I’ll be 39 in exactly ten days. I’m a mother of two daughters—21 and 15. I have all the privileges that you can count—caste, class, religion, skin colour, education, everything. My LinkedIn profile is for everyone to see and assess my professional standing. I have been writing books, book chapters, journal papers, issue briefs, policy papers, media commentaries, poetry, and even extended social media posts on gender equity, violence against women, women’s health, etc, for the past 18 years. 

Yet, I’m utterly helpless, and I don’t know when this will stop. The screenshots are self-explanatory. 

Predictably, this sexual harassment started innocuously with a LinkedIn connection request from a man named Tulsi Kumar and my polite response to a “thank you for adding me” message in May 2024. Then came a barrage of unsolicited DMs on LinkedIn, ostensibly for professional work. I ignored it all. (Us women, we get by with ignoring a lot.)

Making Women Invisible

And on the morning of 10 September, I woke up to the same old sexually charged bullshit. This man also found my Instagram earlier yesterday and left likes and comments there. I’ve had a policy of keeping my social accounts open because that’s who I am as a person—transparency, etc. 

The screenshots clearly reveal that this behaviour was entirely unprovoked, far from being impulsive, almost premeditated. And that apology? It’s as if “liking” me “too much” mandates this behaviour. I made him do it. 

What is it about men? Why must they act like subhumans almost every time? Women are made to watch over their shoulders even more in digital space.  I have written multiple times about the intellectual moorings of this trend of making women invisible by either blocking women’s entry to, or bullying them out of public spaces. It is clear that men have a problem with women in general. But the world is, generally, comfortable with it. The only problem is with women highlighting this problem that men have a problem with women. Families, establishments, technocrats, editors—all act in unison to tackle that problem.

A Daily Dose Of Hatred

“Not all men” tribe, please sit down. Unless you wake up to such crudeness and sexual harassment from random stranger women even in your professional account’s inbox routinely, don’t even think of making your case. This tribe has made it almost impossible for women to express their frustrations with this daily dose of hatred hurled at them. This hatred has many forms, and what I received in my inbox is nothing but garden-variety sexual entitlement. It’s so common, happening day after day, inbox after inbox, that our senses ought to be numb towards it. But are they?

What’s even more frustrating—almost criminal—however, is that LinkedIn doesn’t even give an option for reporting harassment on its platform when you proceed to block and report someone. The reportage mechanism doesn’t even consider sexual harassment. Digital safety, oh joy! Is LinkedIn unaware of such incidents? Its jargon-heavy proclamations on members’ safety are almost laughable when there’s not even a mention of harassment faced by women. “How our content abuse defence systems work to keep members safe” — No, whatever your systems are, they have failed miserably in keeping your members safe.

Digital Safety And Censorship

The problem with the discourse on digital safety, mirroring physical safety, is that it is vitiated by censorship. The urge to curb and ban free speech is the default one for all digital safety purposes. Add to this mix the malafide political digital activity and let’s bid adieu to any real progress on making social media platforms safe. Women are the easiest victims to ignore everywhere, and digital space is no exception. 

Such is the psycho-social impact of not taking women seriously—socio-culturally, politically, economically, and at policy levels—that women themselves tend to believe in their second-class status. “What is the point?” Nothing screams despair louder than these four words. We are almost convinced that we do not matter. How does one even complain when the problem is not even recognised systemically? LinkedIn reporting process exemplifies it.  The platform’s social media help team reached out to me only after I made a public post. They bombarded me with links to file a complaint. I’ve done it. I’ve also been trying to lodge an FIR on the National Cyber Crime Reporting Portal, but it is glitching. The process is a punishment for the victim long before the culprit is even located.

Nobody Likes A Woman With A Voice

I once wrote a paper on how the Hellenistic division of oikos (private space) and polis (public space) doesn’t apply to women. Their oikos is also polis because they are denied a voice even in the oikos. This latest incident of sexual harassment is aimed precisely at that—breaking women from within when and where they expect it the least. We don’t want a woman with a voice, so we’ll weaponise her voice against her. I’ve only chosen to write about this incident and not all the others in the past just to assert one thing. 

Yes, we women are growing tired of resisting and revolting.
No, we won’t stop it just yet. Try breaking us some more. 

 (Nishtha Gautam is a Delhi-based author and academic.)

Disclaimer: These are the personal opinions of the author

A Minnesota woman was arrested after allegedly trying to crush her boyfriend under her car during an intense fight. According to police reports, Veronica Roleen Gast, 30, and her boyfriend were driving to a couple therapy session when the argument quickly became out of hand. The boyfriend, whose name has not been disclosed, told the authorities that he chose to end the relationship and asked Gast to take him home.

Gast reportedly became furious and parked the car on the road, forcing her boyfriend to get out. As he walked away from the vehicle, Gast was said to have driven the car towards him, nearly hitting him. Witnesses to the incident called it a harrowing experience.

The boyfriend rolled over the hood, and smashed into the windshield, shattering it. He suffered a laceration to his right elbow.

Gast was taken into custody and charged with second-degree assault and criminal vehicular operation. She is facing charges of “bodily harm, gross negligence, and domestic assault.”. The investigation into the incident is ongoing.

“The defendant admitted that as she was pulling away, she hit the victim with her vehicle. The defendant said she slowed down and stopped to call the police,” a police report obtained by Crime Online said.

“The defendant said she was in shock at hitting the victim, so she did not stop right away but let off the gas,” the report continued.

Gast told officers the windshield crack wasn’t caused by his body but by him punching it. It’s unclear whether Gast sustained any injuries.

A video has surfaced on the internet showing a hooded man in the UK attacking a Muslim woman in broad daylight in a suspected racist attack, Metro reported. A video of the incident that has gone viral shows the woman wearing hijab standing on a street in Dewsbury, West Yorkshire, on Tuesday. Seconds later, a hooded man comes charging towards her and hurls a concrete slab at her head. Thankfully, the woman is able to move out of the way. She is then seen running away from the attacker towards two bystanders.

An X user shared the video and wrote, ”This is absolutely horrific – a hijab-wearing Muslim woman has had a paving slab thrown at her head by a white man in Dewsbury, West Yorkshire.”

Watch the video here:

This is absolutely horrific – a hijab wearing Muslim woman has had a paving slab thrown at her head by a white man in Dewsbury, West Yorkshire.

Violent Islamophobia is on the increase. pic.twitter.com/AqjNBRIqiI

— Waqas Tufail (@_WaqasTufail) October 25, 2023

Her husband Eid Karimi told The Independent, ”I went inside to get food and she chose to wait outside in the rain because she had an umbrella. Suddenly I saw people running around and this guy. He tried to run but I ran after him and grabbed him. He was shouting ‘Don’t call the police, I won’t do it again. We were holding him down for the police to arrive. He knew he was in trouble.”

Though she didn’t suffer any injuries, she is ”shocked and stressed”, her husband added.

Many internet users were left shocked to see the video and hoped that the woman was okay.

One user wrote, ”Appalling. I hope that she’s okay.” Another wrote, ”This is awful. What a world when we don’t embrace our differences and learn from one another, instead such hatred from small-minded bigots and racists. I hope this lady is ok.”

A West Yorkshire Police spokesman refused to confirm if the attack was being treated as a hate crime. He said, ”We are aware of this video and can assure residents such incidents are treated extremely seriously. A man has been arrested in connection with the offence and enquiries are ongoing by Kirklees Police.”

Last week, London police said they had recorded a 1,353% increase in antisemitic offences this month compared to the same period last year, while Islamophobic offences were up 140% in the wake of the attack by Hamas on Israel.