Report prepared by Action Hero Naksha Errappa
photos: Apurva Mathad
The BN Bangalore meet started at 11.55 am at the Ulsoor Lake Cafe.
Attendees:Apurva ,Arpan,Farida,Manasa,Pratyush,Kunal,Naksha
"Smile at a Stranger " activity
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Arpan:smiled at a man. the man felt weird and gave a 'half smile' back.
Pratyush:smiled at a man easily. then smiled at a lady who seemed to be searching for any association with him.
Manasa:smiled at a man who stared back.
Farida: felt easy smiling at an old man.
Naksha:SMiled at a woman who ave me the "who are you?" look.
Apurva:smiled at a man who averted his looks.
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WHo are you? why are you here for this meeting?
Arpan:works as a software engineer at CISCO.
has followed our blog since a year.
has younger sisters in bombay . witness to an incident of harassment at work to a female colleague brought him here.
Kunal:with us since 2006.works in Advertising industry
"every woman i know has experienced eveteasing (old/young)."
Pratyush:PG Student(Media),Coimbatore
Followed us since along time. finds it 'ununderstandable' that why is it comments are passed everytime he walks with girls?
witness to an incident at a mumbai pub where 2 girls and him were followed for a long time and finally the man came up and asked pratyush if he could talk to the 2 girls!
witness to anoher incident where young boys eve teased girls.
Manasa: christ college student.1st year
tols my mum to avoid certain areas. realised something has to be done. can't ignore or live with it anymore.
farida: works at ANZ bank.
finds it impossible to travel by public transport without being eve teased.
Apurva: works at google.
learned about "hollaback" .looked for similar organisations here and got involved with BN. impressed by the 'artistic' approach to activities at BN.Also feels activities that gain sudden momentum also lose steam soon.
Naksha: Student
Doesn't believe that "stop eveteasing, stop harassment" rallies will work. its a mindset we need to change and that ll only happen over a long period of time.
What BN means to you.
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people wrote down thei views..
defiance
woman standing their ground
awareness
change
bn is a tree whose roots are giving life to several others
feminist
activist
fun
exploratory
interesting
creative
comfort
sharing collective experiences
what street sexual harassment means to you
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buses trains
crowded place
uninvited stupid uncivilised immoral unaaceptable
intimidation
de-humanisation
objectification
whsitling,grinning,kissing sounds,rubbing,
anything a woman is not comfortable with
demeaning
authoritative
ignorance
Discussions about and around the 4 stories
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I would not walk into this cafe if i were alone.
if you are wearing western clothes "maybe you are okay with a lil bit of extra attention".
people in short skirts anyway travel in cars.
degree of attention you get in different places in different for different clothes. so... who drwars the lines, who sets the rules?
women are attacked only if men realise there are no REPERCUSIONS.
clothes are just a justification or an excuse people use as they don't understand the root of the problem or don't want to face it. we need to break this by our "I never ask for it" activity.
On a TV show on Bindass channel, a girl was made to feel so sorry because she was in a noodle strap dress.
Outcomes of the MEET
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Some suggestions
>> "there is no Public Campaigns (by the goverment) on eve teasing. there are some on deomestic violence .
So why don't we use stories like the 4 we just discussed to create a campaign . enacting the story or something like that.We
could use youtube".
Pratush
SOme decisions
>>
Jan 2nd :smile event
Location :Majestic
Co-ordinator-Naksha
note- we might need to move it to jan 3rd ,sunday
>>
Jan 9th :Clothes project
Coordinator:Manasa
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How these 7 can contribute to BN besides being a part of events and activitites.
Pratush:Video/Audio editing if software is given to him.
Manasa:Conduct events in her college
Arpan:corporate interactions with Cisco
