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Feminism: Sex and gender discussions

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Original poster

Woman in Paris attacked the street

65 replies

IAmInsignificunt · 31/07/2018 00:20

This is utterly shocking but is something I know so many women have been the victim of.
I once told a man to “fuck off” on the tube because he kept stroking my hand. He lifted my skirt and pushed my head against the glass petition and shouted “slut” as he left the carriage.

www.theguardian.com/world/2018/jul/30/uproar-in-france-over-video-of-woman-marie-laguerre-hit-by-harasser-in-paris-street

“CCTV video of the attack on Laguerre, given to her by the cafe owner, has now gone viral after she posted it on Facebook. It has also bolstered the French government attempts to outlaw sexual harassment on the country’s streets and public transport.

Laguerre was walking home around 6.45pm past a cafe close to Buttes-Chaumont park in the 19th arrondissement of north Paris, when she encountered her attacker. She said he “made dirty noises, comments and whistled” toward her as they passed. Instead of walking on, Laguerre decided to call him out, responding “Ta gueule!”, or shut up.

“I didn’t even think he heard me,” she told the newspaper Le Parisien. “But he had heard me and suddenly things happened suddenly. He grabbed an ashtray and threw it at me. It missed my head by a few centimetres.”

Laguerre shouted back at the man. “I felt hatred. I refused to be demeaned, it was humiliating.” The man walked back and as she stood facing him, hit her hard.“

The attacker has not been found. That poor woman!

OP posts:
MrsTerryPratchett · 31/07/2018 00:22

Why don't women fight back? THIS is why women don't fight back.

Apileofballyhoo · 31/07/2018 00:29
Angry
LighthouseSouth · 31/07/2018 00:36

oh I just posted about this in the pub

SO MUCH RAGE.

OP I'm really sorry to hear what happened to you.

thebewilderness · 31/07/2018 01:06

It does not take many terrorists to keep women in a state of fear walking down the public streets that men consider their hunting territory.

Mxyzptlk · 31/07/2018 01:09

SadAngry

Original poster
IAmInsignificunt · 31/07/2018 01:12

Obviously a typo in the title!

OP posts:
OvaHere · 31/07/2018 01:27

Awful. Sad

Beerincomechampagnetastes · 31/07/2018 06:20

It is very dangerous in Paris for women. On the underground sex pests are common.
My last visit I couldn’t sit outside in any cafe alone. On three separate occasions I was approached and heckled. One local man came to my rescue until finall the waiter came and recommended I sit inside Sad

LittleLebowski · 31/07/2018 06:52

I just watched this video. Marie Laguerre has done a great service by sharing it so everyone can see the violence and hatred women face when they stand up to sexism. I hope that the prick is tracked down and gets everything coming to him. His reaction and rage is terrifying.

rememberatime · 31/07/2018 07:12

From the parts of the clip I have seen, I note that some men appear to confront the attacker, other women walk toward the attacker. No one seems to comfort the victim. She says she just continued home before returning later.

I felt like she was so alone. No one seemed to notice her at all. The attacker became the object of everyone's attention.

LittleLebowski · 31/07/2018 07:45

The Guardian article quotes her as saying:

"To all those who want to say the witnesses didn’t react well enough, everything happened very quickly and they didn’t have the time to understand the situation. The attacker was dangerous. After the aggression, I went back and the witnesses gave me great support. Please don’t lynch them.”

I would like to think that in that situation I would have had the wherewithal to go to her aid, but also maybe I would have tried to see where he was going/get a photo of him. There is a high chance though, especially if I hadn't really got what was happening, that I would also have just stood there like a giant useless lemon.

FermatsTheorem · 31/07/2018 08:26

It's such a shocking video. It took me ages yesterday to steel myself to watch it - and that was just on a laptop screen. That poor woman, to be subjected to that level of violence.

RedNed · 31/07/2018 08:33

I just watched it. How terrifying, this is just fucking ridiculous. Why would anyone think that behaviour is justified Angry

That poor woman, she was very brave. I hope she's ok and they find that fucking scumbag.

TransplantsArePlants · 31/07/2018 08:37

Sickening. I think I would have done what she did
I have confronted men from what I perceive is a safe distance. I could not swear I wouldn't do it even now

zzzzz · 31/07/2018 08:45

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

UpstartCrow · 31/07/2018 09:36

How is it not already illegal for men to harass women like that?

PyeWackets · 31/07/2018 09:45

When will people tackle male violence? If we treated it with the contempt we treat drink driving we could eradicate it in a generation.

This is why women don't fight back, because it encourages more aggression. This is why we want female space so that we can relax away from males.

ToeToToe · 31/07/2018 09:50

It's a horrendous video. A violent attack on a woman on the street.

I noticed the bystander reaction - obviously these things happen so quickly, it can be hard to react - but I took it to be the actions of people around a vicious animal. Shock. Defensive - is this man a danger to us. Does he have a weapon etc? One man picked up a chair - defensive in the heat of the moment.

Male violence. Violent males are unpredictable - like wild animals. And we never know who they are.

LaSquirrel · 31/07/2018 10:06

This is why women don't fight back, because it encourages more aggression.

Yes, it seems to, more often than not. And you never really know just how much they are willing to up the ante. I have been the victim of street harassment several times, one quite physical assault. Men stood around and did nothing.

TransplantsArePlants · 31/07/2018 10:09

ToeToToe

I agree. It's really interesting to see the different reactions.

The bystanders were scared. I would have been.
They aren't adrenalined up like the woman was

And well they might be. he was a scary, dangerous man

TransplantsArePlants · 31/07/2018 10:11

LaSquirell

It makes me so sad to hear that. And yet we have men who willfully seem to not understand why women have to be constantly on their guard, even if not consciously, when they themselves are scared of other men.

hackmum · 31/07/2018 10:25

Years ago, I read Simone de Beauvoir's autobiography and she recounts a very similar incident that happened, I think, to her friend Olga. If I remember it correctly, Olga was walking down a Paris street when a man approaching her tweaked her nipple. She told him to fuck off and he punched her, knocking her to the ground.

That would have been, I guess, 80 years ago. Plus ca change...

IDontEatFriedTurtle · 31/07/2018 10:44

I felt like she was so alone. No one seemed to notice her at all. The attacker became the object of everyone's attention.

That's a strange way of seeing it. I'd be thankful in her situation that the bystanders stood up at their own risk to scare the man off. And to stop him from feeling safe in coming back. I wouldn't want to be comforted by strangers (though it appears they did, when it was safe check on her).

IDontEatFriedTurtle · 31/07/2018 10:48

Actually chair man does even look back to see she's OK once he's got there with the chair between them.

rememberatime · 31/07/2018 10:53

I guess I just have empathy with the victim - I just really feel for her.

I would want people around me to protect me and to know that I had support.

I don't blame people for reacting in a shocked way and any reaction is the right one in a situation like that.

My immediate thought was to want to care for her - not to chase him.

I don't think that's a strange way of seeing it at all.