When a Hollaback-made video emerged last week of a woman walking through New York for ten hours only to get cat-called 108 times, a lot of people rejoiced - finally, it was time to see that sexual harassment happens so often to women that it's just a background element to their day. However, there was something glaringly off about the video - all the harassers were black or hispanic. The guy who created the video, Rob Bliss, later explained on Reddit: 'We got a fair amount of white guys, but for whatever reason, a lot of what they said was in passing, or off camera.'
Plus, an interesting point to note about street harassment (which isn't shown up by Hollaback's video) is that, for women of colour, there's a racial element to the catcalls they get.
That's why this video, made by Collier Meyerson on behalf of Jezebel, is important to check out. In it, lots of women of colour talk about their experiences of catcalling and the racist element to it. You can watch it here.
In case you haven't got time to watch, one woman explains that the video isn't intended to shout down those who felt the initial video resonated with them (30 million people have watched it!): 'The point here isn't to devalue or minimise the experience of the women who strongly identified with this video, but it's to open the conversation, to make it broader, to talk about different types of harassments, to talk about how I feel when I'm in a bar, full of white men, telling me that my hair is really beautiful and sticking my hands deep into my hair, my voice could be and should be included in this conversation.'
Here's A Potential Solution To That Video Of One Woman Being Catcalled 108 Times In A Day
And another points out how her race is used to further harass her: 'I feel that harassment from white men has been a form of exotifying me, like a compliment isn't simply "You're beautiful" or "Good morning" it's got something to do with my skin colour, my name, "Where are you from?" And I find that's a form of harassment because it makes me feel like my difference is interesting to them and that creeps me out a lot more.'
Plus, in an uncanny way of showing just how creepy some white men can be, during the filming of one interview, completely unplanned, a white guy walks up to one of the interviewees and tells her he wants to kiss her. More conversations like this (the video, not the creepy guy) and perhaps soon there will be a way of ridding the streets of harassment once and for all.
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This article originally appeared on The Debrief.