The City of Cat-calls

I have experienced the catcalls of construction sites in Mexico.  I have been the recipient of broken-English come-ons in China and Tanzania.  I know that the words the men in these countries throw at me are probably some of the only English words they know--words they found from some tourists' phrase book, and that they  just want to have some innocent fun by showing they know a little bit of my language.

In other countries, I laugh. My parents laugh. It's all in fun. They know how to say I have pretty eyes. Cute.

I was not expecting cat-calls when I came to Washington this semester. This is not a foreign country. Women have great political influence here. People speak English here. Cat-calls are not a way to show a commonality of linguistics, they are crude, disrespectful and surprisingly frequent.

Cat-calls in Washington come from homeless men in the corridors of Union Station, everyday-Joes on the escalator, street-vendor workers on the corner of 16th and K streets, and business men wearing pinstripe suits outside Starbucks. They come from high-school boys, young men, middle-aged men and grandpas. It's like a disease, and lots of men from lots of different walks of life have been infected.
I decided to start taking note of a few of the uncomfortable situations my gender has put me into while here in DC:

-From a man handing out shoe sale flyers on the corner near my work today:  "Here, girl! Buy some stilletos! You've got the legs for 'em!"

-Outside Union Station while I was on my way to a Senate hearing:  "Hey gorgeous! Come back..."

-In Georgetown on a weekend shopping trip: "Hey Bright Eyes! Stop! Let's talk."
-Also in Georgetown, with two other girls later that day: "Hello...what did you buy in the bookstore?"
"Nothing."
"Nothing, huh?  Are you sure?  Well...Wait. Come back...."  Just a desperate attempt of a young, presumably drunk guy to talk to us. Somewhat uncomfortable.

-While waiting to cross K St. during lunch today- not technically a cat-call, but still uncomfortable and rather pathetic.:  I was standing on the corner, alone, when a 20-something guy in a suit crossed the street perpendicular to the one I was waiting to cross.  He looked at me, made a creepy face, and held that face while walking to the median of K St. Seriously, he was looking backwards. Then he turned around, pulled out a cigarette, and went back to staring at me as he lit it. Really? Is that supposed to impress me?

-From a boy who was around 15, on the corner of D and 8th Streets, while I was attempting to get through  a cluster of his adolescent friends on my way to work: "Make room for the pretty lady, the pretty lady, the pretty lady....."

-From a group of 20-somethings near a construction site:  "Girl, you so fine. Get back here...." And they didn't just stand where they were.  They continued to make comments as they started following me.

-A joke while I was discussing with friends how cat-calls made me feel like a piece of meat: "You're not just any meat, though, Anna. You're definitely a prime rib."

I've talked to other females living in this city, and it's not just me.  This is the worst United States city any of us have experienced as far as disrespectful advances go.  We can't seem to figure out why it's  such a common thing here.

I have tried to categorize it by location, but almost every neighborhood I have been with has been similarly uncomfortable in this aspect. I wondered if maybe it would happen more if I was wearing normal clothes as opposed to a business suit. It actually was the opposite.

When I looked the most respectable, I received the least respect. In regards to differences that came with different suits, I noticed that the advances came more often when I was wearing a skirt and blazer as opposed to pants and a blazer. Today I wore a pink skirt with a black blazer, and it was the worst day for uncomfortable advances yet. I don't understand why there is such a lack of respect for women in a city full of so many influential and powerful women.

Guys, if you think calling us gorgeous and hot and telling us we have nice legs or rear ends is going to make us feel better about ourselves, you're wrong.  Most of you probably know that already, but it seems some people need a reminder.

A guy-friend I spoke with about this yesterday said that when girls who get lots of these advances complain about it, it is like someone with a lot of money complaining about having too much.  He said it in jest, but it stuck with me.  The "compliments" these men throw at random women walking down the street are not real-- they are not brand-new, freshly printed one hundred dollar bills from the US Mint.  They're bad counterfeits-printed off in large quantities from an old printer in someone's basement.

If a man had real one hundred dollar bills (compliments), he would not be throwing them out to random strangers on the street.  He would save them  for girls that he either knew well or, occasionally, girls that stunned him with their beauty or charm. He would not throw the bills. He would carefully package them and deliver them with respect--making the bill, or the compliment, actually mean something.   

Having words like "gorgeous" and "beautiful" thrown around with such disrespect cheapens them.   Every girl wants to hear that she is beautiful, but she wants the person who is saying it to mean what they say--if he doesn't, it the sparkle wears off.

I'm not saying that guys should never tell girls they are attractive or beautiful or have nice eyes.  We love to hear it when you actually mean it, but we would rather you show us first.

Comments

[Emily Gibbins]

Aside from DC, what other US city have you lived in for more than 1 week?

and those examples are hardly cat calls...

[Jon Swigart]

Despite some of the obvious disrespect by the above posters, I tend to agree with Anna. It's not funny or cute or really warranted, no matter how innocent someone may think the comment is. Most self-respecting women that I've met don't want their looks to be something that is the subject of lustful words or crass comments that are directed at them by men that feel they know exactly what those women want and say they have what they need. If I had that mentality when I came to women, I probably wouldn't be married. Fortunately for myself, I was raised to respect women.

Emily, it shouldn't matter where she lives - if it makes her uncomfortable then who are you to say that it's "hardly" anything? By saying that what was said were "hardly cat-calls" it's almost as though there is a degree of affirmation that it's ok for them the say these things to her and that, because she's new to the city and hasn't live here for long, that it's something she should just get used to. Granted, there are some things that we just have to go along with, and after a while, she might be good at ignoring what people say, but that doesn't mean that it doesn't bother her. And just because she gets better at ignoring the calls, doesn't make it ok that people make them.

[Ian]

I'm pretty sure there is a Seinfeld about this.