"Hey baby, what's yo name?"
"DAMN."
"Great tits!"
"I'd eat dinner off that ass!"
"Yeeehaw!"
"Lil office mama!"
And my personal favorite: "You look like you got white boys callin' you fat, but mama, that's alllll good."
I've heard all this and more while simply walking down the streets in Northampton, MA, where men are strangely arrogant and rude while they're safely in their cars (on the street, I think they're a little scared of the feminists). I do not dress particularly provocatively (although cleavage is usually slightly on display, a fact of life when you're dealing with double Ds), and even if I did, that absolutely does not excuse talking to me or any woman in that way.
I'm not sure what exactly men seek to accomplish by yelling absurd shit like this. Never in my life have I seen it be effective. I've never felt the urge, upon being told I've got "beautiful hooters," to jump into a random man's car and blow him or give him my number or do anything more than laugh at how pathetic he is (though if I'm in a bad mood, they usually just get a "fuck you").
What strikes me as awful about this is that, to these men, my body (and the bodies of all women) are up for commentary at any time. It doesn't matter if you're underage or clearly with another female on a date or if you just don't wanna hear it. So what if she's alone and and it's night time and you're making her uncomfortable? So what if she just wanted to stroll peacefully along the street, alone with her thoughts? Naw, that doesn't matter. Harassment knows no bounds! This asshole has got a message to deliver and that is that she's bang-able, an attribute that his opinion is supreme on because, after all, he's a man.
I recently had a male friend who dresses a little hood who said he hated Northampton and complained about being stared at on the street here. It was all I could do to not tear out my hair as I calmly said, "How do you think women feel?" Our bodies, constantly objectified, are always available for commentary to men. Always. Everyone makes their private judgments, fine. But no one has the right to disturb my peace or make me feel my safety could be in danger simply because they want to share those judgments with me. It's a way of asserting dominance, and that's frightening.
I've had people ask me when I've gotten pissed off about this before, isn't it flattering? Doesn't it make you feel pretty? Honestly, truth be told, some days it does. And that makes me a little sick, that I've internalized misogyny to the extent that a man's approval, even expressed in a way I find to be obnoxious, gives me that rush of feeling good, feeling attractive, feeling hot in a way that my friends or even a female partner telling me I look gorgeous never could.
And THAT, my darling readers, is why feminism is still necessary. To prize the approval of a man over the approval of a female is sexism and misogyny, plain and simple. The importance of their opinions has been inflated in our heads, and we've got to fight it! Make your own opinion more important than theirs. You don't need their approval! Though for now, giving them the finger might be the quickest way to deal.
Much love,
The Albright Sheriff
If anything, getting yelled at on the street makes me feel more nervous and insecure about myself. My skin crawls whenever I hear a honk or a wolf whistle.
ReplyDeleteThe other day I wasn't even wearing anything particularly revealing, and while walking into Turkey Hill with my baby someone yelled out "hey milf! What up?". Oh nothing, just feeling like a piece of meat.
I've been harassed in multiple states, countries and continents and you know, it's as bad here as it is anywhere else . I think that the reasons for it vary depending on the location, although I haven't quite figured out exactly what the differences are. Overall, I think that it boils down to men thinking that they have access to women all day, every day. They have a right to assert their dominance because they know that saying inappropriate things makes you feel uncomfortable and at times, unsafe, so it gives them more power. Power over you. And it sucks. I don't know what the solution is, all I know is that it ain't right.
ReplyDeleteOn a different note, I have heard men complaining about how they feel like they are "on display" at Smith and that they don't like it. My response is: this is only a little taste of what women feel on a daily basis. So if it makes you uncomfortable, stop putting women in that situation and change your behavior.
Lady Lola
I was down the shore last week and my friend and I were walking the boardwalk. In front of us were these girls in small bathing suits. When a large group of guys walked by and one yelled "Dayam girl" as he walked by. This kind of thing makes me physically sick. Some guys are such pigs and sometimes I am ashamed to say I am one....
ReplyDeleteWell, Shieldsy07, you can be proud to say you're one of the few who speaks out about this.
ReplyDeleteEvidence that this problem is about domination, and not guys just trying to make a girl feel pretty: have you noticed how, especially on mainstream sites, any time there is a picture of any female, no matter if she's presented in a way that's supposed to be sexy or not, guys will almost certainly feel compelled to comment on her looks/bangability? I'd venture to say the criticism outweigh the compliments in most cases.
Women do it too, but as far as I can tell they are more likely to comment on the hotness of an actor who's built a career on being hot, or on an athlete's abs or some such, and not just every anonymous male.
So I think that while some creeps do get off on making a real live woman feel uncomfortable/unsafe, there are also a lot for whom it's just a privileged reflex to share his opinion of every female body he sees.
obvs you know i agree with you on all of this. especially the "even though i hate all this bullsh it still legitimizes me" part. but just like my hypocritical love of hip hop music, i'm mostly commenting to point out that im still obsessed with the "little office mama" comment - and always will be.
ReplyDeleteOne time a guy yelled over to my boyfriend and I,
ReplyDelete"I want to bone your girlfriend!"
My boyfriend saw this as a fucking compliment for him. I beat it into his head that it is humiliating me and making me look like an object to be "boned."
However, man kind did me a favor yesterday. A very nice man came up to me and told me, "No disrespect to you miss, but you look very nice in what you are wearing." Then he smiled, walked away, and didn't turn back. Didn't have an objective. Went on with his business. It was very, very sweet.
I told my boyfriend that is what a compliment looked like.
And why do they call them cat calls? I love cats.
For me the most disturbing aspect of street harassment is that I experienced it the worst when I was 12-16, so much so that I stopped walking to friends houses or nearby stores because older men would shout things, slow down in their cars, take pictures, or try to offer me rides. It was really threatening and really could get into your head at a time when you were just starting to discover yourself as a sexual being for the first time. In light of this, I also second the idea that this is about domination rather than genuine attraction. It was just as bad when we were walking around in jeans and sweatshirts as in a sundress or shorts.
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ReplyDeleteHaving been to international schools in Asia for all my life before I went to Smith, my friends and I wondered on several occasions why our obviously foreign (Caucasian) friends would always complain about getting cat-called (I too, have no idea what it's called that since I love cats) whereas our Asian friends never did (and it's definitely not because they were unattractive.)
ReplyDeleteI didn't understand this until one of my male Japanese cousins proposed his explanation to me: it's a form of harassment, and I believe him. Guys know that these comments make your average, sane woman feel disgusted/uncomfortable. So I agree with what Jackie says-- that it's a form of male dominance, but in a different way because it has nothing to do with them wanting your body. Their objective is just to make you feel belittled. It usually works. At least in the context of Caucasian women visiting foreign countries, he explained that most guys are out to harass rather than pathetically woo. I can't speak for the whole continent, but from personal experience, in Indonesia, Singapore, China and Japan (countries where I have either lived or have close relatives in) people generally don't like foreigners and deplore what they perceive as corrupt values. Cat-calling is one way they take out their prejudice.