarantee that calling the police will yield a positive response. There are tons of stories about women calling the police on various anti-street harassment websites. And the police sometimes engage in victim-blaming or even begin treating the victim as a criminal. If that happened, I think I'd become so irate that I'd probably end up being arrested. And that's not a fun way to spend the day.
- Calling the police is a time-consuming and tedious process. I once waited two hours for the police to show up after I got into a car accident; they're not particularly responsive around here, and street harassment is not an emergency. Is this a reason not to call the police? No. But here's the really, really important thing: Street harassment already eats up women's time and energy. Calling the police eats up even more. My most frequent harassment incidents occur at the grocery store and coffee shop near my house. I'm usually in a hurry, pissed off that I'm awake so early, and eager to get home and begin working. Waiting an hour -- or even 10 minutes -- to file a police report is not something I'm ever going to be excited about, and it adds to the time and energy burden of street harassment rather than alleviating these burdens.
Self-Defense Strategies
I'm fucking scrappy. I grew up with a bunch of tough boy cousins, and my huge, intimidating brother is over a foot taller than me. I wrestled with these guys growing up, and they all taught me self-defense strategies. My brother occasionally sneaks up on me or stages fake robberies at my house or in my car in what he calls an attempt to teach me to think on my feet (yes, Trey is a weirdo, but he knows it and in any case that's another blog post for another time). My husband was a Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu instructor before he decided to do legal jiu-jitsu. I am tiny, but athletic and explosive. I'm not afraid to defend myself, but the fact that I have to point this out is part of the problem.
Self-defense will not end street harassment. Not now, not ever. By definition, you only use self-defense when you're already being attacked. At best, it's a way to thwart an already dangerous situation. In most cases, though, street harassment is not physical. If I kick the shit out of some guy because he yelled, "Hey baby" at me, who do you think is going to get arrested? Hint: the one who committed the crime of assault.
Even worse, self-defense is not going to stop an attack that's truly life-threatening. What if the attacker has a gun or a knife? Initiating a self-defense strategy requires getting closer to the attacker. I suppose we could argue that all women should carry guns, but that opens up a whole new can of worms, and still doesn't stop street harassment. Because who's really going to shoot someone who comments on her ass?
If You Don't See Street Harassment, You're Not Looking
I have some fabulous feminist male friends. Despite their pro-woman leanings, though, they all insist that they either never see harassment, or don't see it with the kind of regularity I experience it. Sorry guys, but it's because you're not looking. I see women being harassed every single day without fail. I've also watched bystanders walk away or ignore the harassment. The bystander effect is a real thing.
Because most instances of street harassment involve little more than a lewd gesture or an unwelcome advance, people have little incentive to intervene. No one wants to get involved in someone else's drama, and there's always the lingering question of whether you're interfering with a legitimate romantic encounter. We don't see things that we don't want to see, but that doesn't make them any less real. Staying to yourself instead of observing what's going on around you makes it easier to feel safe, but it also means you're not a part of the solution. Look around long enough and you'll see it.
Street harassment is a societal problem, not something a few individuals experience due to bad luck. This means that no single individual strategy is going to stop it. Much as I am loathe to admit it, I will continue experiencing street harassment regardless of what I do. I guess I could wear a Burqa, but that's not really practical. It doesn't work anyway, neatly demonstrating the fact that women don't cause street harassment with their fashion or behavioral choices. Women will continue being harassed until our society begins to treat them as full equals rather than sexual objects.
But individual people can and should intervene. Street harassment is the creation of men. It's not a women's issue; it's a problem with how we do masculinity in this country. The only thing that will stop it is for men to stop freaking harassing women. This means raising boys with positive values, ending the idea that women should be treated differently because of their appearance or sexuality, and reversing the cultural trend that views sexuality as a weapon.
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