Nothing I love more than being harassed by large groups of predominantly males.
If you couldn't tell, that was sarcasm. This weekend I went to reading festival (which you can read about here) and had a fantastic time! I got to see bands and acts that I have wanted to see for years and got to spend quality time with some great people. It was also very hot (30°C+ or around 90°F- which for the UK is super hot!) which meant every man, women and every one else were in there shorts and t-shirts.
What is the problem in this, you say? Nothing. Apart from every single time I walked past a group of rowdy males which ranged from teens to quite literally 40 year olds, they would shout abuse about my body or 'things they wanted to do to me'. Where I camped, was a short distance from the toilets and main arena, which meant everyone wanted to camp around these areas. These men would gather in groups and shout at usually girls on their own, like me, and basically strive to make them uncomfortable.
Before you ask, nothing I wore was inappropriate for the weather or the situation I was in, not that that should matter in the slightest.
My question is, why do people (and I don't aim this at just male) think it is okay to harass vulnerable people?
After the first day, I had lost count of the amount of times that I had been questioned about my body or why I would wear shorts like that and being told I was 'Titty-licious'. What makes people think this is okay?
What made this even worse in my eyes, is that there were so many younger girls around. At 19, I wouldn't say I was particularly old or wise but some of the teens walking around were having their 14th birthdays, passing by these men- Growing up in a world where this seems okay, like its the norm and that is just the way it is. But it isn't. People shouldn't think that they have a hold over others, that they can harass others because of their gender or their age or their sexuality or their whatever.
Something that I have seen to be really important trending over on Twitter at the moment is #SREnow . SRE is sex and relationship education. Thinking back to your own Sexual Education how much can you say that you really learnt? After reading a long discussion about this topic, it is fair for me to say I learnt nothing about consent, what a healthy relationship looks like, self worth, LGBTQ+ and the list goes on. People are not educated enough.
The young children I saw this weekend at the festival, unaccompanied by their parents and let in to the big bad world, just taking in and accepting all of the harassment, have not got the right education they need to step back and separate themselves from this childish mentality of the harassers. Things need to change and the change needs to happen now. Will you help change someones life, whether it be a child of yours or someone you know? Letting them know that they are worth more than the sexualised harassment thrown at them from an early age?
Don't sit back and let others, not me a 19 year old woman or the young teens I met this weekend or anyone, face the same attitudes I had to endure this weekend.
Disclaimer: I know I have a strong attitude towards these groups of men, however I would not say anything to them as it would put me in a vulnerable position especially when there are 10 fully grown adults against one teen girl :-)
one thing is complimenting a girl, another being rude and obnoxious.
at least noone touched or groped you as seems to be happening elsewhere.
some drunken guy calling you "Titty-licious' is not the end of the world. stupid yes but I don't think it is harassment unless he was pestering you.
That's fine, but when you have to walk past them to get to and from the toilets and to see any music it was constant pestering :-)
Clearly these males in question don't have sisters or females in their lives that they actually care about... Other than their mothers who would most certainly sold them on their actions. Very sorry that you have to deal with this when you are only there to enjoy your time.
Maybe The Men Have To Go Home And Look At Themselves (or these type of men, As Not all Men Are Like This) In The Mirror. They Are Showing Of In Front Of Their Buddies,
It May be Fun And harmless To Them In Their Mind,
Showing off in front of friends, Some People Call It Egotistical?
Years Ago, On Some Cable Station In IN America
There Was A Show Called The Man Hour, I Thought It Was Degrading To Women, Because Of the Showing Of Stuff Covered Up Of Course, but, very little, I had Just been Flipping The channel when it was doing this, And, It Was In the after school hours time too.
Who Knows?
Put 2 or more people together and they usually resort to pack mentality. Mostly men though. They feel safer in numbers saying and doing ignorant shit. You are doing the right thing most of the time by ignoring them. You can't fix stupid.
THANK YOU
It's silly and immature and it shouldn't happen.
Sounds like bullshit, did you take any videos of the men doing this? I'm not saying it is but you make it sound like it was more then 3 or 4 assholes acting like assholes. if it was a whole bunch of people doing this more then 3-4 times why didn't you bust out your phone and take videos of the harassment? to me it sounds like your just playing the victim to get attention.
Have you ever been to a festival where people have unlimited access to alcohol, and drugs -and there are 40,000+ people there? Have you ever walked past large groups of men on your own shouting crap at you and thought : you know what's a good idea? Let me get my phone out record them whilst I'm vulnerable surrounded by no one I know and hopefully it'll stop? Yeah sounds like real bull :-)
@hannahp
You at least called security and reported these people to authorities so they didn't make someone else feel uncomfortable right?
I mean monetizing your plight on steemit is one thing, but a news report about these guys being arrested at a festival would bring a lot more credibility to my mind.
So my question is where was security when this happened? What action was taken to remedy the situation? Have you documented it so you can bring a complaint to the venue? What are you doing to prevent other young girls from feeling threatened or victimized in the future?
I've been to tons of festivals, I've seen this behavior. it happens any time people get together and do large quantities of drugs and booze. This behavior is hardly limited to men. Women do it too, and from my perspective they do it as much or more often than men, but men are expected to just enjoy it or blow it off.
About 10 years ago I was at a festival where one guy in a group of five cat called someone I was with. I walked over and I gave the man some high quality customized dental work. His buddies jumped in, it didn't slow me down. Booze will make a man ten foot tall and bullet proof. Either way, we were both tazed by security and arrested, we both made the news for sitting out the rest of the festival in a jail cell. This wasn't a big festival and it wasn't a big town, it still made the statewide news.
You and any person with you ought to be doing the same, confront the situation and defuse it however you can.
If you can't contact security and you don't feel safe, especially if drugs and alcohol are involved. My advice is don't go or at least get the hell out of there. Tell the venue owner the problem and you will get your money back and if not, you sue.
Some people are going to say this is blaming the victim. It's not, it's having courage to stand for something and courage will preventing you from becoming a victim in the first place.
Same advice I'd give to my own daughter.
Yeah sounds like more bull, can you link to some articles that talk about this? If it was 40k people and it was non stop everywhere and such a problem, more then just you would be posting on it right? what was the festival called?
Here are some articles I found just by typing in "reading festival"
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/women/womens-life/11822420/Bestival-UK-music-festivals-have-a-rape-problem-that-needs-action-now.html
http://thetab.com/2016/05/19/need-talk-sexual-assault-festivals-90401
https://broadly.vice.com/en_us/article/theres-a-rape-epidemic-at-music-festivals-and-nobody-seems-to-care
ok checked out first link and its about all of the festivles and the different rapes that has happened. most say one or 2 girls at max per festival had something happen, that not the amount you were saying. still horrible. ima check outthe second link now, ok second article
same thing, not about one specific festival and its about how 2 people got raped last year at a concert. this post isn't about a specific concert earthier.
on to the third article,
this article starts out talking about something that happened in 2013 and then goes back talking about concerts all the way back to 2008. all of them are single cases of rape and are not this concert you say you just went to with 40k people.
so we are back to the begingin, what was the name of the concert? if it was really 40k people and the abuse was that prevelant shouldn't there be other reports of it happening? you provided me links to articles about rape at concerts as a whole, not this concert your claiming to have gone to and suffered from. can you provide the name of the concert in your story and a link to what happened at that fesitvle? if there were 40k people and it was such a problem you cant be the only one talking about it online. unless its all a lie and your crying wolf to get attention?
not trying to be a dick but you have provided nothing to back up our story. just articles about how rapes at concerts have happened.
also just woke up so sry bout the speling and grammer.
hope to hear back from you with actual links to the concert your claiming this happened, the name of the concert, and proof that others witnessed what your claiming was such a huge problem.
If you don't want trouble, don't go where trouble is.
Crowds are insane.
Thing is the people I wanted to see at the festival are some I have wanted to see for 5+ years. It's a hard situation as I don't want to be surrounded by trouble but I still want to be able to go out and enjoy my life :-)
People are so soft nowadays... Everyone's a victim...
Not sure why this needed to be tagged steem and steemit....
Men used to whistle at me when I was like 12. There's too many pedos out there.
@lindee-hammer
Sorry to hear men whistled at you at age 12. That is wrong and something that needs to be dealt with.
@hannahp is 19, this makes her an adult in every country in the world. The men whistling at her are by definition not pedos. Pedo doesn't mean a grown man who is attracted to a grown woman, whether said woman is half his age or not.
Pedo means any person, male or female who is attracted to a pre-pubescent female or male.
@lindee-hammer you literally just insulted @hannahp by implying that these men were only attracted to her because you think she looks like she hasn't hit puberty yet. That somehow she wasn't pretty enough to be hit on by normal inebriated adult men, creepy age difference or not.
Oh no I didn't take it as an insult as I have always had men groping me etc since around the age of 12 also, I still to this day get vans slowing down when I'm on my own to whistle and shout at me and that's when they're on their way to/from work! But thanks for the look out anyway:-)
Huh I didn't say that at all. She said there were a lot of young girls around and the men were being creepy to them. Learn the definition of literal and then interpret my statement literally because I never said hannah wasn't pretty or I thought she didn't go through puberty. Go read it again, all that stuff you imagined literally isn't there.
@hannahp
Just curious but did you notice that you were harassed by young men and old men, but it's only old men that were the problem? You were ok with young men doing it, but some how the old guys were supposed to know it wasn't ok despite each group having access to similar quantities of booze?
I'm not excusing their behavior. Young man, old man, or young woman or old woman. It wouldn't have mattered, harassment sucks.
How about just being harassed in general? Seems to my mind that if this had really been truth, it would have been the cat calling and what not that was the problem regardless of who did it.
But what do I know?
I've only got 7 kids aged 21 to 3 and, 4 of them girls. I can only give you a father's perspective, but if you had been my daughter. I would have said you're 19 that makes you an adult, not a teenager. Certainly not old enough to be out boozing, but nothing I can do to stop it. So I would ask you some questions.
My first question would be why were you at a place where you felt unsafe?
My second question would be what did you do about it?
My third question would be why would you choose to stay in a place where you felt unsafe?
Oh no I would definitely say that men of all ages were doing it, however when they're close to my dads ages that's even more creepy to me personally!
As I'm uk based we are allowed to drink from 18, but I wasn't intoxicated at all as I really wanted to make the most of the music :-) thanks for taking a look