You are walking down the road and someone whistles at you from a dark alley and/or calls you all kinds of disgusting names, what do you do? The majority of the answers would obviously constitute of the word “ignore”.
Yes, most of us would ignore the situation and go home beating ourselves up about why we did not have the courage to call them out or to confront them. Eve-teasing and catcalling is a real crime and most of the time, the people who engage in this crime are normal people with an education and a job.
But do you think once you call them out or expose them they would have an ounce of shame for their act? A girl from Amsterdam answered this question when she took an initiative to click a selfie with every man who catcalled her to show the disturbing state of affairs.
Noa Jansma, is an Amsterdam-based student who got tired of the regular catcalling she encountered walking the streets and decided to document them to show how documenting the crime affected the accused. She started an Instagram account called ‘dearcatcallers‘ and has opened it to submissions as well.
She made it a point to click a selfie with each cat-caller with her exasperated face and the reactions of the accused will send chills down your spine. Also, don’t forget to look at the captions that she put up along with her photographs to give you some insight.
1. They are posing for the camera.
2. He has the nerve to cozy up to her.
3. She ignored him for 10 minutes, DID NOT HELP.
4. They definitely think there is nothing wrong with the act.
https://www.instagram.com/p/BYYSn9yFD6D/?taken-by=dearcatcallers
5. Disgusting!
6. Baby, the name that haunts us when we walk the streets
7. Wish it was a moronic stereotype
8. This is disturbing.
9. Dictating “you should smile more”
10. They are laughing!
11. Clearly, age has nothing to do with it.
12. I cannot imagine what she must be going through.
13. The sheer AUDACITY!
14. I have no words.
15. Revolting!
Her posts which she put up to encourage women to take a stand against this menace has also received a share of victim blaming because isn’t it always the girl’s fault? Eve-teasing and catcalling has gone unchecked for too long and the sad part about this, is that the people who engage in this crime do not even realise that what they are doing is wrong.