I'm Just Trying to Get Home Too

RCJ News OP-ED

At a reasonable time several nights ago, I walked to Duane Reade to buy a pack of M&M's. When I came out of the store on my way back to my apartment, it happened. For the 18-millionth time -- I know that's not a number or a realistic figure, but I'm making a point -- I've walked down a New York City street to hear a random Harlem area stranger lean in to me and say: "Sexy."

This is not a compliment.

The headline is not mocking Rachel Jenteal's explanation of what Trayvon Martin was doing on the night he was shot and killed by neighborhood watchman George Zimmerman (in an exclusive interview, Jenteal told Piers Morgan on CNN that Martin was "trying to get home" on the night he was killed). That was a real tragedy and I wrote about it on RCJ News. I am, however, trying to explain that I'm tired of being harassed.

"Hey baby", "Hey Princess" or any other distillation are not compliments either. Catcalls, sexually explicit comments, and groping or unwanted touching is street harassment. Can we include leaning in too?

Recently, Michaela Cross, a University of Chicago student posted her account of street harassment after traveling abroad to India. Cross said that she

Michaela Cross in India
(photo credit michaela cross and ourweekly.com)

and others experienced repeated sexual harassment in India and those encounters resulted in her diagnosis of PTSD.

She wrote a essay that was tracked by CNN. Here are parts of her story:

"Do I tell them about our first night in the city of Pune, when we danced in the Ganesha festival, and leave it at that? Or do I go on and tell them how the festival actually stopped when the American women started dancing, so that we looked around to see a circle of men filming our every move?

"Do I tell them about bargaining at the bazaar for beautiful saris costing a few dollars a piece, and not mention the men who stood watching us, who would push by us, clawing at our breasts and groins?

In my reporting, I have covered several areas in New York City and I have watched many women leave their apartments, specifically those women in public housing, to be harassed by large groups of men outside their building. I remember seeing a man try to grab a woman's arm as she walked by. She was moving briskly. As if she knew something was coming and trying to avoid it. A pseudo "duck and cover" technique. Maybe she knew him, maybe she didn't. It doesn't matter.

In broad daylight, I walked by five men after covering a story in Brooklyn who said "oh, she's sweet, she's sweet" leaving me with a deafening sexual undertone. They did not need to grope me for me to feel uncomfortable.

But I felt excruciatingly uncomfortable more than a decade ago during a college trip. I took a Greyhound Bus with a group of friends to Biker Beach Week in Datyona Beach, Florida (the things we did at 19...). I was completely unprepared for what I saw. Keep in mind that everyone is wearing short shorts and bikini tops. I was wearing a tank top and jean shorts. We were walking down the street and passed a group of guys. The minute we walked pass them, I felt a smack on my backside. I didn't know how to react, but I remember staring the bro down in complete shock.

Women like Cross, and those women walking into their buildings are not assaulted with guns, but, I'm sure these women are being provoked like Martin was. How? Cross' account of reaching her boiling point while traveling in India: "When people compliment me on my Indian sandals, do I talk about the man who stalked me for 45 minutes after I purchased them, until I yelled in his face in a busy crowd?"

A few years ago, the Huffington Post reported that the NYC City Council heard testimony from women who felt unsafe and threatened after experiencing street harassment. They even considered introducing legislation to thwart the harassment, but the issue was: how could they execute it. Council member Julissa Ferreras, chair of the women's issues committee, was supportive of the legislation and certainly, Holly Kearl, who was mentioned in the article, would be as well. 

"Because of street harassment, from a young age women learn that public spaces are male territory," Kearl told the Huffington Post. Kearl is the author of Stop Street Harassment: Making Public Places Safe and Welcoming for Women. "They learn to limit the places they go, they try not to be in public alone -- especially at night -- and when they are alone, they stay on guard."

(RCJ News reached out to Council member Ferreras, but emails and calls were not returned)

In Egypt, where women are harassed constantly and aggressively on the streets -- some incidents are due to weak public order since the revolution ousting the President Mubarak in 2011; and now, the same unrest is happening with the ousted Morsi -- men are trying a new shaming method to help prevent street harassment. The Washington Post posted a video on their blog showing two male activists, who had just witnessed women being harassed, pin the harassers against a wall use a stencil to spray paint in Arabic, "I'm a harasser" on their T-shirts. A riskier method, but indeed, the harassers got the point.

A softer solution to the execution problem, is an app (and there really is an app for everything) called "Not Your Baby."  The app will allow users to input where they are and who is harassing them. A response will be generated to the user "in the moment" for direction from others who have been harassed on how they dealt with it. Stopstreetharassment.org has also created a new app where victims can upload in real time information about where they experienced harassment on the street. 

But, there could be technical difficulties if you use it on the subway. A temporary solution in that case is to ignore it.

Stop street harassment art by Brooklyn artist 
Tatyana Fazlalizadeh. (photo credit feminspire.com, Fazlalizadeh)

Coincidentally, however, while waiting for the subway, one guy with his wide-brimmed sport team hat and baggy jeans, again, leaned in to me for a full sentence: "It is too hot to be drinking that coffee [on the subway]." Really? Or, you could have walked by and said absolutely nothing. 

Ugh, I get it, critics. I've heard it 50 million-thousand times (again, trying to make a point): they are only being friendly; just smile back and say hello. But, the difference is that it is unwanted attention. And I don't want to smile back. 

I wonder if harassers feel provoked while trying to get home.  

What do you think?