No, it’s not a compliment.
An aspirational guide to eradicating the catcall once and for all.
This piece was published in UNSW’s student magazine, Tharunka, in Issue 3, 2022 — titled ‘Hot & Cold Takes’. Find it here: https://issuu.com/arcunsw/docs/tharunka-2022-issue3-hotcoldtakes/17
Boys. ‘Men’. Listen up. I am about to hollaback.
Recently, I was running late to work and looking a complete mess. A truck-full of tradies thought differently though, winding down their windows to holler crude things at me. It was an infuriating experience but there was nothing I could do to change it, so I just let it go.
A few days later however, my fury was reignited. My 16-year-old sister had come home and told me that a man in his car had honked and whistled at her when she was walking to the bus stop. Really? At 7:30 in the morning? She was in school uniform. She was clearly a CHILD. That was the final straw.
So ‘men’, here I go. It’s 2022. You should all be aware by now that there is NOTHING complimentary about loudly and publicly ‘hitting on’ a stranger in the street. We are sick of you honking at us, yelling at us from the top of a construction site, and approaching us when we are alone. Enough is enough.
Right now, the collective conscience about misogyny and rape culture is at an all-time high. We are seeing a global reckoning of male power and entitlement, which has infected our largest industries and institutions. Yes, people are angry and change is brewing, but we still haven’t figured out how to stop misogyny at its most basic level: catcalling.
In 2018, a survey by Plan Australia found that almost 1 in 4 women in Sydney experience street harassment at least once a month. To make matters worse, 4 out of 5 Sydney women say they first experienced street harassment when they were under 18.
Further, in July this year sexual assault reports in Australia hit a new high , according to the Australian Bureau of Statistics. If we want to change the culture of misogyny and violence against women on a grand scale, we need to work on the ‘small’ stuff first. It’s time to figure out how.
Welcome to my step-by-step guide to eradicating catcalling.
1. Make the scumbag squirm: whip out your phone and start recording them.
Name and shame catcallers on social media. It worked with anti-masking Karen’s, so why wouldn’t it work with a catcaller? Every major city in the country needs an Instagram account that people can anonymously submit catcalling incidents to. Check out New York’s account for my inspiration (@catcallsofnyc).
You share a photo, video, or quote of what happened, and the exact location of where the incident took place. It would be a triple whammy: alerting women to places that could be unsafe, raising awareness about local street harassment, and publicly shaming scummy men!
2. Nip shitty behaviour in the bud.
We need to incorporate education about respecting women into school curriculums. We could start by getting young men listen to this awesome podcast by Eleanor Gordon-Smith. She pulls two men aside after they’ve catcalled her in King’s Cross, confronts them, and then tries to convince them not to do it anymore. And when put on the spot like that, it really got them to reconsider their choices. It’s an incredible insight into the catcalling male’s psyche. It could really change a young man’s mind about the impact catcalling actually has on women.
3. Make them feel our fear.
Create a Virtual Reality simulation to put catcallers in our shoes. They would ‘walk’ down a dingey street, with women accosting them from all directions. Yelling lewd phrases at them, whistling at them, following them, honking car horns at them… I feel like a vengeful genius just thinking about it.
Plus, we wouldn’t have to worry about the ethics of ‘giving them some perspective’ because it’s not even real!
4. Criminalise street harassment. For real.
On par with theft or drink driving, make it an enforceable offence, with fines or community service, even jail time for some.
We need to hold men accountable with real consequences for their actions. It’s already been done in countries like France, and it works. So we need to do the same.
5. Mass brainwashing.
If all else fails, we erase catcalling from the collective memory of society. Easy peasy.
Paul Kelly once said, “from little things, big things grow”. We have trivialised the ‘little’ things like catcalling and groping and now, we’re faced with the misogynistic monster it grew into: Rape Culture.
By that same logic, if we start by fixing the ‘little’ things, we’ll see bigger and better changes in the future. Let’s eradicate catcalling now, so that the girls and women can finally feel safe on our streets.
