Archive

By Renee Davidson I came to Collective Action for Safe Spaces (CASS) in 2012 because I was sick of street harassment. I had moved to DC after graduating college, and street harassment became less of an infrequent nuisance and more of a daily onslaught. I was street harassed when I was wearing work clothes at […]

By Danielle C. Belton This piece was originally published on at Clutch Magazine. Recently I’ve moved back to Washington, D.C. and have begun the process of finding a permanent place to live. It’s exhausting. But I tried to make it less so by picking a bunch of places all in the same neighborhood that I […]

Location: N Lynn Street & Route 29 (Arlington, VA) Time: Evening Rush Hour (3:30pm-7:30pm) As I walked onto the sidewalk, a man holding up a sign begging for money from cars at the stop light started yelling at me to lift up my skirt so he could “lick my pussy”. I turned around and started yelling at […]

Location: 17th & K NW (Farragut North) Time: Daytime (9:30am-3:30pm) This is what happened when I walked 1 BLOCK to grab some lunch: Exit Pret a Manger: Dude looks at me and says, “hey beautiful.” I awkwardly downcast eyes and give a weird, toothless, grimace-smile (working on not reacting this way, but I feel conditioned to respond when […]

Location: 16 and K St NW (Union Station) Time: Daytime (9:30am-3:30pm) Walking back from some lunch time shopping at Metro Center, I felt a trickle of sweat on my chest. I looked down to see and a man, yellow oxford shirt, khaki pants, goes, “Yes, they are big tits.” I stop, say “That’s disgusting!” and keep walking. He […]