School

anonymous

This boy in my class was being repeatedly weird to me. one day, while I was peacefully doing the work sat next to him, and he poured honey on me. it was really strange and random and I was just told to go to the toilet and clean it off (it didn’t come off – it’s honey??). After I went to place the textbook in the middle of us and he snatched it from me. He said ‘you will do as i tell you and only speak until spoken to. i am your superior’. He isn’t. He is my classmate. When I told the teacher, she said I can either deal with it or sit in the back and have to miss out on the work because I won’t be able to take the textbook with me. After the lesson, when I spoke to another teacher, they said “Boys Will Be Boys” and told me that I will have to deal with it sooner or later. I was 13 and later on in the year his sexual comments increased and started trying to touch my thighs.

Mo

The constant accusation by the red top press and elsewhere that a women is ‘flaunting’ something (dress, abs, legs, backside, etc) is aggressive and abusive. Women wear clothes they enjoy – it is not flaunting anything. This word should become a total no-no when used to describe any female, as the word feisty is; let’s start challening its use please

S

From 10 years old onwards I’ve experienced constant sexual harassment in my life. An early example was of walking home with a friend and a group of older teenage boys whistling and laughing at us as we approached their group and as we walked by two of them exposed themselves and both had erections. We ran home shocked. We didn’t know what it was all about to be honest, didn’t have the words to tell our parents, but instinctively knew to get away. I developed breasts early and it drove the boys in school crazy. Constant comments and groping. One time a few boys from school called to my home (I was about 12 and my parents were at work) and when I answered the door one of them grabbed my breasts then threw money at me? They all ran away giggling and laughing. As a young woman I am unable to count the amount of times men would whistle at me, rub themselves against me in busy clubs or bars, grab my breasts, grab my genitals and try to kiss me (which is the most stomach churning sometimes). In my working life if I was in any way nice to a male colleague they’d think I wanted a sexual relationship, even though at this stage I was married with a child, they’d make advances at work gatherings or comment on how I looked “really great” in this or that or say inappropriate things about how it was a pity I was “already spoken for”. Let’s not even mention the staring because life is too short. As a 40yr old I felt the harassment has eased, I guess I’m not as desirable anymore, which further compounds the fact that in many men’s eyes my worth isn’t much more than their sexual satisfaction. Or so I thought. Maybe the pandemic meant less exposure to men because post lockdowns I’ve noticed the stares here and there, the attempts to get into my personal space and touch me (not breasts, I’m not that green anymore) and recently a friends partner has called to my home with spurious reasons, hugged me (it’s that passive aggressive shit, if I say no to a hug am I the bitch for misinterpreting his intent) and commenting on how well I look. As I type all of this I wonder why it is I’ve never reported any of it, officially or otherwise. I guess I’ve felt it’s part of being female – warding off male attention, but in a way that doesn’t result in you being labeled a bitch or in some way making the man aggressive. I’m drained after sharing this.

Anon

When I was 17 at a school party a boy blatantly sexually assaulted me by coming up behind me when I was sitting down and grabbing me and kissing me after I had already made it clear to him, I wasn’t interested. There were over 100 people there that night, and only one girl asked if I was ok (thank you E!). I called him out about it when in class the next week because he was claiming I was a ‘slag’ who was all over him – which was completely untrue, I was scared and embarrassed and went along with it in the moment because I had no idea what to do – 17-year-old me was too embarrassed to push him off me. I lost many friends because of this, they all thought I was a crazy feminist bitch. Even though he had a terrible history with being a creep when drunk (he assaulted 3 other people that night alone) almost no one apart from my very close girlfriends understood how his behaviour was wrong. I am now in my 20s and can finally understand and admit to myself that what he did was assault, and it’s ok to feel angry and grossed out by it. For years I felt guilty for getting angry at him and feeling like I was making a mountain out of a molehill. Fuck you Ben. We need more Es in the world.

x

one of my personal pet peeves is when im at school or out in public and a man feels the need to put his hands on my waist or touch my waist to get past me. especially when they physically move you out of the way instead of just asking you politely to move. i get fully grown men doing this and I’m only 15. It’s uncomfortable. and a power trip for them apparently.

Diz

I worked in a team of 10 teaching staff. 4 of the team including myself were women over 50. The Head of faculty, a male in his late thirties referred to us as “the old women”. We don’t want the old women working together on training days. We need to reallocate teaching rooms because we don’t want the old women being together at one end of the corridor.

anonymous

I was 14 years old when my boyfriend wanted to do something more than just make out and when I told him that I didn’t feel comfortable and that I didn’t want to do anything yet he started saying that other girls are better because they do what their boyfriends tell them. Also he went to our friends to say that I was the problem and tha he wanted a different girl

Lisa

I was attempting to compete in high school swimming competition, when 3 boys came up to me and were treating me really horrible, saying that girls can’t swim, and that I would fail and never be happy. I don’t know why, and I never will. I beat them in races and they didn’t say anything to me. After the race, in the changerooms, I heard some wolf whistling when I walked in. It was the boys. I told my mum and sister. They tried to find out who the boys were, but never could.

Anonymous

I debate at high school and today I was at a competition. My partner and I (both female) were in a room full of guys in our final round. Both my partner and I offered various questions to the other team but were both told in no incertain terms by our opponent ‘sit down’ and that ‘he couldn’t understand us’. The same point was brought up by another (male) debater and the person who had rudely ignored us engaged with his point immediately. I was also told by the same debater in his response that ‘I brought nothing to the debate’ (despite going on to beat him). Throughout the debate no disrespectful language was used towards any male debaters. During all the time I’ve debated, I’ve noticed that guys can stand up and assert anything with the utmost confidence with strong body language and a loud voice whilst girls tend to try and prove our points with a quieter, less assertive tone which just gets ignored. Normally this doesn’t bother me much but today, the way my partner and I were treated (that was picked up upon by various people in the room) was so disrespectful but I feel like I can’t complain because it’s not overly ‘misogynistic’.

Niki

I’m not quite sure if this qualifies but I wanted to share about it anyway. Today I went out to my local mall with some of my friends where we were catcalled by a group of boys. We were sitting in a Boba shop and they kept sending us weird looks, they even tried to get our numbers and stuff. It was overall just weird and we decided to leave the store. As soon as we walked out the door, they also got up and started following us from a safe distance. We wouldn’t have realized except we decided to take a selfie and saw them approaching behind us. I don’t think I’ve ever been that scared. We walked incredibly erratically to try to lose them, eventually having to duck into a store to lose them. Again, I’m not quite sure if this qualifies but I wanted to post my experience.