Denis Santos
- Woman takes selfies with her catcallers
- Woman addresses catcalling by taking selfies with her detractors
Noa Jansma, a native from Netherlands, shocked the internet by her controversial ‘Instagram project’.
Selfies with catcallers?
It might seem a little dangerous and creepy, but the 20-year-old Eindhoven local just did the unexpected. She spent a month taking photos with her catcallers. “We were talking about this topic in class,” she said in an interview with Buzzfeed.
“Realized that half of the class, the women, knew what I was talking about and lived it on a daily basis. And the other half, the men, didn’t even think that this is still happening. They were really surprised and curious. Some of them even did not believe me,” Jansma continued.
She then showed the proof. In a span of just one month, she was able to take 24 photos of the times she got catcalled in the streets. It is evident through her Instagram account, @dearcatcallers. “I thought men would be suspicious of me, that they would understand my motives when I was taking selfies with them. So I was kind of fearful,” she shared.
In the contrary, many of them gave her a thumbs up, thinking that what they did complimented her.
“They really didn’t care about me. They never realized that I was unhappy,” she described the feeling,” she said.
She experienced the worst cases, one even followed her on the streets and invited her to his car. Despite the courage, there are certain cases where she opted to choose safety first. She did not document all the times she got catcalled, especially when in the ‘dark, little streets’.
Extension?
“This project also allowed me to handle catcalling: They come in my privacy, I come in theirs. But it’s also to show the outside world that this is happening so often,” she said.
For now, she decided to stop taking pictures, but she would really appreciate to hand over the reins to other women, in Europe and/or around the world. The continuation of this project is really important for her.
“I’m not the subject. The subject is catcalling. I also want to show that this happens around the world. But I want to make sure that responsible women do it, because what I do is a bit risky,” she ended.
