In a viral Facebook post, a certain Feline Dimatulac shared a video of her confrontation with a man who allegedly touched her while she was inside a UV Express van on June 15.
According to Dimatulac, she was on her way home from Mapua Institute of Technology when a male passenger seated next to her began touching her left thigh. Initially, Dimatulac thought the man unintentionally touched her and proceeded to sleep. However, after some time, she realized that the man was deliberately trying to touch her body by forcing his hand under a bag placed on her lap.
Since Dimatulac wasn’t sure if the man was actually trying to harass her, she pretended to be asleep and hid her right hand under her bag. Just as she expected, the man once again attempted to touch her. Luckily, she was able to grab his hand before it could reach her private part.
In the video, Dimatulac can be seen confronting the male passenger about the incident. However, the man denied Dimatulac’s claims since she didn’t have evidence to prove that he really harassed her.
“Di ka nahihiya. Wala ka bang nanay, wala kang anak, wala kang kapatid? Alam mo yung ganyan, dyan nagsisimula yan eh,” Dimatulac said.
(Aren’t you ashamed? Don’t you have a mother, a child or a sister? You know, it starts from that.)
Watch the video.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BSeZvHqAEqs
“The sick fact that this sort of thing happens everyday, and they can walk away without any punishment. They can deny it. And nobody would take a second glance,” Dimatulac wrote in her post.
In the Philippines, women from all walks of life can experience sexual harassment in the streets, school, workplace, and even in their homes. Even after the passage of the Anti-Sexual Harassment Act of 1995, women are still subjected to unwanted sexual advances. According to the Philippine Commission on Women, Filipino culture has long tolerated and even encouraged sexual harassment by using it as a subject of jokes.