Many of us remember the
viral video of a woman walking down the streets of NYC for 10 hours, only to be harassed over 100 times. This video quickly spread around the world, and led to discussions about how common and serious street harassment is and how much it limits women's access to public spaces.
In TGI Friday's latest ad,
#AppCalling,the company used the same footage from the viral anti-street harassment video, but
replaced the woman in the video with various appetizers, like a cheese stick. "Nobody likes a catcaller… But who can blame someone for #AppCalling," the ad reads.
That's right --
TGI Friday's is comparing the daily plight of women to to food, trivializing street harassment in the process. Even worse, the man who created the original anti-street harassment video says he sees nothing wrong with the ad, and allowed TGI Friday's to use his footage.
Please sign the petition to tell TGI Friday's -- stop trivializing street harassment, and pull your ad!While TGI Friday's says it's against catcalling and the ad is meant to be funny, it isn't. #AppCalling is problematic because it doesn't call out the behavior of cat callers, as it purports to.
It actually celebrates their behavior, but it shouldn't.Sixty-five percent of women and 25% of men
report being harassed in public spaces, according to a 2014 study. Half of them were harassed while they were teenagers. In the real world, this behavior often escalates to threats, intimidation, and violence -- indeed, the actress in the original anti-street harassment video received death threats for speaking out about the issue. And it disproportionately affects persons in marginalized groups, making it a matter of equity.
Ending street harassment means taking it as a serious offense, not trivializing it. Please join Stop Street Harassment and Collective Action for Safe Spaces in telling TGI Friday's to pull its ad!