If you’re looking for a way to get a girl’s attention, it is surely not going to work by calling for her from across the street when she walks by. Surprisingly, there are other ways of catching a girl’s eye.
As a girl, it has become a routine thing for me to walk in the mall or down the street and hear the sound of an unknown male calling for me and using names that I wouldn’t let anyone throw my way. Along with me, many other women experience this issue and it’s to the point where it’s not surprising anymore.
Girls face this use of catcalling on a daily basis, and while it’s been spread constantly about how it’s so degrading, people still aren’t getting the hint.
Plenty of men like to use the excuse that catcalling is a way of giving a complement and shouldn’t be taken as an offense. However, when these so called compliments involve parts of a girl’s body that is seclusive to her, it’s no longer considered something nice. When it gets to the point where we feel attacked and it doesn’t make us feel good at all, how could it be working?
I came across a video that shows the real life of a woman when walking down the street. It shows an average girl making her way through New York City, and through the hidden camera you are able to see the many cases of catcalling from men of all ages trying to get her attention.
It is stated in the video that in the span of 10 hours the girl was verbally harassed over 100 times. If this is one girl in one day, then it’s crazy to think about the number of incidents that occur on a daily basis to women all across the world.
“It makes you feel offended, and it makes you feel uneasy and uncomfortable with yourself [and] with the people around you,” said freshman Isabella Botero. “They’re calling you out for certain [qualities] you have, and not actually describing who you are.”
However, not all men support the use of catcalling. While everyone tends to group all men into a category that is for catcalling, they’re forgetting that there are men out there who are just as disgusted of the idea as women are.
“Catcalling is very degrading if you’re trying to get a girl,” said senior Derek Nieves. “Talk to her like a human being and not a piece of property.”
Catcalling isn’t just seen as you walk down the street, or out in public. It happens right on the school campus, and it specifically affected senior Michelle Salazar as she walked into a classroom one day.
“I find it to be very rude and disrespectful to be trying to pick up a girl by embarrassing and harassing her in front of your friends,” said Salazar. “It is very unattractive as well as degrading to be whistled at like a dog that anyone can have.”
At the end of the day, there’s no problem with wanting to tell a girl she’s pretty or that you are interested in her. If anything, it’s makes our day. There’s just a way of doing so that doesn’t make a girl feel like she’s being targeted.
