sexual harassment

Pippa’s Story #quitthecatcall

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As confident and badass as someone appears to be, more often than not, their experiences with harassment affect them. It’s not always visible, but it’s there.

Our actions and decisions are based on our experiences and, when it comes to harassment, we often base our actions off a fear for our safety.

Badass triathlete, business women, actor and very busy Pippa Moss kindly took the time to speak to me about this.

Pippa was also part of a photography campaign challenging stereotypes about Essex girls which I encourage you to check out!

Hi Pippa, so nice to catch up with you – sorry it’s not under better circumstances! Would you mind speaking a little bit about your running? When did you start?

Started running at secondary school – I wasn’t great but what I lacked in skill I made up for in enthusiasm and so became the reserve for both sprinting and long distance. I was in every sport team going so was pretty fit anyway. I was a pretty small teenager so I was quite nippy at basketball and hockey and all that.

After my Dad died (and during the many bereavements I’ve gone through) it became my way to ‘escape’ – if things were tough at home, I’d get changed and put my trainers on and just run. It became therapy whilst I learnt to figure out how to articulate my thoughts and feelings. 

I’ve since run a half marathon and did my first Olympic distance triathlon last year. The first of many I hope! I want to get better at endurance running and do the London Marathon.

London Marathon is probably one of my dream races too. Your triathlons are impressive! I imagine that means you’re out on the streets a lot training. Have there been incidents of street harassment in your life outside of training? What is your earliest memory if so?

Earliest memory is having my arse slapped when I was walking down Southend highstreet in Essex with my Mum. After that when I was on my first night out with my boyfriend I was pussy grabbed by a stranger. We got him kicked out but I didn’t drink or enjoy going out for a long time after that. I didn’t understand it. I also find it funny how I always feel the need to say I was with my boyfriend at the time. Regardless of being in a male presence, I don’t know how guys think this sort of behaviour is okay. 

Wow, I’m so sorry to hear that Pippa, it just goes to show that the normalisation of street harassment leads people to violent and physical altercations too. So, I imagine there have been many instances of you feeling unsafe on a run, then? What was the cause of these and what actions did you take in the moment, if so?

A lot of instances! There’s the usual, drive-by hooting and yelling at you – if it’s busy you feel safer but if there’s no one around it’s scary. I used to give them the finger or shout something back – but since I start self-defence (yes, I started learning self-defence) I learnt that you have to do everything in your power to avoid a confrontation. Now I just ignore it. I have plenty of other instances of being harrassed, however, where, if I felt safe enough, I would go up to the person committing the harassment and introduce myself and let them know, perfectly calmly, who I am and that I don’t appreciate it. I ask them for their name and tell them mine, offer my hand to shake and just get to know them a little. I feel like this makes them see I’m not just something you can shout a ‘compliment’ to. Fuck knows if it actually acheives anything.

Are then preventative measures you take to try and avoid feeling unsafe, then? I know I’ll often think twice about wearing shorts if the weather is nice (although it doesn’t often stop me).

Depending on the time of day I alter my route. Even though I prefer running in shorts I rarely do. I should wear what I want but I feel my past experience makes me conscious about it.

I know I also base my clothing choice on how busy it’ll be out, like rush hour, for example, I’ll avoid tight clothing. Is there a certain time of day or environments you avoid running in?

I prefer running in mornings and evenings – I used to run in the dark with lights because I felt more comfortable doing so, but as I’ve got older and experienced more crazy behaviour I tend not to do this so much.

I ask people whether or not their experiences with harassment affects their behaviour and habits running and, as you’ve mentioned, it makes you reconsider what you will wear, as opposed to what you want to wear. It seems that this has really impacted your freedom when running?

As mentioned in another question, yes. Sadly, the idea that what you’re wearing can be held against you should anything happen seems to be prevalent. I was a street performer for a while and being an actress I can hold my own, if I’m just living my days I tend to wear what I want. But I find in the gym community/running you sometimes get some ‘lads’ who feel like they have a right to ‘oggle’ at you. I’m just running/gymming to get to work. Not for attention.

Have you experienced any negative feedback from people close to your training and street harassment? A lot of women I’ve spoken to experience inadvertent victim blaming.

In a way. My Mum always says “be careful”. Like I’m just going to be completely reckless and irresponsible. It really pisses me off because women shouldn’t have to “be careful”. We should all, as a race, be respectful. Little girls shouldn’t have to “keep their wits about them” (another favourite catchphrase my family use), we should teach everyone on the planet to respect others from a young age, then we might not have this issue. It’s this subtle phrasing that reinforces the idea that women need to protect themselves, when in fact, we need to teach the perpetrators, not to attack in the first place. We need to nip the root cause in the bud.

Ahh, completely agree! Often these warnings come with the best intentions but it really does put the emphasis on us having to mind our safety, rather than just being able to exist safely. Is there any particular event in which you find there’s an influx of harassment? Lockdown has been particularly bad for me.

To be honest, not particularly. It’s pretty consistent regardless of the social climate.

I can’t really work out if the consistency is a good or bad thing! Sorry you have to deal with it so often though. What would you like to see being done about this? What kind of actions do you think need to be taken?

If that when we reported this sort of behaviour something was actually done about it. I would like us to acknowledge talking to and shouting at and sometimes touching women you don’t know/hardly know in public and privately is a massive problem. #MeToo has helped this in not just the creative workplace, but all. Still I feel a lot of harassment reports are swept under the rug for not being a serious offence. Just a few months ago before lockdown I had a group of lads inform me one of them was a rapist and start vocally harassing women on the tube. I reported it and absolutely nothing was done about it. 

Thanks Pippa, that last encounter you mentioned is absolutely out of order.

it’s evident that there’s a data gap in the UK regarding street harassment. Even though it isn’t currently a criminal offence if you see or experience and incident please report the time, date, location and something to identify the perpetrator by (like a number plate). The more we report the more evidence we have to stand on when we take this fight to MPs.

Illana’s Story #quitthecatcall

street harassment

Last week was Street Harassment Awareness week.

But just because that’s over doesn’t mean that the conversation should stop.

In fact, we should be even more vocal about it – until we feel safe on the streets, whether that’s running or going about our day-to-day lives every week needs to be Street Harassment Awareness week.

After a really positive launch of the series last week, I’m going to start posting more regularly to keep the traction of the message up. It’s tough to feel proactive in our current climate but I don’t want to let the message slip out of the public eye.

This week I spoke to Illana (@run_farther_illana), an active member of the online running community who, very impressively, completed RED January this year during the beginning of her first marathon training cycle.

As with my previous posts, I asked Illana about her running journey and how Street Harassment has affected her and her behaviors within it. She speaks very eloquently about the pressure for us, as victims, to accept the brunt of responsibility for perpetrators actions and challenging the norm.

I’m sure a lot of us can relate to what she has to say.

Hey Illana, so, first thing’s first – What drew you to running?
I started running in May 2019 after beginning the Couch to 5k plan, which I started out of curiosity for running. At the time, my boyfriend had recently started attending parkrun more regularly and hearing his experiences about the encouraging environment and atmosphere about parkrun, I wanted to give running a try in addition to the gym classes I was used to doing.

I love parkrun, it’s one of the main things I can’t wait to get back to after this lockdown! Have there been incidents of street harassment in your life outside of running? What is your earliest memory?
Yes, I don’t think many people (women especially) can say they haven’t been harassed on the street, whether that’s heckling or cat-calling to serious harassment which compromises your physical safety. The obvious examples are from general girls nights out as I’m in my 20s where groups of lads would shout at you from across the street, or when innocently running errands in town having a total stranger verbally harass you. I was heckled by a driver in a work vehicle once – it involved some gross gestures. I was so horrified I reported it to the Police. They were extremely helpful in supporting me and making sure I had the option to prosecute if I wanted to, but I chose not to but I’m glad that the Crime Reference Number contributes to vital data and insight into these incidents.

There’s a lot to be said for reporting incidents of harassment when they happen – it all gets logged and goes toward proving how rife this problem is. Have there been many instances of you feeling unsafe on a run? What caused it and what actions did you take in the moment, if so?
I’ve never felt really unsafe where I’ve felt I needed to take action in the moment. There have been instances where I’ve felt uneasy or unsure, especially if I’m running an unfamiliar route I always contemplate the “what ifs” but usually dismiss the worry quite quickly.

I think most of us can probably say the same for a lot of our runs – the fact that uncertainty is the norm for us is concerning to me. Speaking of the norm, a lot of women I’ve talked to say that considering their safety, even in the back of their minds, is the norm. Do you take preventative measures when running?
I always try and prepare to make my runs as safe as possible if I’m going alone – I’ve purchased a RunAngel wearable safety device, and always run with my phone too. I never run alone in the dark in neighbourhoods or areas where I can’t get immediate attention or help. It’s normal to me to think about my safety – whether I worry about getting an injury or getting lost, but sadly thinking about safeguarding myself against street harassment is part of that “risk assessing” too.

I’m the same – I’ll not even consider running without my phone. It’s sad that there is a need for these devices and apps, but it’s very useful that they’re there for us too. In terms of the environments you run in, is there anything you’ll avoid?
Weirdly, I feel a lot safer running around cycle paths or footpaths that aren’t near the roadside. The only other people I see on these routes are cyclists, dog-walkers, or other runners. However it’s taken me some time to build my confidence and familiarity running around those areas. I hate running on pedestrian paths alongside roads at rush-hour or late evening as I’m always a lot more conscious about traffic and what actions/behaviours motorists can do, drive away, and get away with!

100% my experience too – busy roads are the worst and I can guarantee I’ll get harassed without a doubt on the main ones near me. Have you found that Street Harassment affects your every day behavior, both in running and non-running life? It’s getting hotter now, that tends to be an area of concern for a lot of female runners.
What I’m wearing sadly extends to what I choose to wear when running as well. It’s awful that we have been conditioned within the culture of victim-blaming It’s absurd and ridiculous to worry about simple things, like the length of my shorts or removing layers on a hot day to nothing but a sports bra,  just because we’re worried about street harassment.

Totally! Others behavior should not affect our every day comfort. It’s especially easy to blame ourselves in regards to what we’re wearing, I know I constantly doubt if it was “my fault” because of my outfit choice which, as you said, is conditioning and completely ridiculous. Have you experienced any negative feedback from people close to you regarding outdoor exercise and harassment, like victim blaming due to outfit choices, for example?
No, luckily all other runners and friends I trust enough to vent to about this are extremely supportive and understanding. I think we all have shared experiences and stories to share so it’s a collective understanding of how frustrating, disappointing and annoying it can be. I’m fortunate that the experiences I’ve had mean I only feel those things in response, and nothing so severe has happened to me to cause a massive mental health knock, or impact my life or my relationships with others profoundly.

That’s good to hear – this sort of every day oppression can be tough on our mental health so it’s great that you’ve fought back against it. What sort of change would you like to see, going forward, to hopefully put an end to Street Harassment for good?
Fundamentally, it is the behaviour of perpetrators and the assumption that we should just “brush it off” that needs to change. Why is it okay to accept street harassment as a norm in society whilst many are stigmatised or judged when they talk about it? Hopefully we are resilient enough to ‘let it slide’ and ‘brush it off’, but we should also allow ourselves to get angry and challenge this norm. There needs to be more education and outreach to explain why it’s not okay, whichever environment it takes place in. There also need to be opportunities to empower people to be active bystanders so we are equipped with tools and techniques to safely intervene if we see something, or personally experience something, which is wrong and makes us uncomfortable. Hopefully with the work that you’re doing we can make it more positive space to openly talk, share and empathise with each other within the running community.

Agreed – education is key! Thank you so much for your honestly, Illana. The more I speak to people the more comfort I find in our shared experiences. Which is an incredibly sad blessing and curse. Is there anything else you’d like to touch on?
There might be a lot of people that scroll past these accounts and think “Nope, can’t relate” as they might not have had experiences of street harassment themselves or perhaps their experiences aren’t “bad enough”. But perhaps I’d like everyone to think about the things you worry about on a run, and question whether that stems from a worry for your safety or risk of street harassment. I’m sure after this post people might reflect on where they run, when they run, and the crowds they avoid (although, with social distancing in place, we all know our running habits have changed drastically in response to that too!)

Thanks again, Illana. I think daily harassment is such the norm now that we often don’t notice we’re victim to the subtle biases anymore. It’s important to remember that we don’t have to put up with this – together we will put an end it!