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Sara

When I was 13 I was walking on a country road not far from my house (I’m from Italy, although I now live in UK). It was 2 pm and I was looking at flowers and minding my own business, when I heard a car getting closer, with loud techno music coming from it. I already knew what was coming, and I wasn’t wrong. The car stopped next to me, 3 guys in their ’20s came out, while one remained at the wheel (please remember I was 13, and looking younger). One blocked my path, and the others went behind me and next to me. The guy asked me if I wanted to get in the car for a ride. My reaction to these sort of things has always been to get aggressive, so I started to yell at them that they were disgusting paedophiles and picked up a rock telling them I would throw it at their faces (I was bluffing of course, as to really do that would have put me in the wrong in case the police was called, I already knew at 13 that I would be blamed for defending myself, even from 4 adult men). The guy in front of me told me I was crazy, and they all got in the car and left. This was one of the scariest but not the first or the worst instance of sexual harassment I experienced. No 13 yo should ever have to pick up a rock to scare some men off.

Jazz

I was 10 or 11, and he was 14 I think. It was in the end of the day, I had just come home from school maybe and hour ago. I was at home (brother,sister,father,and my dad’s friend were home too) I was walking down the hoiallway and I had just walked past my brother slightly opened door. When he called out to me, and I had nothing to do so I called back saying I was coming. I pushed open his door, and looked up at him. (He was lying on his bed, but it was a top bunk so I couldn’t quite see him.) he said he wanted to show me something, so I went up closer so I could see what he wanted to show me. When I went up closer I saw what I now know was an erect penis. (I went to a catholic primary school, and I didn’t know anything about male anatomy at the time) I’m not sure what I did, but I think I made a weird face, and I was totally confused. He put it away in his pants and showed me a stuffed toy that he cut a whole into, (I’m sure you can guess for what reasons) Most of the details and the rest of what happened i can’t really remember. Is all very foggy, and I remember feeling icky for the rest of the day, and days after that as well. I didn’t know it was wrong so I didn’t tell anybody. I truthfully thought it was normal. I remember looking at him and seeing him days after, and feeling weird and awkward. Now that I think about it there were other times where my brother acted very sexually around me. One time he smacked me in the bum. There was another times when he asked me to sit on his lap I can’t remember for what reason. I did. And when I sat down he pushed himself against my bottom. There were times he would say very degrading things, and just all around be inappropriate. There are other times Where I walked home from school and I would notice cars going a bit slower when they passed me in my wind-blown skirt. Or feel unsafe when a group of older guys would pass me on the street. It absolutely sucks to feel that way. I feel like i might have selective amnesia maybe about some things that have happened to me in my past because they were to traumatic to have at the front of my brain. And it took me a while to remember what happened. I only remember because I watched the Netflix show Sex Education. And there is a part in the series where Aimee (one of the characters in Sex Ed) gets jizzed on by a man in the bus. (I actually found this site through a video on Netflix’s YouTube channel about Aimee’s story) and it made me think of times I felt uncomfortable and unsafe, or weird. And then I remembered what happened and it made me feel sick. I don’t know what to do to about it. I’m not sure if I should tell someone. The most frustrating part is that my brain keeps trying to discredit what happened to me. Like did that really happen? You did this for attention? Blah! blah! blah! But I didn’t my brother did. He did it because he wanted a reaction. No I’m not sure what you would even class this as. I looked up (I looked this up after remembering what happened to me) similar things, and the closest thing I could find was indecent exposure. But the definition says it’s when someone displays sexual organs in a public area where it is not wanted. And I’m thinking in my head, well that didn’t happen to you jazz, it wasn’t in a public place, and maybe you did want it. I didn’t even know what a fucking penis was for crying out loud. what happened to me was wrong, and it is wrong. And also the thing is is that my brother was 14 when he did that to me, would he even have punishment or consequences at that age. And as a women I am conditioned to go. Oh well he was just young and dumb. And that it was a boy being a fucking boy. I am done. This needs to stop. I am horrified at what I have come to realise about the world at this time of writing this I am 14. At one of the things that makes me so mad is that no one knew. No one asked me while I was weird around him. No one knew what head done. That’s what sucked the most I felt fully alone. And now I know that I am not. That that feels so good. 😉 Ps, sorry this was so long. I just needed to get it off my chest.

Emily

I was in a restaurant in Budapest. I was really dehydrated and had mild heatstroke so I felt very sick and weak. My face was pale and sweaty and my lips were white and flaking. I got up to go to the loo and passed a table of men who were drinking. One of them wolf whistled at me- not in the way one might imagine but three short, sharp whistles as though he was whistling at a dog. As I mentioned before there was nothing ‘provocative’ about me (not that it should matter but I’m just emphasising how ridiculous this situation was), though I was wearing shorts. Because it was summer. And over 30 degrees. So this guy was clearly just looking at my ass which annoyed me because you know, objectification. I just glared at him as I walked past him but I let my imagination go wild as I imagined going back there and giving him a piece of my mind and throwing his stupid drink all over him etc. To top things off I was only with my dad and sister and my dad didn’t really know how to react so I felt like an idiot for telling him about it. Anyway, I’m only eighteen and I’ve started to experience more and more sexual harassment and sexism these days, including being honked at by some 50-year old guy in a car (I flipped him off, naturally) to being spoken to like a child as I walked through and accidentally bumped into a group of men in Rome, and being whistled at by the same guy sitting in the street as I walked past a long line of men sat on the floor. Every time it happens I feel dirty and the need to cover or shrink myself. I shouldn’t have to feel that way as I’m not the one in the wrong.