I don’t like to talk about the online harassment I experience, not least out of guilt, because I seem to get off lightly.
The past couple of weeks though, have been hard. There were two lists, and my name was on the short one. People I know, and like, were exclaiming “lol I’m on this list” and I was privately messaging people to say, not lol. Be careful. It got to me.
And then we have the 25th anniversary of the École Polytechnique. It hits close to home, following that, and Canada, where I lived for years. Where I felt safe. In part because of the after-effects of such an event.
Then I’ve noticed a slight uptick in the kind of… snide comments. A little extra mansplaining. They’re not harassment, but they are not exactly nice either. If everything I said online got such a response, no doubt it would really start to get to me.
I am not, in general, a fearful person. People have sometimes described me as brave, (or stupid!). I have travelled all over the world, sometimes alone, sometimes to countries that are not popular tourist destinations. I have been at times physically intrepid, particularly when attached to a pair of skis.
But there are some things I have come to find anxiety inducing.
I have come to be wary of most nerdy boys, and fearful of some.
I am panicky faced with the prospect of sitting next to a strange man on an overnight flight.
I am afraid of online harassment going offline, and the likelihood it being a woman I know, a woman who I am friends with, or would like to be.
All of these things, have very real impact on my life. When I decided to leave my tech job I worried about normal things – could I get another one, if I wanted? The prospect of failure. The general misogyny of the tech industry and it being no better elsewhere. And I worried about getting harassed more, what I would do if it stepped up.
It did, once I removed the name of my former employee from my twitter profile. But it is still manageable. I am still lucky.
So I still write code (although of late I manage to avoid nerdy boys), I still fly, I still speak my mind,
I brace myself, though, before I hit tweet, before I hit “schedule” on a blogpost (and after, frankly). Whenever I get some extra attention. I wonder, is this going to be the time when they come after me?
So far, so lucky.
There is no winning. I have little empathy for the men (and women) who seek to perpetuate a culture of misogyny, but they subjugate and constrain themselves. For me, silencing myself is, at least right now, not the way I choose to lose.
It’s nearly 2015… didn’t we all think, that we would be doing better than this?
There was an amazing response to my previous post, it was really gratifying to have people find it worthwhile.
I wrote it, finally, for two reasons. The first was to take ownership of the experience, to not sweep it under the carpet like it was me that had done something wrong. When you allow someone to silence you, you let them define the story. I was done with that jerk defining that one.
The second reason was because I kept hearing people talk about women needing to speak up, but either glossing over the harassment, or just ignoring the effects of harassment. There are some women who have been horribly harassed, far far worse than I was, and yet they come back, sometimes they even give talks about it as with Caroline Criado-Perez or Anita Sarkeesian.
I found it hard to relate to these stories. These women are usually by some definition public figures – journalists, media commentators, politicians. I could deem their experience too far away, too un-relatable. Well they needed to get on stage and speak again, it was their job, a bigger part of their life. As a software engineer I could get away with staying hidden, keeping quiet. An intellectually dishonest justification of a decision born of fear.
There was a lovely response to that post, people told me that I was brave, thanked me for sharing. And I thought, it’s not really that brave, after over two years. It’s not really that brave, to give a talk at a women’s conference.
That was the warm up.
For my next trick, I talked to a bunch of dudes about love.
I exaggerate slightly – the first in front of 90 people at iOSCon, of whom about 10% were women. The second in front of hundreds of people, a pretty mixed audience, at ModevUX.
My talk was Distractedly Intimate. You can find my notes here, but the short story is, it’s about how people’s feelings about mobile effect what we should build, about how we love our devices but rarely give them our full attention. I reclaimed the feminine rhetoric, and told stories around these themes of – we are in love, we have changed, we are not really here. I talk about adorable hedgehogs, goats, imaginary girlfriends, and the time that I live tweeted a date with a misogynist.
I was terrified. This flowery descriptive explanation, became distilled in my head to “speak to a bunch of dudes about love”. In the days running up to the first event, some mansplaining – a common occurrence as a women working in a male dominated field – had me retreating and panicking. The audience was surely going to think I had nothing to offer, and critique me accordingly. Sitting in a room full of men, not relating to the content, I felt sure this was a precursor of what was to come. Surrounded by people, but feeling other, and alone.
I was blocked on my script. I know, substantially, what I wanted to say, but I couldn’t fit it into my narrative. Denise coached me through it. Then I just couldn’t seem to sit down and write it. Rushing around at work, heading to the gym for a couple of hours instead of sitting down and cranking it out. It occurred to me, as in an elaborate fit of panic-based procrastination, when I chose the 90 minute walk home in the drizzle over the 20 minute tube ride, that I could throw money at this problem. Denise worked my content into the format we’d discussed, and I could breathe again. The problem was manageable. It always had been, but I was stressing too much to realise without help.
It occurred to me, that it was reasonable to ask them to cover an Uber across town. This would make me dramatically less stressed, as it would be faster and more private that two tubes and a 20 minute walk. They agreed.
I wanted to avoid the speaker dinner, figuring that it would only make me more terrified. But I went (Denise talked me into it), and had a really good time. The organisers were no longer names on an email thread, but real, warm people, who were positive about my talk.
I booked the day off work, so that I could focus the morning on last minute bits, going over my slide deck, going over my notes. Double checking my timings. I felt OK about things; I even found time to get a haircut.
I found myself, in a room full of men, miking up. Trying to get the thing over my ears, and under my hair was a reminder that I would be the first woman on stage that day. Too late now, keep breathing. They found me a different mike.
I hid behind a pillar as I was introduced, and then came to the front. Looked out at the room, and could only see men. Took a deep breath. It’s too late now, go with it. Started speaking. Got my first laugh. Good sign, keep going. Spotted a woman at the back. A woman closer to the front smiled at me. Keep talking.
And so I did it, I talked to a bunch of dudes about love. And then a couple of days later, I flew to another country and did it again. Bigger, with tighter timing. Getting dressed that day, I put two items of clothing on back to front, and one inside out. It could have been terror, or jet lag. Thankfully, these wardrobe malfunctions were long resolved by the time I stood on stage, blinded by the bright lights, and tried to make sure my 15 minutes was a worthwhile experience for the people there.
I was shaking with fear. Probably the entire time. I was thrown by the handheld mike, and the clicker, and discovered that my iPad was too heavy to hold one handed for an extended period – time to upgrade to the air, I guess.
When I came off stage, a fabulous amazing woman, one of the co-chairs, told me that I had seemed poised.
I was transported back to the workshop in Oxford. We each gave a word which we felt captured the idea of an eloquent woman. Mine, was poised.
You can see the comments and live tweets, captured in Storify, here and here. I feel compelled to tell you at this point, that one guy thought there was a disconnect in my narrative. I have this urge to apologise, to write some kind of in depth explanation of how those two things are related, just for him.
But in the end, his criticism is intellectual, and not personal. And constructive, not an expletive. So I will leave it, and consider it overall, a win.
My friend and I went to Bangkok for the long weekend. We relaxed in the spa, swam in the outdoor pool, explored the shops, got lost and wondered around the city. Rode in a tuk tuk.
I wondered, why it was that we spent more time at the hotel than I would usually. Than I did, say, when I was in Copenhagen last year. I realized it was the stress of being out and about, and worrying about things that we don’t usually have to worry about. That guy being helpful? Hoping he is just practising his English, until he tries to send us to a “special” mall with a “special” sale on, where if we were to go along with it, we would be pressured to buy overpriced jewels. Worrying about where our guide was, after he took us to watch precious stones being polished and oh, we do find ourselves in an overpriced jewelry store. Because that is a trick, apparently, they disappear, and you’re stranded, and voila, you can’t get away until you buy something. We found him, we didn’t buy anything, it was OK. But I don’t usually have to worry about that. I don’t usually have to bargain everywhere. I know I’m paying over the odds – I live in Australia… but so is everyone else.
It occurred to me how I took my safety like that for granted. From there, I went on to India where I actually ran away from someone who insisted on “helping” me and then followed me wanting money. I crossed the road – one of the most terrifying things I have ever done. Leaving India, on the way to the airport, I’m running later than I want to be (checking out was incredibly inefficient) and the driver asks me if 45 minutes to an hour is OK. I say, get there as fast as you can (not the best thing to say to your driver in India)… he gets there in 30 minutes, in a zooming, honking adventure. This part is important. It’s the last thing I remember doing, when I was not afraid.
When I teased the boy about the tuk tuk, asking if he worried about me, he said he just worried about me being in Thailand and India full stop, and why didn’t I vacation in a rich country instead. So at the airport, the developing countries part of my trip over, I messaged the boy, and told him he didn’t need to worry about me anymore.
The next time he hears from me, I’m crying hysterically and filing a police report.
It’s soon after takeoff, I’m so tired because the flight was at 4am and it had been a long day and I was so jet-lagged, having left Sydney about a week previously. And the guy sitting next to me, I guess the selection of movies was insufficient for his entertainment, because he starts touching me. He puts his hand on my leg, and I’m so tired and I have an eyemask on, so I can’t see, and, I think he must have just mistaken it for the armrest, and urgh but I’m so tired I don’t even really get what is going on. He puts his hand on my breast, and I tell myself I must be imagining things, is missing the boy making me crazy?
But by the second time his hand is on my breast, I know I’m not imagining things. And I know I’m not imagining his finger drawing circles on my back, and when he moves backwards and forwards and something hard touches my leg… I know I’m not imagining that.
And I’m weirdly calm. I just keep moving away, and I’m fixated on, well I can’t possibly sleep with this going on, and the next time he touches me I’m going to have to go and tell a flight attendent and get them to move me.
I wait.
He puts his hand on my breast again. I move, more sharply this time. He pretends to wake up like I’ve disturbed him, and I put on my sneakers. I get up, and he’s talking about how he’s so uncomfortable. I walk away, pretending I’m going to the bathroom. He follows me, telling me about how uncomfortable he is, some back problem, and how he is going to ask them to move him.
At the back of the plane I find a hostess but he’s behind me and starts talking. She sends him back to his seat, saying the plane is full. He goes back to sit down, and I say I’m going to look for a bathroom, and get away, walking around the back and up the other aisle.
It’s horrible when someone creeps on you, but on a plane, it’s extra terrifying. You’re trapped, there is no way to walk out. You’re powerless, hopefully the flight attendants will help, but what if they don’t believe you? What can you do? I wonder if this is why I waited so long, had to be so sure.
I find a bunch of flight attendants eating. And then I start crying. I’m hysterical. I speak at first to a female one – she’s nearest, and I think she will understand, but it is a male one who is more helpful. They sit me down, tell me I won’t have to go back. The creep arrives, and looks concerned – asks me if I’m OK. I lie and say I’m just having a panic attack. The male flight attendent gets physically between us – I was so grateful for that – and scares him away. I say, “that was him”. Someone gets the most senior flight attendent. More crying. Someone gets my stuff. More crying. They put me in business class. The male flight attendent tells me, “these men think they can get away with this, but they shouldn’t”. I can’t seem to stop crying. Luckily I have some stuff to take the edge off long haul flights – I take it. And cry, until I eventually pass out.
In the morning I wake up, surrounded by 15 dudes. It is business class, after all. And I’m still very upset, but calmer, and I tell myself – some men behave in an appalling way, and they will probably get away with it, but I am done making it easy for them.
So I tell a flight attendent I want to file a police report.
The plane lands. I am kept on board, so is the creep. I see him walk by. I feel dirty. The police come on. I write everything, ask for an extra page, and then another. I call the boy, and one of our friends, and cry. I don’t remember what they say. The male flight attendent is so kind, but eventually he has to go, and I’m distraught, and alone, in Germany, with 3 more flights and countless hours to California. I give the paper to the policeman, and he tells me the female (he makes a point of letting me know this) judge has already decided, there’s not enough evidence – my word against the creep – and she is letting him go.
And I knew this would happen. Eyes open, I filed that report knowing nothing would happen. But it’s still shocking to me that he’s not even put in a holding cell at all, he’s just had a minor 30 minute inconvenience, really. And I understand it’s his word against mine, but I could no more make it up than I could fly. It was so horrifying to me that I wasn’t even sure it was happening at first – I mean, who does that? Who does that?
Really the message is that he can try and sexually assault a minimum of one woman on his way to every country?
They let me off the plane, and I make my way through the airport. I’m not sure how I’m going to cope with my next flight, and it’s hours away. The boy calls me, and I cry some more. When I get to further into the building, I can see the desk where I can try and change my next flight, I pull to one side, against the wall, to finish our conversation.
And the creep walks past, sees me, and comes towards me. I panic, and run away, accidentally hanging up in the boy in the process. And I’m really stupid, I run in the wrong direction – he’s approaching me from the direction where the people are, and so I run to a place where it is deserted. And I am terrified. I am not someone given to being physically afraid, but I was. I really was.
And that is stupid. I am very fit. Physically extremely strong for a woman. I remember him as being toad-like, short, soft, wide-nosed, old enough to be my father. There is no question in my mind that physically, I could hurt him. But I ran away.
I called this emergency number we have, and someone talked me through the airport, into the lounge, looked at the map and the layout and told me he wouldn’t be able to get there given he was en-route to the US and I was travelling within the EU. Tried, but failed to change my flight. I waited in the lounge, spoke to my friends and the boy. Tried to calm down. Got on the next plane, sat in the window seat with two random dudes in the other seats, and spent it pressed against the window, sobbing.
My parents picked me up from the airport in the UK, and I cried some more. Slept – a little – and the next day was on my way back to another airport, trying to get to California. And I was panicking. I had submitted my upgrade request, but I didn’t know that I had got it and I was terrified. Unsure if I would manage to get on the plane if I didn’t. Freaking out about getting a taxi by myself at the other end. Thankfully I got the upgrade for the long flight (and the short one, as it turned out) and a friend messaged me saying she would be at the airport. I picked up chocolate and shortbread for my friends, and the guy at the counter complemented my henna. I did not freak out – I took this to be a win.
And I made it to California, exhausted, shaken up, but feeling that I had proven something to myself in having done that. But so weirded out by the change in me – that I had gone from being someone who would travel alone in India, tell the driver to get there as quick as he could, to this shaking, crying mess, who was afraid to take a taxi, period.
All week in California, I was kind of functioning, mostly focused on the flight home, and how I wasn’t sure I could cope with it, but also just desperate to get home to my friends and the boy. And of course I came home, and shortly after crashed. Before I realized, I knew my friends were worried, my manager was worried, and so I went to see my doctor, and he seemed oddly concerned as well but I was like “statistically, most women experience something like this” and then the next day I go to the gym early in the morning, 45 mins cardio, spin class, and 20-some laps and then I’m crying in the hot-tub not wanting to go to work.
And my experiences in a male-dominated world, another recent no fun thing that I had to go through and – statistically – most technical women do – were all jumbled up in it. And so my doctor sent me to see a shrink, and gave me some valium for the anxiety and panic I was feeling. The first time I saw her, I had taken valium the night before, and I think she thought I was basically OK. The second time, I wa not dosed up, and at the end of the session, she tells me, I’m angry.
And it’s like, of course I’m angry. I’m tired of making this choice – be a bitch, or be a pushover. I’m tired of the things that men feel it’s OK to say to me, the things they feel it’s OK to do. Tell me my opinion – on something entirely subjective – is worthless. Behave like a jerk, but then ask me for a favor. Tell me what I should think, how I should feel, what I should do. Suggest I should be a product manager. Suggest that I need permission to travel from my boyfriend.
I think about that guy at the airport when I left Canada who said something about me meeting a nice man in Australia.
I think about the guy who said to me recently, that I must be doing the wrong thing in the gym, because I spend a lot of time there and I should look better than I do. And then, when I looked horrified, said, “it’s not that you don’t look beautiful, it’s that you could look even more beautiful” – like what I was upset about what the suggestion I don’t look good enough, rather than my appearance is what defines my worth as a person. I mean, not a person, only a woman, to this man, another one, nearly old enough to be my father.
I think about the guy who suggested it’s fine that I don’t do something because I’m afraid. And I contrast him, with the others – who were just mad that I am afraid.
And I think about that creep at the airport, how he felt he could come towards me after that, after all of that, how I made it clear it was not OK what he did. And in my mind he’s coming to make more excuses, to tell me his hand slipped, like he was saying as he followed me around the plane. And what kind of insanity is that? How would he think that I would believe that? That his hand slipped and fell – very gently, hidden by a blanket, onto my breast, THREE TIMES.
I’m angry, because now I’m afraid. I’m afraid of what some men will do, the way they will justify their actions, the things they feel entitled to take, to do. I’m angry, because I don’t think things will get better. I’m angry because the choice is between bitch and pushover, and we can never win.
So I go kickboxing. I have a mean cross, a vicious hook, and I knee like I really freakin’ mean it.
It’s good to express how angry I am in a way that’s not crying, but it just reminds me of another reason I have to be furious. He touches me, but there is not enough evidence. If I hadn’t turned around, if I hadn’t run away, if I had broken his nose and stopped him from ever being able to replicate. Well his scars would be evidence, and that would be assault.
But what he did, that was just a man doing a horrible thing, and getting away with it, as they so often do.
I want to add – I realize that I had so many things here that another woman might not have – a working phone with which I could make international calls, an expense account and my own credit card that meant I could pay to change a flight, stay in a hotel, take a cab etc. An emergency number. Gold (elite) status, and lots of upgrade credits. Family at my stopover, and a close friend at my destination. I’m 27 and maybe look younger (especially when travelling, dressed low key with no makeup), in terms of women in their early, mid twenties, that kind of creep might prey on – I have more power than most. I hate to think about how some other woman without all that would have coped. The flight attendants were amazing, but once off the plane, I was alone. I should never have been in a position where he could see me and try and approach me in the airport. It’s horrifying. I wrote to the airline I was on (Lufthansa) and the airline I have status with (Air Canada) over two weeks ago now saying what had happened and pointing this out and… nothing.
In the aftermath of my decision to quit grad school, I’ve been doing a lot of thinking, and seeking out advice.
I called Julie from Escape the Ivory Tower, and we talked about whether it was possible to write a thesis alone, and my fear that if I switched schools I would just fail again, because the problem is, in fact, me. I think you should always look to yourself before blaming others, and I remain unconvinced that I am not the problem.
At the conference, I got talking to another uOttawa prof, who tells me he hears so many nightmare stories from students that he’s contemplating starting a blog about it – I hope he does! He also told me a couple of useful things. Firstly, the only way to get the incompetent CS grad studies receptionist to respond is for professor and student to go there in person. Secondly, it’s not “hard” to graduate without a supervisor. It’s impossible. Your supervisor has to sign off on your thesis, and get two other profs (one at UO and one at Carleton) to do the same.
He asked me some questions, like why did I publish (it’s the done thing/people tell me to), did I enjoy going to conferences (it’s fine, but I met at least as many cool smart people working for two days from the London office as at this one), and did I really, really, want to be a grad student (no).
I can fight with bureaucracy to get reinstated – and navigating bureaucracy is not a skill I possess. I can then fight to either get my supervisor to let me transfer to someone else (yes, the view of the university is that I am his possession to give away), or try and get him to sign off on a thesis and convince two other people to do the same – this seems improbable given that he a) doesn’t know what I’m working on and b) told me it was worthless, but my office mate thinks he might.
Or I can use my energy elsewhere. To reclaim my life, to create things for the sake of it, to be a good software engineer and throw myself into a job at a company that has already changed the world, and that I think will continue to do so.
You can probably figure out which one I’m choosing.
I’ve been reading Chris Guillebeau’s The Art of Non-Conformity (Amazon). Interesting book. I’m probably not as unconventional as him, but I have lead an at-times somewhat unusual existence. So I don’t check that box? It’s OK. It doesn’t define my worth as a human being.
But – one last paper. I’d been working on it, had an idea for it, but just not making progress. The abstract deadline is looming. I don’t know if I can do it.
And there’s a bunch of reasons that might explain why – insane travel, new job, other things to write, being so ill over xmas, lack of direction.
The truth though, came out when my boyfriend suggested I repackaged my conference talk as a tech talk, when I’d just got off an all-night flight and was too exhausted to present any other reason.
I don’t think what I’ve done is really that interesting or worthwhile.
I could add, “to other people” but maybe I’ve been doubting myself for so long that it seems that way to me as well.
Nearly a year ago, my supervisor told me my work was worthless – specifically I think the words were – “makes no contribution”. Anyone I’ve spoken to has been horrified by that – not a good thing to say to a student, not motivating, not true, whatever. However, for all I talk about “the surest way to mediocrity is trying to be liked by everyone” I’ve clearly believed it enough to let it hold me back.
And I look at the situation I find myself in – not graduating, feeling frustrated, let down and ripped off by uOttawa – and I’m honest with myself, I haven’t asked for what I needed, I haven’t pushed for any alternative, a different supervisor, or a different school, I’ve just said, “OK, if that’s what you think… I’ll just be over here quietly getting on with things”.
So – I haven’t written that paper. Because it’s easy to rationalize being rejected when it was rushed because you’d been travelling like a madwoman and were working full time. It’s easy not to put my everything into it because I don’t really believe in what I’m doing anymore. It’s best not to not get too attached to it. To fail – before I even start – because I didn’t really even try.
The abstract is due tomorrow. The paper is due in 8 days. My plane lands in 4 hours and 51 minutes.
Last year, I tried to take up rollerblading. But then they broke, I couldn’t get any in my size, went to China, dislocated my kneecap… suffice to say, I didn’t get very far.
This year, I’m trying again. I have rollerblades, they fit… and then I didn’t go.
I was scared.
When I rollerbladed before, my ex would come with me. It’s amazing how much I depended on him, despite priding myself in my independence. I also can’t work out the stupid printer set up. But that’s by the by.
Anyway, eventually I went out – and it was fine. I enjoyed it. How much time have I spent prevaricating, scared over something that I have no reason to be scared off? What else have I not done because I was afraid?
Maybe next week I’ll get out my bike, which I haven’t been on since the whole kneecap-dislocation incident. Or do something else that’s a little scary. Suggestions?
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