“It’s worse than before”: with confinement, the feeling of insecurity of women grows on the street

Deserted streets, infrequent transport, etc.: in this period of confinement, many women testify of the harassment and sexual assaults suffered in public spaces, where they are now “as afraid by day as by night”.

In the middle of the day, Fatima Benomar was followed “by a group of young people”, rue de Rivoli, in Paris. “They stuck with me because I did not respond to their advances, insulted me, threatened and followed me shouting:” Anyway, it shows that you are a slut “”, recalls- she at AFP. The 36-year-old feminist activist says “I was really scared”: “I couldn’t take refuge anywhere, all the shops were closed and I could ask anyone for help”. Now, to get to work, she takes the small adjacent streets.

For several days, testimonies like that of Fatima Benomar have multiplied. “Whenever I go jogging, men turn my way, whistle at me, look at me with insistence or even, like yesterday, block my way while laughing, “Chloé told Cheek Magazine, end of April.

Man discovers street harassment in video of woman

“Outings turn into moments of anxiety”

Until now, Laurène Martin, she “had never been afraid in Île-de-France”. But since March 17, the daily commuter-Paris journeys of this 28-year-old nurse have become a nightmare. “On the second day of confinement, guys jumped on me in the metro to steal my phone. I screamed, they left and the only other passenger on the train, a man, came up to me and asked me if I had a husband … “, she told AFP. After accumulating unpleasant experiences, she started cycling. In his eyes, it “is clearly worse” than before. “There are fewer people to assault, fewer witnesses, and the groups of men who stay outside are the ones who absolutely disregard confinement.”

“We are locked up at home, so normally outside exits, to see the sun, are breaths of air. However, they turn into moments of anxiety and women quickly reconfigure themselves out of fear ”, abounds Géraldine Franck, 37, a feminist activist, who has seen testimonies swarm on social networks. “The day becomes the night, there is no longer any difference for women.” Faced with this observation, Alice decided to create the Facebook page “Pay Your Containment”, which lists testimonies of street harassment, like “Paye Ta Schneck”. “At the beginning, I received a testimony every three days, but for a week there has not been a day without someone sending me a message,” she confides to Cheek Magazine.

In Seine-Saint-Denis, last week, two women were raped within 24 hours on the public highway, one in a park in Aulnay-sous-Bois, the other in a street in Montreuil.

Read also “ How to react when you witness street harassment?

Marlène Schiappa is preparing for deconfinement

For anthropologist Chris Blache, the period of confinement offers “a precipitate of what we usually know” in terms of domination of men in public space. “When you empty the public space, mechanical principles come back: the owners of these spaces experiment with their right to property,” adds the co-founder of the “Gender and the City” laboratory.

This Thursday, April 30, Marlène Schiappa, who deemed it useful to recall that street harassment remained “obviously prohibited during confinement”, said she feared “a wave of sexual violence at the deconfinement”. The Secretary of State for Equality between Women and Men notably pointed out “the feeling of impunity of the attackers combined with the phenomenon of decompensation”.

In order to “inform public action” for the future, its secretary of state created a think tank made up of experts a month ago. Lawyer, psychiatrist, author, artist, advertiser, two neuro-scientists are among the dozen personalities who will have to prepare a report on the measures to be taken to protect women after May 11.