Why Girls Today Think Sexual Harassment Is Normal Stuff

[ismnotwasm]

The study, from the journal Gender & Society, built upon results from a 2011 survey where 56% of middle- and high-school girls and 40% of boys reported that they’d received aggressive sexual advances — pressure for a date or to have sex, or verbal harassment. Of those harassed, only 9% reported the incident.

Harris-Perry and company were aghast at what they mistook for an initial report on how often sexual harassment occurs among kids. Unfortunately, though, that bit is actually old news.

In fact, the original contribution of the Gender & Society study is to reveal the extent to which girls who’ve suffered sexual harassment often see it as “normal stuff” that “just happens” because it’s what “guys do.”

The researcher, Heather Hlavka, finds that survivors of sexual aggression understand these aggressive encounters partly in terms of “dominant discourses.”

Translation: they frame their own experiences of harassment based on cultural notions about what gender and sexuality are — or should be.

http://everydayfeminism.com/2014/05/girls-think-harassment-is-normal/?utm_source=Everyday+Feminism+Subscription&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=7647b488a4-RSS_EMAIL_CAMPAIGN&utm_term=0_d19c2176ed-7647b488a4-91557593

[Demeter]

1. It's not as if girls have options, here

When facing sexual harassment, what's a girl to do? And I'm talking GIRL, as in, under 21. Although the situation doesn't really improve until a woman hits 40 and becomes invisible.

Talk to parents? And what can the parents do?

Talk to the school? As if schools are going to do anything.

Talk to the police? No way, Jose.

Talk to the minister or priest? That's asking for worse trouble. Too many predators in that pile.

The only survival-oriented response is to ignore it and walk away. One's speed of exit depends on the level of threat one senses.

Also, avoid situations of being without support, another girl or boy or adult. At least, there will be witnesses.

[Squinch]

3. This exactly. And it's not like you CAN avoid situations of being without support, so you just have

to walk, as you say.

[redqueen]

2. K&R nt