Drive-by Harassers

Dear editor:

I am not a prostitute that you can yell "How much for a night?" to via your car window. I do not think that my sexuality is anyone's business nor should your opinion of what it is be screamed across Austin. I couldn't care less about how attractive I look from a moving vehicle 20 feet away. I am not interested in your revving engine and your offers of 'free male genitalia' (I'll edit the exact phrasing for the sake of appropriateness) disgust me.

Wow. It feels great to finally have the chance to offer responses to a few of the rude comments I've had yelled at me/my peers during my time at Cottey.

I don't understand how anyone can find harassing a woman on the streets of her college acceptable -- let alone an entertaining activity! Yet, that's exactly what seems to be happening in Nevada. Cottey students have become objects to yell obscenely at as you laugh and speed away. Can someone please explain to me why this conduct is being tolerated!? Well, I refuse to do what so many students at Cottey do, accepting this behavior as "something we have to put up with as we try to ignore the comments." I am not attending a women's college to learn how to become another passive victim of sexual harassment! It seems so ridiculous to me that being hassled on the way to class or meals is typical at Cottey College. What sort of representation of the community do those of you who harass us think you're giving? Honestly.

I am from an area where I can be on the streets with tens of thousands of people and never have someone verbally harass me, expecting the same treatment in a "small, supportive, rural town" does not seem outlandish. As incoming students we are instructed, as part of our orientation, to be polite and to always thankfully acknowledge the stopped Nevada citizens on Austin and College Street.

So, while we are trained to smile and wave (with all five fingers) do you practice the latest distasteful remark to yell at those 'Cottey c***!? It's such a cliché point, but surely you would never yell these things to your girlfriend/mother/sister. I'm asking you to consider your behavior for one minute -- that should be long enough for you to realize how incredibly offensive and immature yelling at women out of your vehicle's window is! Seriously, we do not deserve to be disrespected. I hope that the citizens of Nevada agree with me, and will advocate for this absurd behavior to stop.

A woman who respects her body enough to defend it,

-- Kayla Wardrup