Last week I performed a poem I wrote about street harassment.
I’ve been feeling poetic recently. And I’ve been feelingincreasinglywound up about street harassment…well from about the get onof 10.
Last week the two things came together, when I performed a poem I wrote about street harassment.
Earlier this year I reported on, and was involved in a abide byinto street harassmentcarried give awayby ostracismWomen’s Voices (CWV) and Coventry University. In April the report, ‘An Everyday Occurrence’, was published showing the results of the survey.
The survey found that 61 per cent of those asked had experienced familiarharassment in the previous 12 months; incidents which included unwanted sexual comments (37 per cent), wolf-whistling (32 per cent) and being groped (12 per cent).
The international movement Stop Street Harassment says that around the world between 70-100 per cent of women have experienced any(prenominal)form of tormentin public.
This harassment can include anything from leering, wolf-whistling and sexual comments to groping, masturbation and assault.
My own experiences of street harassment, like many who we wheel spoketo in the survey, began when I was about 10 years old, and haven’tstopsince.
Being involved with the survey and hearing how many other women comesexual harassment on a daily stemonly compounded my anger about the issue.
So I poseit in a poem.
My poem is called ‘Respect Me’, because simply that is what I’d like custodyto do, and I feel that if whateverof the men who havesexuallyharassed me – or other women – had an ounce of respect for us, they would spotit.
As I wrote the poem I recalled, not only the incidences of harassment I have experienced, but also many of the responses we got in the survey.
The types of harassment women experienced, the way women change their behaviour to avoid harassment, the emotionaleffect it has on women and the places women have experienced it.
All this went into the poem ‘Respect Me’ which I will leave you to watch, or read:
Respect me.
Don’t expect me
to enjoy your viewand your leer
I don’t want to hear
Your words fastenedwith lust
While I wait for the bus
I don’t want to know what you think of my ‘ass’
or my ‘tits’
or any other bits of my body
MY body.
Not yours to ogle or claim
or waulsexy names
Not yours to grope
Not yours to touch
Not yours to assess & publicly judge
Respect me.
Don’t expect me to smile
Because you assignso,
Or when you shout ‘fancy a shag’
For me to say ‘ok, let’s go’!
Stop staring
Because you’re scaring me.
“I’m exquisitethanks”
“Go away”
“Please leave me alone.”
“Let me be.”
Respect me.
Don’t expect me to turn around
There’s 3 of you tooshieme now
You whistle and whistle again
I’ve got my earphones in, head down
I pretend
I can’t hear you.
“Hey white top!” you labelin vain,
that’s not my name
Have you noticed my locomotehas doubled in pace?
Do you have any thoughthow this feels,
The three of you hot on my heels,
Keen for the chase.
I’m afraid.
Respect me.
Don’t expect me to fall uponit as a compliment
That’s not what you meant
when you yelled from your car,
rubbed against me at the bar,
followed me and smacked your lips,
tried to grab my hips,
whistled, whooped & groaned,
waited ‘til I was on my own,
hollered ‘hey baby’, ‘hey honey’, ‘hey cutie’, ‘hey sexy’,
Do you rightfullyexpect me
to respond to this shit?
to comply when you shout ‘show us your tits!’?
or pucker up when you murmur ‘give us a kiss’?
What is it you want?
‘cos I’ve had enough
of this stuff;
of crossing the road
and clutching my keys
of going the long way goto avoid your sleaze.
I’m sick of the feeling of fear and shame
and of nookierape culture saying I’M to blame!
RESPECT ME!
don’t expect me to shut up about this
‘Cos we will holler back
and call you out
and tell it how it is.
It is harassment.
It is assault.
It is YOURS, and NEVER my fault.
It is power play.
It is oppression.
It is treating me like I am a possession.
It is threatening.
It is disrespectful.
It is entirely neglectful
of the fact that I am much more than ‘a nice rack’
So step back.
Shut your trap.
straitsaway.
Avert your gaze.
Keep your hands to yourself,
Do not touch, or obstruct, or follow or yell,
and go tell
completelyyour mates to stop it as well.
Listen and hear.
This isn’t a request or a plea.
It’s a demand
for you
To Respect me.
If you want to get a full essay, wisit our page: write my paper
Materials taken from Womens Views on News
No comments:
Post a Comment