The article that inspired me to write this post can be found here: https://medium.com/@mshannabrooks/why-women-smile-at-men-who-sexually-harass-us-cf4eeb90ed30#.aufijar1s
This article made me think. Really think. Because yes, I’ve experienced the same kind of harassment as Olsen has. Numerous times. And yes, I’ve handled it with smiles sometimes, small tiny “thanks”, but I’ve also handled it with aggression. And, right as I am writing this, I’m reminded by this amazing youtube video: https://youtu.be/V4UWxlVvT1A?list=LLMvlSBU7PkC1Hg-sVuckohQ
I recommend you, reader, to go and read that article and go watch that youtube video before continuing to read this post. Done? Great.
First of all, I’m not saying that men don’t experience sexual harassment. However, men have not suffered from sexual harassment for hundreds and hundreds of years, now, have they? I think not. And men have not been suppressed by women for thousands of years, have they? No.
I don’t like going out in the city at night, especially not on the weekends. Not even just to meet a friend at a café, or to do evening events at the Student House I volunteer at. I hate the city at night, because there’s a 90 % chance that some man will shout something at me, or follow me, or grab my arm and say something suggestive and nasty. I hate the way they think it’s okay, because they are drunk, or homeless, or, you know, “just young and partying!!!”, and I’m just “boring” if I don’t find their harassments entertaining or arousing. And it really doesn’t matter if I’m wearing a dress or if I’m wearing pants, walking shoes, gloves, winter coat, and a scarf covering half my face. If I look like a girl, they feel free to harass me. And I find it disgusting and disturbing, and most often, to be completely honest with you all, I feel frightened. Because I’m not very strong. I don’t carry any weapons. I don’t even wear heels, so I can’t defend myself with my shoes. All I can do is run away. Luckily, running away, or escaping on my bicycle, or running to a bus and jumping on it in the nick of time, or moving to the opposite end of the train (though most often I will be followed on the train and have to get off at a random station and wait for the next train) – luckily, these ways of escape have worked for me so far. As well as what Olsen writes about: smiling politely, sometimes even forcing out a small “thank you”, moving away in a casual manner as to not provoke the harasser, never letting him think that I am moving away because of him. These are all mechanisms I’ve used again and again and again. Most often on the train, actually – the train, or on Friday nights in the city centre. And when I say that they work, I mean that I have never been raped.
I felt a knot in my stomach when Olsen wrote about her then-boyfriend’s reaction. Had it been me, I would have been so pissed and so upset, I don’t even think I could have explained any of this to him properly. But, as Olsen points out, it’s hard to blame him, as he’s probably never experienced anything like that on his own body. So obviously, he doesn’t have years and years of training.
Whenever these things have happened to me, I’ve always felt sad and regretful afterwards – and, if it involved physical contact, I’ve felt filthy. Why didn’t I talk back to him? Why didn’t I slap him? Why didn’t I do something?
I’m reminded of something that happened to me on a train once. I am sitting with a group of girl friends, talking and chatting. Suddenly, I feel someone touching my hair from behind me. I turn around, and apparently this creepy man felt the desire to touch my hair. I look at him in disgust, and tell him to leave my hair the fuck alone. I turn around again, and seconds later, he’s grabbing my hair again. I turn around, and tell him off again, and he just smiles at me, that son of a bitch. We ended up moving away from him to sit somewhere else. NO ONE around us told him off – no man, no woman. They just watched it happen. No one told the man to stop touching my hair. I had to move away from the man harassing me. And yes, I do have pretty hair. And yes, it is very soft. And yes, that man may have been a tad cray-cray and most likely drunk. But HOW does that make it okay?
The answer is, it doesn’t. It doesn’t make it okay. But a lot of people seem to think so. Being drunk does not entitle you and your friends to pull up my dress on the dancefloor at a club. It doesn’t entitle you to shout things at me in the street. It doesn’t entitle you start a suggestive conversation with me on the train or to call me “baby” or “honey”. I do not care how many beers you’ve had. It is still not okay. I don’t feel safer knowing that you’re drunk. I don’t feel less scared, I don’t feel less provoked, and I definitely do not feel less harassed.
Shooting someone because he looked at you funny is insane, right? Well, so is grabbing a woman’s ass just because she is there. So is shouting at her in the street because she is there. So is pulling up her dress on a dancefloor in a club just because she is wearing a dress and dancing in a public place. Clothes can’t ask or tell someone to do anything. Did I tell you to touch me? No. Are you saying my dress talked to you? Are you saying that an inanimate object said something to you? Because then you need to get some serious help.
I’m also reminded of something I experienced in my last year of high school. There was a guy, let’s call him Pete, who shared my interest in Japanese popculture, and I thought he was nice, even though he was also very socially awkward and… well, weird. After a while, he began feeling a bit too friendly with me. I tried my best to keep a distance, removing myself from him at parties we were both attending, trying to keep people between us so he wouldn’t sit so close to me etc. One night, at a friend’s birthday party, I was about to leave, and he asked if we could walk together to the train station (my dad was picking me up, the sweetheart). At first, I tried to refuse, telling him that there was no need, he should just stay and have fun at the party! But he insisted, and I said okay. I held my umbrella in my hand so that he wouldn’t try to hold my hand, I tried to keep a distance between us as we walked, but that resulted in us walking more to the left, because he was trying to walk closer to me.
When we finally got to the station, I was so relieved. My dad’s car was already there, so I said bye and wanted to walk away, but then.. then he forcibly grabbed my head and pushed our faces together in the most disgusting “kiss”. I tried to push him off, but he would have none of it. I finally got him off me, and I RAN away from him, jumped in the car and told my dad to “GOGOGO”.
Later, when I wrote to Pete on Facebook in a private message telling him how harassed I’d felt, how he had crossed all of my boundaries, that I had not suggested I wanted any of it, and that he was to never do anything like that ever again, I was shocked by his answer. He was of course sad that I had felt that way, but he refused to apologize because he had wanted to do it for such a long time, and it felt so right to him.
When I told my friend about it later on, she wasn’t surprised. He’s tried that with me too, she said, and another girl from our class.
Needless to say, I’ve been force-kissed more than once by guys at high-school parties.
Why is this redeemed to be okay? No, I didn’t ask for it. No, I didn’t bat my eyelashes suggestively. No, I didn’t “put a spell on you” or “tell you with my eyes” or “dress in an inviting way”.
I don’t know how to end this post. I guess I’ll end it by saying, I support you, Hanna Brooks Olsen. I agree with you. And I understand.
The Elephants in the Room 