_In Support of the Blank Noise Project_
No matter what country you’re in, there’s bound to be an undercurrent of that idiotic sentiment: that women are molested, raped, sexually harassed, because they were _asking for it_. This _they were begging for it_ look, is apparently only visible to men who are equipped with special visual abilities and who have mastered the art of mind reading, also known as _assholes_.
In the Indian subcontinent particularly, such a sentiment has developed into the despicable pastime of some Indian men, eve-teasing, otherwise known as street sexual harassment. The author of this post has come into close contact with such behaviour, at times having been victim of it herself, and spends her time online defending the case of “foreign women who were apparently asking for it”:http://www.indiamike.com/india/showthread.php?t=24668 (because they’re foreign, wear jeans, and must therefore be a village bicycle), and at other times “writing long epics on new feminism”:http://popagandhi.com/263/why-i-am-still-a-feminist/.
The “Blank Noise Project”:http://blanknoiseproject.blogspot.com/, currently operating “online and on the streets of Bangalore, Mumbai , Delhi, Chennai and Hyderabad”, has been active for a while. They are presently running a campaign, named Did You Ask For It?.
Testimonials of street sexual harassment/ eve teasing from women across age groups, and from diverse places tells us that women get sexually harassed in no matter what they wear.
Blank Noise also believes that women do have a right to feel good about themselves, and wear what they please, without being sexually violated, because ‘you’ think she’s ‘available’.
We question, defy, and attempt to put an end to the argument that women ‘ask for it’. To establish ‘asking for it’ as a mere excuse for sexual harassment, we are asking all women to send in one garment that they wore when they were eve teased.
Each contributed garment comes from someone’s incident as a testimony, or a witness and forms part of a larger collective.
You could chose to send text, describing yourself, or the incident along with the garment.
The garments given will be strung together and installed in a public site. We require 1000 or more clothes from participants all over. The installation of clothing testimonials will travel across cities Bangalore, Delhi, Mumbai, Hyderabad and Chennai…
Please send your support and plenty of good vibes their way.
_Dec 2004, Calcutta: Picture of some unwanted posters on women’s issues; the black one is on the plight of trafficked women and children,, the one behind of a campaign in protest of eve-teasing._
possibly related
Thanks to Melissa Fryrear /
The Lexicon Is A Strange Thing /
Women Bloggers, And.. /
Pap, Pap /
Why I Don’t Usually Talk About Anything Else /
This entry was posted in general, glbt. Bookmark the
permalink. Both comments and trackbacks are currently closed.
Did You Ask For It?
_In Support of the Blank Noise Project_
No matter what country you’re in, there’s bound to be an undercurrent of that idiotic sentiment: that women are molested, raped, sexually harassed, because they were _asking for it_. This _they were begging for it_ look, is apparently only visible to men who are equipped with special visual abilities and who have mastered the art of mind reading, also known as _assholes_.
In the Indian subcontinent particularly, such a sentiment has developed into the despicable pastime of some Indian men, eve-teasing, otherwise known as street sexual harassment. The author of this post has come into close contact with such behaviour, at times having been victim of it herself, and spends her time online defending the case of “foreign women who were apparently asking for it”:http://www.indiamike.com/india/showthread.php?t=24668 (because they’re foreign, wear jeans, and must therefore be a village bicycle), and at other times “writing long epics on new feminism”:http://popagandhi.com/263/why-i-am-still-a-feminist/.
The “Blank Noise Project”:http://blanknoiseproject.blogspot.com/, currently operating “online and on the streets of Bangalore, Mumbai , Delhi, Chennai and Hyderabad”, has been active for a while. They are presently running a campaign, named Did You Ask For It?.
Please send your support and plenty of good vibes their way.
_Dec 2004, Calcutta: Picture of some unwanted posters on women’s issues; the black one is on the plight of trafficked women and children,, the one behind of a campaign in protest of eve-teasing._
possibly related
Thanks to Melissa Fryrear / The Lexicon Is A Strange Thing / Women Bloggers, And.. / Pap, Pap / Why I Don’t Usually Talk About Anything Else /