WANT DAILY (China)
SHANGHAI – There have been numerous recent reports of female passengers being harassed on Shanghai’s subway. Instead of acknowledging the complaints and enforcing security measures, the Shanghai subway authority has decided instead to post a photo of a woman wearing a transparent dress clearly showing her underwear on its website.
The photo’s caption said: “If you takes the subway dressed like this, it’s no wonder you get harassed. Since there are so many big bad wolves on the subway, girls should behave themselves!”
This quickly sparked serious controversy, as Chinese netizen outrage denounced the subway company’s blaming the victim.
The “Voice of the Feminist” movement responded to the provocation by stating, “Women should be able to own their bodies. The subway company should take a stand against sexual harassment”. This week, two volunteers from the feminist group protested on the subway with a board that read, “I may be hot, but you can’t harass me”, the Want Daily newspaper reported.
A man called Buddy said in his blog that “If the notion takes hold that women who wear less have only themselves to blame if they tempt males to commit crime , the end result will be that a woman won’t be allowed out unless she covers herself from head to toe.”
Joe, another blogger asked if “according to the subway company, does this mean that me are allowed to harass women at the swimming pool?”
Others, however, defended the Shanghai metro authority, saying an appropriate dress code in public is common sense.
Photo – Weibo/xiangqi119
Photo – via Want Daily