It happened one night when no one was watching. Puberty? No. Something far more crazy and ugly than that. Catcalling. Solicitation. I was a 13 year old girl waiting for my dad to give me a ride home when a man came up with an offer to buy me a drink from a soda machine.
Innocent enough? Sure.
The creepy part was when he solicited me for sex while looking me up and down.
That's right. As I looked at this man who was so close in age to a friend's father, I couldn't understand if he was joking or not. He could have been anyone's father or husband and yet he said those nasty words to me.
"Do you want to fuck?"
Shock overcame me and I ran away completely traumatized. If I could have gone back in time, I probably would have punched him and gave him a piece of my mind. What gave him the right to say something so gross and horrible to a child? My clothes came from Goody's and I carried a backpack full of books and homework.
No makeup and none of the flirting on my part. Why did he target me?
The second time I exited Walmart. My dad and his friend were far ahead and in a haste I jogged to catch up. To my left, a man grabbed my arm. He was on the phone and I thought maybe he had a question or needed help.
No, he winked and mashed his lips together at me. His grasp tightened and I fearfully yanked my arm out of his hands and screamed. It was loud and the shrieks that followed embarrassed him to the point of dropping the payphone and leaving.
A coward. He was a coward to put his hands on me.
College wasn't any different. Silly me thought that being older meant no one would bother me the way those men did before. Silly me didn't grow any wiser.
Returning on a walk one night downtown, a group of men in mid-twenties or early thirties shouted, "Hey, it's my birthday! Give me a free one!"
This time I found my voice and boldly retorted, "Fuck yourself!" Laughter. That was all I heard as we continued walking like it was a joke or a game.
After talking with some friends with similar experiences, I realized this is never going to stop. These people who outwardly seem like honest folks are wolves waiting to catch prey. It doesn't matter who you are. Age doesn't matter at all.
In their mind, it's okay to touch you because they can. It's okay to do it to you even when they have children and wives at home. It happens to women the most, but men also get the catcalling and the physical harassment.
None of this is okay.
To this day, I ride the free bus downtown where anyone can get on. Some people don't get off and the driver doesn't realize the man in a hat is inching closer to me. He stares at me like something to eat. Uncomfortably, I shift and glare at him for the rudeness. That rudeness is other than his curiosity about who I am.
It's him getting ready to pounce. And it has come to pass that a man did touch me inappropriately on the bus. At this point I am furious and let the driver know what is going on. He gets kicked off, but not for long. He will be on the next bus and the next on another day or today.
What women can do is stay as we are. Don't dress any differently. It gives no one a right to touch us because our shirt shows cleavage or a skirt is short so we must be asking for it. What women need to do is stand up against these criminal acts. If a man touches you, tell him he has no right to.
Get a witness and call the cops. Who cares who he is? He needs to go to jail! He could be the your friend's buddy from college, the teacher beloved by the community or a neighbor who your family adores. It doesn't matter if others think he might be a good person who did something wrong. He knew what he was doing and deserves to be locked up.
Ladies and gentlemen. If this ever happens to you, please call 911 and get whoever violated your rights as a human being to the dungeon. While the problem is sexual harassment, it isn't. This behavior occurs daily and it seems to be old news. But we need to change the attitude that it is a blip in the air that we shrug off.
In a perfect world, classes would constantly teach men and women the concept of keeping on our hands to ourselves from the time we are in kindergarten up to forever. One Human Resources Sexual Harassment Training isn't enough in on the job training. Simple admonitions of "Don't touch!" here and there won't stick if it's not talked about afterwards.
Constant reminders that personal space matter needs to be talked about everyday with children and adults in school, work, going out and wherever. Incorporate this talk in your life as much as possible because it is important.
Just believing that the neighbor's boy wouldn't dare to hurt anyone isn't enough. It has to be ingrained throughout our lives that this violence against people isn't okay. We can't change the issue until we start changing the conversation.
