Property

[Content Note: Misogyny; street harassment; patriarchy. CN: Video autoplays at second link.]

This is a great piece by Jess Zimmerman about a video produced by Cosmo entitled "Men React to Their Girlfriends Getting Catcalled," in which, naturally, the men get shocked and outraged that other men are harassing their girlfriends.

Presumably, I'm supposed to be cheering. I'm supposed to relish seeing it finally click that this is the daily experience of living in a female-presenting body (and not just a young, pretty one, like the women in the video). And yet, all I can think is: "Where have you been?"

It's true that men who don't commit street harassment don't see it in action. Women who are walking alone get catcalled; women who are walking with men do not, because the man's presence tacitly asserts ownership. So this is probably the first time these guys have seen it play out—unless they watched the last widely-publicized street harassment video, of course, but that one wasn't about their girlfriends.

But why did they need to see it play out to take it seriously? And furthermore, why did they have to watch it happening to a woman they have a stake in? "You're somebody's daughter, somebody's sister," says one of the irritated boyfriends. "Like, I'm sure if somebody did that to their mother or their cousin, they wouldn't appreciate it." Why did it need to be brought to their front door to feel real?

...For a lot of men, it takes the "wives, mothers, and daughters" framing to make them sit up and take notice, preferably when that framing is brought to them by a man. That approach situates women's issues within a framework they're conditioned to accept—one in which important problems are those that affect men and are discussed by men.

And, crucially, a framework in which their patriarchal entitlement is upheld: These are their women. These women are their property, and they are tasked with their protection and defense by virtue of their ownership.

What this video demonstrates, although this is certainly not its intent, is a struggle between men who treat women as public property and men who treat those same women as their private property.

In either case, none of the men—not the ones doing the harassing, nor the ones getting angered by it—demonstrate respect for women's autonomy. None of them center, nor even seem to be aware of, the fact that women own themselves.

Dear Men: You don't own women. Love, Liss.