A pat on the bottom, a grope in the street; if you’re female and travelling alone, it doesn’t matter whether you walk ten paces to your local corner shop or voyage across the world, the likelihood is you’re going to receive some pretty frequent unwanted advances.
For some women, the thought of being marginalized because of their gender is infuriating, for others it’s the sheer audacity or rudeness of a stranger that drives them insane, but for me, it is the unremitting regularity of the problem that drives the nail in the coffin of my last scrap of willpower to protest.
The very nature of the beast is man’s delusion that their relentless pursuit is acceptable, and worse, appreciated, by the opposite sex.People will tell you to dress appropriately, not to make eye contact, and just to walk away, which are all great ways to suffer social oppression, but even the most staid behaviour is not going to help you a jot if you have some obnoxious cling on with desperate aftershave, grinding his bits on you in the queue for the post office.
And it’s not just the toothless curb crawlers that will try their hand, businessmen and other working professionals will test their luck, albeit far more discreetly, but nonetheless with the same unstoppable belief that women will be receptive to their vile proposals.
After two years of living in a city where situations of U.A. were unfortunately consistent, I became completely worn down by the effects of hanging my head wherever I went and accepting whatever repugnance came my way. I worked in a school set in the middle of a busy marketplace; I loved my job, the city and had a great circle of friends to socialise with, but despite following the guidance of women who told me to ignore the cat calls and indecent proposals, my morning walk to work made my life a misery.
The difficult fact of the matter is that no culture has got it right or wrong. I see unwanted advances as a type of bullying; no culture is exempt from this and no culture has yet eradicated the problem.
If the X Factor has taught us anything, it’s that sex sells and crazed delusional people are everywhere. If you want advice, I’d say wear what you want, act how you want, just never underestimate the power of your appeal and the depths of relentless sexual delusion in the world.
To read about others’ experiences living abroad click here
I understand completely. After travelling solo around the world quite a bit, I still find it to be exhausting. I always wear sunglasses and tell everyone that I am meeting my husband, if i get asked and harassed but in the end you just have to get on with it. Only time, education, cultural changes and political will change these things. Not in our life time. Just don’t let it stop you from doing what is important to you.
Thank you for commenting Mz Zoomer, it is exactly this exhaustion which I’m writing about. You’re right, it’s extremely important not to let it stop you from doing what you want to with your life, and only long term social change will make a difference, it’s just difficult for many women to know what to do in situations of unwanted attention, when speaking out is met with further attention and even abuse, and suffering in silence will not instigate change.
“all great ways to suffer social oppression” This is absolutely true and many don’t understand that those tactics don’t address the real issue. I am always hoping to learn new ways to be a better ally as a man. What can I do?
Hey The Life Mosaic, I’m really happy you picked up on that phrase, it is important to me and illustrates exactly how I felt when experiencing unwanted advances. I think just the existence of respectful men in the world, such as yourself, redresses the balance. In the same way that a kind stranger can make the difference after a nasty altercation with another, faith is restored by viewing the world in its totality, good and bad.
After high school, I spent a year in Paris, France as an Au Pair. The experience opened my eyes, and not always in a good way. The repeated unwanted male advances wore on me over time, and soon, I found myself limiting where I would go and at what time I would go there. So I think you’re right; it is a form of bullying.
Hi Carrie, I just replied to you but my post might not have worked. Anyway, I’m glad you picked up on the message about bullying. I refer to harassment as a type of bullying for a specific reason. While travelling, I do not feel as though I am in a sexist, misogynist or even patriarchal country, but rather that I am simply coming up against an unrecognised form of bullying that unfortunately has been allowed to carry on for far too long.
Is there hope? In one of my first jobs in the early 70′s in North America I was harassed constantly. There were 400 men and 8 women working in that building and I learned never to take the elevator or get to work early or stay late. I was exhausted and felt shamed by administration when I complained. Finally I protested loud enough that one of my tormentors left when he was harassed and rejected -by some of my male co-workers. Not all of them are scum; some are heroes. Now the women working there can’t believe my stories, so much has changed, but it didn’t change until the men themselves realized it was a problem. It takes time, but cultures do change.
Hi Charis, it’s interesting to hear this sort of thing happening in North America. There has certainly been a fair amount of machismo and harassment in Britain over the years, particularly in the workplace, but most of my experience and the stories I’ve heard from others have taken place in European countries. Having said that, earlier this year my poor mother had her breasts fondled in a supermarket. I was outraged that something like this could happen in a rural English town, but the problem is obviously a lot more widespread than I thought.
I hear you sweetie, I still get it now in some countries and I’m probably old enough to be your ma!
In my younger days, I met this kind of attention with total hostility by slapping, yelling at and exposing the b*stards. Once when being groped on a crowded tube, I reached back, took the guys hand and clawed ridges into the back of it. All he could do was gasp, otherwise he would have exposed himself. When i got off, I had skin and blood stuck in my nails which was disgusting, but I certainly gave him something to explain to his missus when he got in. I also made it clear to the pervs in my workplace not to mess, cos a kick in the balls often offends.
As I got older, I got cleverer. Wearing a religious symbol around your neck helps in certain countries, as does saying stuff about their mum ‘Your mother would be really proud of you protecting a tourist like me in such a dangerous area’, or name checking God or Allah sometimes work.
Whilst it’s important for you not to take risks or put yourself in danger of retaliation, sometimes the only way to train a dog is with a rolled up newspaper. Otherwise, scream, feign tears and run up to the nearest motherly/fatherly looking soul and hopefully she/he’ll protect you and reprimand him!
Hope some of this helps.
SS x
While physical retaliation would be satisfying, like you say, there are dangers attached. However, I’ve thought about ways this kind of behaviour could be realistically tackled, and I’m still at a loss. The perpetrators are never brought to justice and the only way to produce any kind of result would be to react physically in the same moment. I would never advise anyone to retaliate with violence, but I’m really not sure what other choice there is.
Actually, that’s not fair on dogs; sorry dogs I love you!
This just makes me wanna give someone a super hard elbow punch and I have spranded a number of free-wandering hands in my day!
Cat-calls don’t bug me but you touch me and it is your funeral.
Hi Shonnie, I have definitely utilised my elbows in the past to make a point, anything more and I might be in trouble!
I live in Cairo and this is very much a hot topic at the moment, not just with regards to travellers but with women in general. What has shocked me has been the response form people who should really know better. There is the usual debate about dressing modestly and not making eye contact but to be honest as a man I feel deeply ashamed that women cannot dress as they wish for fear of attracting unwanted advances. Egypt’s solution so far has been gender segregation which to my eyes is no solution at all!
I haven’t read about this gender segregation idea but it sounds crazy!
WOW. that is slightly terrifying as a solution
That is not the way to solve the problem at all.
My wife got groped a number of times – in India and Egypt – very distressing. It certainly leaves a bad taste in your mouth in countries that you would otherwise leave with good memories.
Costa Rica – land of the groped Tica (and gringa). What an eye opener for my wife who lived in the states all her life. Time for a quick education. After eight months she’s getting the self defense mechanisms down.
Later…
I guess life out there is really different from America. Especially for women.
It’s a great post. I live in Asia, and I was having a very similar conversation with a Russian friend of mine (a girl) she’s very pretty – she’s a office worker so her line of work is pretty serious and she’s very professional. The question was, as a pretty Russian (friendly) girl how can she make friends with expats, or locals without giving people the wrong idea or leaving herself open to creepy unwanted advances… it was a tuff question to answer.
This is a brilliant post and it is so true. Why should always women have to adapt to a sexist culture and not the other way around?
The worst, and most common, advice I usually get is “always travel with a man, that’s the only way you can escape harassment.” So a woman needs a man to protect her from other men? It may be true that we live in a men’s world but I will never accept the social order.
Thanks for the thoughts and for the follow! You write about an important issue, and the only thing I would disagree with is the “wear what you want” advice. I think if women want to be noticed for more than their bodies, they have to accentuate things other than that. It might be impossible to reverse the sexism we see in our culture (magazines, billboards, TV) all around us, but we can hold our own standards and show that our sex is not what we, as individuals, derive our value from.
Something I know too well. I was a female working in a mans word, I was the only woman in North America doing my job which required me to get down and dirty in some of the nastiest cess pits you have ever encountered. I heard every comment in the books, and had issues with men on a lot of the construction sites. I was only there to work, not flirt let along pick up a date. It always astounded me that even after crawling out of the sewers there were still men that objectified me. Some men never quit, it’s second nature to them and they don’t even realize what they are doing.
After a few years I adopted a ‘Butch’ personna when I was on a job site. I wore mens work shirts, kept my hair up under a ball cap and generally acted like I batted for the other team..It made it easier to work on the job sites.
I’m not suggesting that we should all hide, but sometimes instead of taking the high road, we just need to take the easy one.