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Short Shorts

On Sunday it was International Women’s day and I wrote a post about street harassment. It was a fairly vague statement of a post but it did serve in starting a conversation with lots of my running friends (men and women) about running and harassment. Whilst international women's day on the 8th March was a great ‘excuse’ to post about the issue, the reality is, is that it isn’t a one day ‘shout about it and forget about it’ problem.


Street harassment in general is a concern, with street / trail / footpath harassment whilst running being a specific problem within our running community. I will add early doors here that it doesn’t just affect women and that the offenders are certainly not just men!


Harassment is defined as any unwanted behaviour which you find offensive, makes you feel intimidated or humiliated and often works by degrading the subject to make them feel inferior. In many cases this is a male perpetrator towards a female, but it can absolutely be; male to male, female to female and even female to male. Street harassment is a form of harassment that consists of; unwanted comments, gestures, honking, wolf-whistlings, catcalling, exposure, following, sexual advances, and touching by strangers in public areas which of course include our running routes and trails.


Even now as you read through that list I’m sure the majority of you can recall a time that you were running along and have been honked at by... (I hate to say it because it’s such a cliche but it’s often very true)... a white van. Just a few weeks ago my friend Sarah and I were running along a part of the South Downs way that briefly runs parallel to the A31 when a number of vans honked at us. Not only was this frightening for us, but Sarah’s dog Watson found all the stimulation really distressing and it put us all in danger due to trying to make sure he didn’t pull Sarah into the road.


I actively choose my running routes based on time of the day and whether I know there will be a high number of workers on those routes. For example in my home city of Cardiff there is a lot of development going on which brings with it a number of leering construction workers (majority male). I have made the mistake of running past these developments during their working day to be; whistled at, clapped at, have videos taken of me as a worker runs alongside waving like an idiot, been asked to stop and…, been called a ‘slut’ and even have a van drive slowly alongside me playing music. In order to avoid this, I simply run routes that I know will have fewer workers because it is humiliating, degrading and makes me feel objectified. The few times I have confronted such comments whilst out running, it hasn’t empowered me but has made me feel argumentatively precious and that I don’t have ‘banter’ or am having a sense of humour failure (their words, not mine). I’m fortunate as I have other routes that I can run and I am flexible with the time of day I can run. However for others it might be the case between running and being hassled or not running at all. I can bet that 95% of the time the ‘not run’ scenario wins!

This kind of harassment isn’t just happening in cities, far from it. I have experienced and been witness to equally horrific behaviour whilst out on the trails. In many cases this is even more frightening as there are fewer escape routes and fewer passers by to call for help. Furthermore there have been a number of occasions where I have been running with male friends or running alongside my husband on his bike where derogatory comments about me have been said to those men as if I’m not there. Comments that instantly cause the male I’m with to apologies for another person's behaviour. It makes me feel ashamed and it makes the man I’m with extraordinarily awkward and embarrassed. At a previous job I went running with a colleague before work once and he experienced so many; cat-calls, leering and comments whilst out running with me that he didn’t feel comfortable to ever come out with me again because he said ‘if I was out by myself I have never and wouldn’t ever get that type of attention’... brilliant, cheers, I’ll just deal with it by myself then…


There’s only so many times you can laugh these things off, say ‘no I’m not running to your house so we can …’, smile politely at the blatant observation that I have legs, pretend to not hear being called a slut as you run past a bus stop. Anyone who knows me will agree that I don’t put up with much BS and will openly speak my mind about a situation, but…


Confrontation isn’t a long term solution, a societal level shift needs to happen. I’m fed up of being told that you just need to; ignore it, confront it, and forget about it. I will challenge that every-time by saying that it shouldn’t solely be up to us the ‘objectified’ to change this type of inappropriate behaviour. There needs to be bigger consequences, more bystander intervention and better role modelling (female sports coverage, can we reduce the comments made about athletes outfits, physiques and weight please?!). There needs to be a reduction in masochist marketing (yes I’m talking about the use of ‘babes’ in female sporting social media, and ground to bum photo shots) and why o why are we still sexualising female athletes in 2020?


Seriously? Imagine Tiger Woods posing like this for a front cover shoot

Why is the media still depicting female athletes in suggestive poses and clothing, or even nude magazines and commercials basically projecting a “woman first, athlete second” attitude that challenges athletes’ achievements and self-esteem. We need to call out this obscene sexploitation of female athletes every-time we see it to make those at a much higher level realise it’s wrong, as this inevitably trickles down to the ‘lads’ on the building site assuming I’m fair game as I bumble my way through the morning 10km!


If you made it this far in the blog, THANK YOU for sticking with me through an issue which I’m aware if not articulated correctly could come across as ‘poor Bambi legged E with her blonde hair and sparkly nails get attention on the street’. So I hope I have given it my voice and an insight into why it is a problem. I also hope that this will continue an increased awareness of the problem which in turn will lead to larger changes being made for the better.


And remember, just because you wear short shorts, that is not an invitation into those short shorts! Whether you’re running 5km in 50minutes, or a marathon in 150minutes you ARE an athlete and your achievements define you, not the perkiness of your bum.


See you for an adventure soon.


E






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