On that note. I had the lovely opportunity of discussing street harassment in my WCP class this morning. A lot of good things were said, and a few amazingly disturbing things were. One of the ones that literally made my jaw drop, was a peer defending street harassment as "freedom of speech." This isn't meant as an attack on that person, but rather my need to acknowledge the fact that so many people today have no real understanding of the Bill of Rights, and their intensive purpose of protecting all citizens. I understand that things like this are actually relatively common in Intro classes - that's part of why they're offered. To educate. It just makes me sad to think that so many men and women don't understand the actual limitations and boundaries of these laws. Yes, freedom of speech and expression exists; but only to the extent that your "speech" isn't detrimental or violating to another's civil and human rights.
To defend street harassment as an extension of free speech is, in a sentence, to diminish the victims of such harassment to something sub-human. The perpetrators of street harassment, and other forms, forego their rights to such protections as "free speech" once they infringe upon the rights of others to comfort and safety in a public space.
The idea behind street harassment is that the street is a public area, and as such, as a "male" area - one in which masculinity and males are in charge. Not public in the sense of "it should be safe," but public in the sense that it is free from the safety that comes with a neutral space. Neutral and public are not synonymous. Historically, women's places and roles are privatized, meant to be in the home; and men's roles are publicized, in government or economic sectors. By relegating discussion to a public atmosphere, there is sometimes an inherent assumption that it's "man's terrain." Also relevant.
No comments:
Post a Comment