It was a warm day, and I was feeling good about myself. I put on some tight pants, knee-high boots and a low-cut shirt with my boobs pushed up. I looked in the mirror and thought, “I look fucking fantastic.”
(Let me say just this once: I dress for myself. Sometimes that means a hoodie and some grubby jeans, and sometimes that means my pants are tight and my cleavage is on display. Whatever makes me feel the most positive on a given day.)
Anyway, I was walking down the street, minding my own business, when some guy comes moseying on by. He said “hi” to me, and I nodded briefly before continuing on.
He kept talking.
“What’s your name?” “That’s a nice shirt.” “Why won’t you talk to me?” “Come on, let’s just go somewhere,” and then he tried to get real close to me and he smiled while he spoke to me, “I have money.”
Without going into detail, since I was a child I have been easily shaken by men, especially when a sexual tone enters the situation. My reaction to this sleazy bastard was to back away from him, and my face grew hot as tears came to my eyes. I was ashamed in that moment that crying came so easily to me. When he saw my face, he stopped short and said, “Whoa, I was just joking.” He looked at me like I was crazy and walked away. I stood there for a moment before abandoning my errand and running home.
In the safety of my living room, I began to feel it. Anger at him for making me feel afraid, for assuming he could say whatever he wanted to me, whether it was a joke or not. Anger at myself for not kicking him in the balls and standing up for myself, anger at the tears that were on the brink of spilling onto my cheeks. I called my boyfriend, who headed over promptly. While I was waiting for him, I called my friend. Her reaction … wasn’t great.
She was sympathetic, but not surprised. She asked what I was wearing. I was baffled at the question. “Well, you know how guys are. You have to be careful what you wear nowadays.”
In my emotional state, I was angry at her response, but I also wondered if there was truth to it. I questioned myself. Somewhere, deep down, I assigned blame to myself.
It wasn’t until a few years later that I realized how screwed up that was.
I have a large stockpile of pent-up anger when it comes to street harassment. It’s the arrogance of it. The men who do it somehow think they have the right bestowed on them by virtue of their dick – that they can say whatever disgusting thing comes to their minds and women are just supposed to take it. It’s all just a joke—lighten up sweet cheeks! Take it as a compliment! Don’t be such a bitch!
Worse still, as my friend showed, we should also expect that if we dress sexy, well, we’re just asking for it. What are these poor men to do – they just can’t help themselves! Boys will be boys.
Bullshit. I know enough decent men to know better than that. They can stop themselves, but some choose not to.
And, look, I love my gender, but some women out there aren’t fucking helping. The idea of a woman being at fault is a tale as old as time, but sometimes it seems like women shift the blame onto other women quicker than men do. That’s a huge problem. We need to get onto the same page here. Self-entitled creeps who feel like they can say whatever crazy shit they want to us shouldn’t be dividing us, they should be bringing us together.
For a perfect example, look back to this past summer. While participating in an interview on the set of the Trailer Park Boys, Snoop Dogg dropped some sexually suggestive lines on a CBC camerawoman. Afterwards, she complained that Snoop’s behaviour had made her feel uncomfortable.
You’d think other women would empathize – these uninvited remarks were made in a very public setting in front of her co-workers, while she was doing her job.
Not so much.
My Facebook timeline was flooded with women who were calling her names and saying it’s an honor to be hit on by Snoop.
Fun fact: it’s never an “honour” to be the subject of uninvited sexual comments when you’re doing your job. It wasn’t an honour to be hit on by Snoop when he was relevant in 1993, and it certainly isn’t an honour now.
The same rule applies to women walking down the street. We don’t need unsolicited evaluations of our sexual qualities, no matter how convinced you may be that our clothes are sending some subtextual invitation that only your hormone-drenched brain can decipher. Some may call such intrusions ‘compliments’, but if you cut through all of the tired, self-serving rationalization, it’s pretty clear what they really are – harassment.
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