A man said the most vile thing to me today

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I was getting the kids out of the car today at the garden centre. I was flustered and probably looked grumpy because I’d just mopped up vomit and as I was chucking tissues into the bin a guy walked up to me (he actually seemed to change his direction of travel to engage with me) and said “hey baby, smile”.

I ignored him and started to walk in the direction of my kids and the car when he half shouts “hey baby, HEY BABY, you’re beautiful when you’re angry, let me suck your clitty”.

A woman walking nearby toward her car was stopped in her tracks by how foul it was and turned around and said “what did you say?” but the idiot was off and running.

Why do they think they can say this stuff to us? Why did he think he could interrupt my day with his odious, aggressive expression of control?

I’m going to talk out every single time a man makes me feel like this. I will not allow men to feel comfortable living in a world where this happens. This is not fair.

No it’s not a physical assault but it will stay with me for weeks, I won’t feel safe in that car park, I’ll be on edge even more than usual for weeks, everywhere I go. WHY should I have to feel like that because of his pathetic controlling, sexualised nature?

The problem here is that many men think public space belongs to men.

Bloody scumbag,yes I would report it because a garden centre is a place you purposely go ( might go frequently) sorry for you but good for the woman that shouted at him.

I have had comments to this level - a horrible man told me he would "fuck me in the arse" outside a swimming pool. I did report it, because of my worry that a lot of children use the facility and that he might harass them. The officer who took my statement was amazing and told me fairly firmly that I was absolutely right to report it just for me-that it was wrong. He was given a fixed penalty notice for a public order offence, I was happy with that outcome.
To the idiots who describe this sort of thing as banter, I'm no wallflower and worked k a mens prison for a number of years. I've heard it all. This frightened me, which was what it was intended to do.

Totally uncalled for behaviour. I would like to think in that circumstance I would say something clever and snipey back to get him to STFU and modify his own behaviour in future.

However the reality would probably be that I wouldn't want to cause conflict just in case it escalated especially if my children would bear witness to it. He may turn out to be a violent person, you never know. Truly disgusting behaviour.

@mommy2018 - please don't try and defend this man. He's a prize tosser.

I've always wondered whether it's legal to shout stuff at girls and women.

Or be offered money for sex acts.

Why does the age of consent come into it, that is age of consent for having sex, nothing to do with men shouting at you.

This oh I've got big tits men notice so what. My friends with big boobs have had a nightmare with men commenting, shooting stuff, grabbing them etc. One had a bus driver day he'd let her off her fare of he could have a feel.

It's all revolting. It's not a proposition. No woman, surely, had responded to a man shouting "out you with the tits get over here and suck my cock", for example, by saying ok yes please, have they.

Women who say all this shit is fine arts a real problem, not as big a problem add the men, but I just don't understand why they defend it.

Sometimes they say they're going to follow you, rape you, it's not ok, it's not banter. All of it is about putting you in your place. A lot of women and girls find it flat out scary.

And the idea of shouting obscenities at a woman who is with her kids, just no no no why defend it FFS.

Sigh

Whetethewildthingis good for you and that puts paid to the idea that terrenceandphilip did upthread that this sort of thing is not a crime so no point with police.

I think TerranceandPhilip is a police officer, am I right? I think saying the f word in public is technically a public order offence?

Yes they were absolutely clear that it is a crime and they pursued it and got him pretty quickly. I had a letter from victim support asking if I wanted support, which I didn't but was nice to have. The whole experience for me was positive.

If terranceandphillip is a police officer then I find it extremely unsettling that she (he?) is coming into a female dominated website, visiting posts about sexual harassment and essentially telling all the women reading that there is nothing illegal about it and therefore don't bother reporting.

I think there are a few police officers on here, or people claiming to be police officers, who do this.

I don't know if it's because they're pretending and they're just misogynists, or if they are police officers and want to discourage women reporting stuff. Or some other motivation (?).

Fwiw I have never been sure if this sort of thing is illegal or not and have never reported. It really had a big negative impact on my life when I was younger though, I definitely think it should be illegal, especially the more obscene/ threatening stuff.

It's part of rape culture. It's normalising the objectification of women.

It IS illegal, its a public order offence -terrence is right about that but goes on to minimise it. It probably would not get to court but as in my case can attract a fixed penalty notice. And I've worked in the criminal justice system and seen people prosecuted in court for Section 5 Public Order so yes, it can get to court.
I think it's all about whether the will is there for the police to follow up on it and see that it is serious. I was lucky in that respect but I know not everyone would be.

Whetethewildthingis good for you and that puts paid to the idea that terrenceandphilip did upthread that this sort of thing is not a crime so no point with police

I didn't say it's not a crime. I specifically said it's at best a public order offence, which as described by the OP would be unlikely to pass the threshold test.

Swearing in the street is a public order offence. Most road rage incidents are going to be public order offences. In 2018 you're simply not going to have them investigated. There's not the resources.

If terranceandphillip is a police officer then I find it extremely unsettling that she (he?) is coming into a female dominated website, visiting posts about sexual harassment and essentially telling all the women reading that there is nothing illegal about it and therefore don't bother reporting

Yep. That is definitely what I said.

So you are saying not to bother reporting it to the police as they won't care, due to lack of resources rather just a lack of will to investigate.

Can I just check that you think that the behaviour of this man was wrong, as a human being, not speaking as a police officer?

That's revolting, I hope you're ok.
I was in Tesco the day before Christmas Eve, so it was very busy. I bent down to reach a bottle of booze and a man came up behind me and shoved his hand between my legs.
I turned to him, for once speechless, and he grinned at me.
So I punched him in the face, and a woman who witnessed it smacked him around the head.
He was whinging about being hit as the security guard manhandled him out.

DH works in the criminal justice system (don't want to say how). He reckons it could be prosecuted under the public order act, as threatening behaviour. It was targeted against a person; it was intended to harass and/or intimidate.

I hope the OP takes heart from this.

Minimising this sort of behaviour or accusing critics of it of exaggerating it is so wrong.

Can I just check that you think that the behaviour of this man was wrong, as a human being, not speaking as a police officer?

Abso-fucking-lutely. Surely everyone except the dregs of society would? It's disgusting.

So you are saying not to bother reporting it to the police as they won't care, due to lack of resources rather just a lack of will to investigate

I'm saying what the OP was subjected to won't meet the threshold (in my opinion) for prosecution. I'm also saying that these days public order offences are rarely investigated unless actually witnessed by an officer, because there simply isn't the time to deal with people shouting abuse at one another.

It probably would not get to court but as in my case can attract a fixed penalty notice

Well given FPN's are only given for traffic offences, do you mean PND's?

I've asked DH again about this, Terrance. He confirms that cases where a police officer has not witnessed the behaviour do come to court...yes, even when it's one person's word against another's. CCTV is sometimes shown, because it can confirm various aspects if not the actual words used.

I think that coming on to a female dominated website, and saying don't bother reporting distressing crimes for whatever reason is questionable behaviour.

If women are told not to bother reporting this stuff then how will we ever combat it? If the police/govt etc think it never happens/ women don't mind then they won't do anything. If men see it as essentially legal to sexually harassed women and girls on the street/ threaten them etc then they will keep doing it/ get worse.

The met have basically just announced try aren't going to bother with loads of crime of the type committed against women by men, this is not positive.

Women and girls need to be making more of a fuss, not less. We're sick to the back teeth with this shit.

I bet if a man approached a school boy , and said this kind of stuff to them, society, the police etc would say that's wrong. But girls are supposed to suck it up.

And the fact of coming onto posts about sexual harassment specifically to tell us not to report stuff is shitty behaviour.

Actually maybe I'm being unfair. Different forces may deal with it differently and maybe some areas don't have quite as much on, but where I work we don't have enough to deal with actual violence so this wouldn't go anywhere

Pp got a result. We need more of this stuff, not less.

Stop telling women to put up and shut up.

I think a case where people are 'shouting abuse at one another' may well be a waste of time (police and courts).....the 'six of one half a dozen of the other' incidents. This event as described by the OP is not like that.

Terrance, you'd think that everyone would recognise this behaviour as disgusting but as you can see from this thread some don't. And obviously many men don't, as they keep behaving like this.

I'm not sure that your slightly cross nit picking about terminology is a good way of getting your disgust across though.

Report it OP.
I had 6 youths, aged around 16years old, making very explicit sexual remarks to me.
I am a disabled older woman. It was 10 am one Saturday morning, on a train platform. No one else about. Two of them were filming me on their phones. They thought it was a hoot.
I was so scared but managed to take a few paces and press the emergency button on the platform, which is when they ran off.

Briefly, British Transport police were brilliant and turned up pretty quickly. Dealt with it seriously, they were very kind towards me. They recovered the CCTV . Seemingly, several of the youths were already "known" for anti social behaviour stuff and were charged with public order offences.

No real police officer (still in the job,) would post half arsed crap on here about what happened to you not being unlawful.

It might not go to court, (you might not want that yourself,) but this bit of scum needs to be flagged up on the police radar. These people don't just do it once do they?

You were with your children too, what a low life this guy was. Don't be put off.

I've asked DH again about this, Terrance. He confirms that cases where a police officer has not witnessed the behaviour do come to court...yes, even when it's one person's word against another's. CCTV is sometimes shown, because it can confirm various aspects if not the actual words used

Fair enough. I've never seen it.

And the fact of coming onto posts about sexual harassment specifically to tell us not to report stuff is shitty behaviour

Again, not what I said. You seem spoiling for a row, so I'll leave responding to you.