I haven’t always been someone who thought that politics greatly represents me. However, I found comments made earlier this month by Justice Secretary, David Liddington,
that he takes the issue of up-skirting "very seriously" and is taking
legal advice on whether it can be added to the Sexual Offences Act
2003, really heartwarming.
This is a human issue that applies to everyone - no matter where you come from or what political side you are on.
Before photos were taken up my skirt while I was enjoying a festival in July, I thought this was just a fetish reserved for the depths of the internet. I would never have imagined that someone like Dr Richard Anthony George - a PhD researcher who has pleased guilty to upskirting two women on the tube - would do something like this.
And now it's turning into an act of revenge.
The men who did it to me had been trying to hit on me for half an hour and I said no. They wouldn’t leave me alone. The perpetrator took the photo and then showed it to everyone around me, presumably as a way of saying 'screw you.'
This is a human issue that applies to everyone - no matter where you come from or what political side you are on.
Before photos were taken up my skirt while I was enjoying a festival in July, I thought this was just a fetish reserved for the depths of the internet. I would never have imagined that someone like Dr Richard Anthony George - a PhD researcher who has pleased guilty to upskirting two women on the tube - would do something like this.
And now it's turning into an act of revenge.
The men who did it to me had been trying to hit on me for half an hour and I said no. They wouldn’t leave me alone. The perpetrator took the photo and then showed it to everyone around me, presumably as a way of saying 'screw you.'
When
I reported this to the police, they told me that it happens a lot. And
yet, women aren’t reporting it because there isn’t a legislative act
that protects them - so they have no automatic right to anonymity.
People
always ask why women don’t report sexual harassment and it’s because of
how they’re treated when they do - as I have been. The law hasn’t
caught up with the digital age and mobile phones. The law thinks that if
you don’t touch the woman in question then it's not assault, and that’s
a problem because taking images of someone's genitals without their
consent is sexual assault - it’s stealing sexual gratification.
Just because you haven’t touched them, doesn’t mean they don’t feel incredibly violated.
Just because you haven’t touched them, doesn’t mean they don’t feel incredibly violated.
There
was lots of great support when I went public with the assault and
started a petition to have up-skirting made illegal under the Sexual
Offences Act but also an unbelievable amount of awful messages and
trolls. I had to take time off work the first week because I couldn’t
cope; I was receiving many messages saying I’d made it up, that I should
have worn a longer skirt, that I should drop 'dressing like a slag'. My
phone was going off all night.
Now it’s got to the point where I’m using this as fuel to urge me forward. It doesn’t hurt me anymore, because if they still don’t understand that my wearing a skirt in 30 degree heat isn't 'asking' to be sexually assaulted, then I’ve got work to do.
Now it’s got to the point where I’m using this as fuel to urge me forward. It doesn’t hurt me anymore, because if they still don’t understand that my wearing a skirt in 30 degree heat isn't 'asking' to be sexually assaulted, then I’ve got work to do.
Lots
of women reached out to me when I went public and I started to see how
widespread the issue was. I received a message from a 13-year-old girl
who had the same thing happen to her at school. The photos were sent
around her school and she now feels sick every day and can’t go in
anymore. How have boys of that age got to the point where that’s their
idea of a prank?
Two weeks ago, I put on Twitter that I needed a lawyer to work with for advice. A couple came forward and I went with Ryan Whelan from Gibson Dunn, who is from Scotland, where upskirting was made illegal in 2009.
We saw the best strategy moving forward would be to amend Section 67 of the Sexual Offences Act 2003, which involves the act of voyeurism. At the moment it only protects women when she is in a private setting like a dressing room or at home, not a public setting like a festival, which is why I couldn’t prosecute using this law.
We are setting up a meeting next week with David Liddington and Richard Burgon and there are many other MPs who are in the process of getting together as a group to take into Parliament.
We saw the best strategy moving forward would be to amend Section 67 of the Sexual Offences Act 2003, which involves the act of voyeurism. At the moment it only protects women when she is in a private setting like a dressing room or at home, not a public setting like a festival, which is why I couldn’t prosecute using this law.
We are setting up a meeting next week with David Liddington and Richard Burgon and there are many other MPs who are in the process of getting together as a group to take into Parliament.
Changing
section 67 will mean victims are treated differently. There would then
be set repercussions - if you take photos up a skirt of someone's
genitals, you will be on the sex offenders register. That, surely, would
make the offenders will think twice. And if you try and stop this
behaviour, then you stop sexual assault further down the spectrum. If
someone could do that to me in broad daylight, what does that man do
when he’s really drunk and there's a girl on the other side of the
street? It is a battle and it has been a battle, but if more women feel
protected because of what I am doing, I can't think of a worthier cause
