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A pat on the butt, a dirty comment about the appearance or figure is the norm. According to statistics, 87 percent. women have experienced some form of harassment. A large part of the aggrieved parties do not file a complaint. They do not know where to report, they are ashamed, preferring to forget and sweep the matter under the rug. Learn the stories of three women who have experienced sexual harassment.
- Sexual harassment – according to the definition – is a behavior of a sexual nature, violating dignity, unacceptable and contrary to accepted social norms
- The STER Foundation report shows that almost 90 percent. women have experienced some form of sexual harassment at least once in their lives. Such situations usually occur in public spaces or at the workplace
- Alice was molested by the coach. She was only 17 when he took her to the woods and tried to rape her. Izka was molested by an acquaintance from the stable. Neither of them reported the matter to the police, both preferred to forget
First compliment: for the body
The secret was the wine. Unfortunately it spilled on the blouse. But one by one: Alicja in the morning wraps empty bottles in a plastic bag and puts them in the bag between her clothes. She runs out of her friend’s apartment, all embarrassed, because she will be late for training in a moment. That’s why he forgets about the garbage can. He shakes the bag, a trickle of wine oozing from the net onto his tennis clothes.
Mom said she was a resolute teenager.
So when the tennis coach drove Alice home after the rape attempt, she slowly turned the key, quietly entered the room, and pretended to be asleep. Maybe my mother would read something in her face and she wouldn’t find out that her daughter was not resolute.
End of the 90s, Alicja attends high school. There is no boyfriend, he cannot kiss. And the face is beautiful, no make-up, the body is supple, slim, wherever you touch it – without a gram of fat. This provokes men, especially the elderly. Compliments are falling, once in the bus one man came up and a little speechless, he put a handful of chestnuts in her hand. That she would get anything from him, because she’s so pretty.
Worse with boys. Those in high school do not confirm the beauty. – Maybe because I could hit? – wonders. – That I wasn’t a mimosa? Because, you know, mimosas had a better bite. That’s why Alice is sorry.
Right after the start of the school year, her father invented her tennis lessons. He played well himself. There was one sports club in the town, he knew everyone there.
The club is decent: it has several bars to choose from, beer gardens are set around the courts. Andrzej is a regular in one of them. Well dressed, handsome, athletic, great demeanor. It inspires confidence. He often takes a table from which Alice is seen practicing with her father. One day she gets up from the table, walks over to them, talks briefly, shakes hands.
He remembers the texture of his skin, dry, wrinkled. “But besides, you wish your husband would age so nicely! – convinces. – He was about 60 years old, he wanted to earn some extra money for retirement. Maybe the qualifications were important to my father, that’s why he chose him, maybe he was inexpensive? – thinks. She never asked.
She goes to trainings 2-3 times a week, always alone, each lasting an hour. My father comes by to check the progress sometimes, but not intrusively. The mother is even less intrusive, she does not check anything. She did not recognize Andrzej at all.
Are you drinking this already?
– Without exaggeration, he only touched me when he put his hand to the racket – Alicja calmly explains – that’s what a coach is for. He suggested what to eat, he advised me to run and develop my thigh muscles better. Physicality always appears in conversations with the trainer. And when we were leaving the court, he asked privately what was up. I’m outgoing, I was going through high school stories then, you know, but I didn’t think it could excite an older guy. I was rather impressed that he was interested in me. There is a specific relationship with the trainer, it is important. I trusted him.
After some training, he suggested: help me choose a perfume for my daughter. I come home excited and tell my mother.
“He liked me,” I was glad.
And she categorically forbade me shopping with the coach, she asked nothing more. I did not expect such a critical reaction. We did not go shopping. He found a better way for me.
There was a night party at a friend’s, in the morning, in a hurry, I threw the net with empty bottles into the tennis bag, the remnants of alcohol spilled on my clothes. I would darken my parents, and I treated him as a partner, we knew each other for several months.
– And that is what you like wine? – -he smiled. – Are you drinking this already?
In a week: – I hope you haven’t had a drink today. And tomorrow, what are you doing with your friends?
He asked constantly. He likes me, he’s joking, I tell myself. But wine is already heavy for me, it has become the leitmotif of every training. Finally, Andrzej suggested that they drink together. I got scared. But it’s stupid to refuse, that’s clear. Maybe I will offend him, offend him? I’ll have a drink with my buddies, not with him? I put off school and lessons, and he doesn’t give up. I felt trapped. And I agreed in the end, because I hoped it would close the topic and let me breathe. I couldn’t tell my parents. Wine with a friend was a secret. I am from a good family, I knew that it is not proper for teenagers to drink.
Otherwise I’ll be frivolous
“I’ll drive you home later,” he said. He had never driven her back before, she was returning alone, on foot. She thought they would go to a restaurant in the neighborhood or to a pub near the courts. They will sit at the table, drink a glass and the whole story. But as they left the sports club, he pointed to her car and opened the door. She doesn’t remember if she hesitated. She remembers the thought that as A said, you have to B. Otherwise she’ll be frivolous.
They got in and drove to the grocery store.
“Wait in the car,” he said. She waited. He remembers that store, you went up a few steps. Of course, she never climbed those steps again.
He came back with a bottle of wine and plastic cups. She said nothing, she was shocked. Not sure if she asked where they were going. He doesn’t remember what happened in the meantime. Probably some nervous conversation to keep the conversation going, pretending not to be afraid. He did not anticipate what he was planning.
They left the town, the buildings ended, the forest began. Without hesitating, he turned into the gravel path and stopped the car. She didn’t know where she was. He took out the plastic cups, opened the wine, poured it full, to the bottom.
“Because I’m driving,” he explained. – And now’s the time for dirt-stitching.
She thought they would clap each other with cups. He wrapped his hand around hers and started kissing her. Actually, to lick it, because she was sitting in shock with pursed lips, and besides, she didn’t know how to kiss. He began to slide his hand over her legs.
“Relax,” he said. She didn’t relax, she just tried to pull away. Then he started to press her harder and harder, touching her body more and more. She struggled. Finally he stopped.
“I understand you don’t want to,” he asked. She nodded. He returned to his seat and drove her home.
There is a roommate in Alicja’s apartment, so we talk to me, it’s almost midnight. Now she is 34 years old and there are many questions left in her.
“If you pass a man in the park who looks like he wants to rape you, it’s an obvious evil. You know you have to be scared, go the other way.
People play tennis on a level. He was like a nice, warm grandfather, besides, he had a granddaughter. I was looking for a partner to talk to, I wanted to be treated as an adult. On the one hand, I was a child, on the other, I was learning femininity, I had no experience yet, I did not have sex. Often the teacher impresses, maybe he saw it? Maybe I was talking about myself too freely? Maybe it was a signal that he was allowed more? After all, such a situation dirty both sides – she wonders and immediately answers herself.
“You know that he still looks like Apollo running around the court with a racket!” It’s like that. In such a situation, it can be suspected that I wanted to know my own sexuality through a relationship with an older man. But, sexually, Andrzej was an old man for me.
For several years, she did not tell anyone about it. She felt a great deal of guilt and shame that she could not predict the danger, react in the right moment. It opened when, during the publication of “Wprost” about Kamil Durczok, the media started talking about molestation.
– I told my closer friend, without details. It turned out that each of us experienced something, it unblocked me a bit. I am not ashamed to admit that I was a victim of sexual violence, but I do not want my parents or friends to know the details, it costs me too much. I know that I did not provoke with my outfit or behavior. But I was wondering if I had allowed too much in the conversation, maybe I had given some sign that I was not aware of? And finally I got into his car.
I didn’t report to the police, I would do the same now. What for? I would have to expose myself to a stranger who won’t help anyway. Where else am I going to go with it?
Then she quit training, parents did not ask why. She never confessed to them. Andrzej called several times and asked why he was not coming. She replied that she had a lot of lessons. Finally he stopped calling.
Komplement drugi: hello beautiful
– Fai la scopa? The old Italian asked in a small street.
She is confused because she doesn’t know Italian so well.
– Fai la scopa? – the old man repeats and stares.
A moment ago she stopped the motorbike. She got lost, the old man asked for directions. Yes, he showed the way and added a few more words from his heart.
Something’s wrong, she thought, and drove away. In a helmet, jeans, sweatshirt and gloves.
He tells the boy, a young Italian. – What was that about? – he asks.
The boy shrugs. –And will you give him a stick, he asked.
Complement three: horse courtship
A pat on the buttocks is part of the poetics of horse riding. Supposedly. It is true that Izka did not tap anyone (and she could!), But when someone patted her, she understood that it was nothing dangerous. Maybe sexist, but no sexual act, oppressive. Obviously, if a guy would slap her normally, in a pub, for example, he would have been hit in the face. But in a horse farm, pick-up is the norm.
She called Wieśek more than once. They had a good relationship, healthy, with distance. Her boyfriend left for Oslo, she was to join in a month. She saw from Wieśku that he was wearing boots, so she was careful. He had his own stud, Izka sometimes went to go there.
“She’s put on weight again, my spine is going to crash!” He shouted, joking as he tossed her into the saddle. Sometimes he tapped his hip. “Here you went!” What did you eat yesterday, donuts?
Well, such poetics.
– The guys are simple – Izka explains to me – especially those who have spent all their lives in the stable. But I have always liked Wieśka – he emphasizes.
The girls changed clothes at Wieśek’s office. He had a small one, two by two meters, and then he would go out. Sometimes they found a vodka bottle.
“ Did it bother him being a coach and drinking? ” He wonders. – I didn’t see him stagger, so he drank harmlessly, such a slight exhilaration. Work in the stable starts at five in the morning, but don’t think he was always drunk then! He didn’t drink every day.
Izka emphasizes that she went to the stud in the morning and was unpainted, hairless and without a shower.
It happened once. Wiesiek silently followed her into the booth, from behind he put his hands under her blouse, grabbed her breasts and pressed them tightly against him. She turned around, huffed something, but says her tone calmly. She told him to leave and Wiesiek left.
She was shaking afterwards, she didn’t come out for a good half an hour. She took her things and went home.
“I’ve got to deal with this,” she decides after she has cooled down. – Proforma. Because I will be shooting a puff or getting intimidated.
So he goes back to the stud a few more times. They did not talk to Wieśko about that situation, they did not talk much about it. Izka knows that he was sucked then, sobered up and probably felt stupid. And that is a mitigating circumstance for her. – Good guy. Maybe it was difficult with his wife. I didn’t want to report it, cause him trouble. Anyway, to whom I could report it was his stud.
She didn’t think of it in terms of harm. She felt objectified, humiliated, nothing more. – Because I was already an adult, I had a partner with whom I had sex. I knew how guys can be, that physicality, sport, sweat – they provoke. I didn’t think then that he might have molested other girls at the stud, that the younger ones might not have known how to defend themselves. And I didn’t warn any of you, we had little contact.
She only talked to her older buddy who introduced her to Wieśek. This one got pissed off: -Why don’t you fuck him …?! – she exclaimed – You had to screw it until it fell off!
She didn’t ask Izka what she felt like she was doing. – I haven’t talked about it anymore.
Names and some details have been changed to keep the characters anonymous.
***
In 2016, the report “Break the taboo” was published by the STER Foundation. It shows that 87 percent. of the women surveyed experienced some form of sexual harassment. Nearly half were touched against their will. More than a third of women were forced into sexual activity, 23% experienced an attempted rape, more than 20 percent have been raped.
The rapist is most often a close person: current partner (22%) or former partner (63%). Rape usually takes place in a private apartment.
It was different with molestation: most women were molested by a man they did not know. A large group also includes men known by sight (42,3%) as well as colleagues and friends (41,8%). At work, women were harassed by bosses (15,8%), co-workers (24,7%) and clients (19,9%).
Harassment is most common in public spaces (76,6 percent), the workplace (52,4 percent) and in secluded spaces (37,8 percent). Women are least often molested in their own apartments (33,9%).