Why is public sexual harassment often dismissed as a compliment? Words by Eliza Hatch

Why is public sexual harassment often dismissed as a compliment?

There are many different ways you can experience public sexual harassment, from being shouted at in the street to being followed home, groped at a nightclub or stared at for too long on the tube - sexual harassment presents in a myriad of ways and is not limited to a certain kind of locations, time of day or even by who can experience and perpetrate it.  In terms of gender, while the vast majority of public sexual harassment is experienced by young women and girls (75% of girls aged 12-25 experience PSH in their lifetime), men do experience it too, with trans and gender non confirming folk experiencing it a disproportionately higher rate. (hate crimes towards trans people have risen by 88% over the past 5 years) 

There are plenty of misconceptions which surround the issue of public sexual harassment - or PSH for the purposes of this piece. That it happens to a certain kind of person, at a certain time of day, because they were dressed in a certain way or were travelling by a certain route - all of which have been, and will continue to be debunked. Unlike what many people believe, PSH often happens in broad daylight, it can happen in front of hundreds of people, to someone wearing any possible combination of clothing, and even to those who have followed every “rule” in the book. New data from the British Transport Police shows that over a third of women have been sexually harassed on their commute to work, and contrary to popular belief, the majority of incidents took place in rush hour, between 5-7pm, the most busy period.

Another commonly held belief is the “perfect victim” myth - which has led many to believe that PSH is only experienced by a certain type of person. This is a stereotype which has been influenced and forged by years of whitewashed social conditioning, bolstered by overrepresentation of the Hollywood damsel in distress trope in tv and films and a history of institutional racism. Cruicially, this is why when we speak about sexual harassment in all it’s forms, it’s important to talk about intersectionality -  as our experiences will differ greatly based on several factors. Not all women will experience harassment in the same way, or experience justice in the same way too - because of these kinds of prejudices, and the way the justice system has historically prescribed to this myth.

Contrary to these wider societal stereotypes, the way we experience abuse will present and affect each of us in a unique way, depending on our identity factors. These factors can include your: age, sexuality, gender, race, class, religion or if you have a disability. Otherwise known as “intersectionality” a term coined by legal scholar Kimberlé Crenshaw, to describe how different forms of discrimination overlap and intersect, creating unique experiences of oppression. Put simply, it is the fact that not all inequality is experienced the same way.

“We tend to talk about race inequality as separate from inequality based on gender, class, sexuality or immigrant status. What’s often missing is how some people are subject to all of these, and the experience is not just the sum of its parts.” - Kimberlé Crenshaw

Most commonly however, public sexual harassment can be ignored or dismissed by others - and even by ourselves - as “not that bad” or just an attempt of “flatty” or even a compliment. 

The crime (and yes, it is a crime) which is most commonly excused in this way is catcalling - the act of giving an unsolicited or unwanted sexualised comment to a stranger in public. 

The delivery of these forms of harassment can broadly vary. Catcalls can be delivered with an aggressive shout from across the road, a call from a rolled down car window or even a whisper from someone walking past. Many men (and some women even) have historically argued in their defence, citing a well-meaning intention or desire to flatter. Unfortunately, no matter how “positive” the intention behind the comment or phrase, it is not the intention that matters - but how it is received, the impact. 

Other common defenses of catcalling are that you are “overreacting”, or that it “could have been worse" or that it’s “not a big deal”. Some might say that if the remark is not even sexual, it “doesn’t count” as sexual harassment.

These defences are not only infuriating, patronising and pointless, but they are also not true.

It’s entirely appropriate to react to something which is often just the tip of the iceberg to all the unwanted sexist, gendered comments a woman or gender non-conforming person can receive about their appearance in just one day. 

The bigger picture here is that many people don’t understand that unwanted comments or “micro” forms of harassment act as a gateway to many other forms of normalised violence. It can be difficult If you haven’t experienced normalised sexual harassment from a young age, to see how an unwanted comment is part of a larger system which links all forms of gender-based violence.

A criticism many feminist campaigners have come up against when pushing back against everyday sexism, is that the mere action of challenging does more harm than good to the cause. This is the idea that by even talking about the “micro” forms of harassment, the catcalls, the looks, the stares, the normal everyday lived experiences for over 50% of the population - you are pulling focus from much more serious issues - like rape, child marriage and femicide.

Such was the sentiment of the 100 French celebrities an actors who signed an open letter denouncing #MeToo and it’s intentions when it had barely taken off in 2017.

This is also known as an unhelpful form of “whataboutism” - the technique or practice of responding to an accusation or difficult question by making a counter-accusation or raising a different issue. The thought being, that by focusing on something like as sexual harassment, you are trivialising the issue of gender-based violence. That might be the case if harassment and assault were isolated events, but unfortunately, they are very much connected.

When "small" acts of sexism or harassment go unnoticed and unchallenged, they create an environment of normalised violence which underpin more extreme acts. An example of this can be seen when harmful figures like Andrew Tate spew misogynistic rhetoric unchallenged, there is a real world threat of normalising violence towards women, girls, lgbtq+ folks and other marginalised communities. While the threat of online incel to real life violence was dramatised in the Netflix hit TV show Adolescence, there are many real life examples which mirror this pattern. For example, when it was revealed that the triple femicide murderer Kyle Clifford was listening to Tate’s podcast before killing his girlfriend, her sister and their mother women with a crossbow in 2024. 

Much as the Angolini Inquiry revealed, before ex-police officer Wayne Couzens kidnapped, raped and murdered Sarah Everard, he was caught multiple times indecently exposing himself to women. He was even given the nickname "the rapist" by his colleagues, yet his behaviour was ignored or downplayed, time and time again. Similar patterns can be seen with the case of ex-policeman and serial rapist Dave "the bastard" Carrick. Multiple warning signs were missed, or just downright dismissed.

This link is also known as misogyny. Meaning: a dislike of, contempt for, or ingrained prejudice against women/ femme presenting people.

This is a significant piece of the puzzle, when we look at the reasons behind why sexual violence is so widespread and normalised around the world. Other key pieces include and are not limited to; white supremacy, ableism, homophobia, islamophobia, and transphobia. But for now, we can think of this link in the most common interpretation: The Pyramid of Sexual Violence.

If we refer to the pyramid of sexual violence, otherwise known as the continuum of sexual violence - then we can anticipate and intervene before at a point where harfmul attitudes and beliefs can be challenged.

The continuum of violence is a theory coined by feminist scholar like Liz Kelly - who introduced the concept of a continuum of violence against women in her book Surviving Sexual Violence (1988). Instead of thinking about violent sexual of gendered crimes ad one offs from “bad apples” or "mentally unwell" people or “monsters” - as the media and politicians often like to frame them, Kelly argues that all forms of gendered violence from “catcalls” and sexist jokes all the way to femicide, exist on a spectrum.

‘My perspective is that all forms of sexual violence are serious and have effects: the ‘more or less’ aspect of the contiuum refers only to incidence. There are forms of sexual violence experienced by most women in their lives, which are also more likely to be experienced on multiple occasions. These more common forms are also more likely to be defined by men as acceptable behaviour, for example seeing sexual harassment as ‘a bit of fun’ or ‘only a joke’, and they are less likely to be defined as crimes within the law.’ 

- Liz Kelly, The Contiuum of Sexual Violence in ‘Women, Violence & Social Control’ by Jalna Hanmer & Mary Maynard (1987)

To answer the original question, the reason why public sexual harassment is often dismissed as a compliment, is because this link and wider understanding of how everyday sexism underpins more extreme acts of societal violence is often missed. If you understand that a catcall supports the foundations of structural misogyny, which then normalises and adds to an environment which excuses rape culture and gender based vioence - then how can you truly see it as a compliment? It is only when we willfully ignore these links that the myth is allowed to prevail.

The more we educate around the history and culture behind these myths, the more chance we have of challenging these structures once and for all.