I’m 20 and I’ve already lost count of how many times I’ve been sexually harassed

A new poll has painted a shocking picture of the abuses young women experience every day. But it’s no surprise to Isabelle Joshi who works in a busy bar…

It’s got worse – particularly while working in a bustling, busy bar in central London (Getty Images/iStockphoto)

As a 20-year-old who works in a bar, I can’t even count the number of times I’ve been sexually harassed.

So the results of a new poll, which says that 44 per cent of girls my age don’t feel safe walking on the streets alone – and that 27 per cent have experienced sexual harassment – don’t surprise me in the slightest.

The first time I got unwanted attention was when I was just 11 years old. Walking home from school in my uniform, very clearly a school-aged child, I was catcalled by a group of older men. The sense of intimidation that I felt then has not abated in the years since then – far from it.

It’s got worse – particularly while working in a bustling, busy bar in central London. Despite management and security doing what they can, the job comes with its fair share of harassment. Late finishes and drunken men are an unfortunate recipe for a heady cocktail of verbal and sexual harassment.

In a way, it becomes just another part of the job – something we “just get on with”.

But it doesn’t stop it from feeling absolutely petrifying. When it happens, your body completely seizes up and you become stuck. Even though it’s become “normal” to me, it’s something I never really get used to.

I’ve had a man grab the back of my head and try to kiss me. I’ve had one say he’s going to follow me home once I’ve finished my shift. I’ve had a group of men bombard me with questions regarding my sexual preferences, before explaining their own to me (in excruciating detail), despite me making it very clear that the conversation was unprofessional and inappropriate.

All of these incidents involved men who were much older than me, talking this way to a girl barely out of her teens. Each time, I have always felt the same afterwards: uncomfortable, embarrassed and stuck.

This is a feeling that, for me, has never gone away no matter how many times I experience it. The fact that these incidents usually occur at night makes them seem scarier, but they can happen during the day as well. There is a group of builders I pass daily on my route to work, and on multiple occasions they have catcalled, made comments about my appearance and made me feel uncomfortable – all in broad daylight.

That’s why I don’t feel safe walking the streets alone. It doesn’t have to be dark and 2am for men to make me feel afraid.

But harassment online can be just as common – and traumatic – as it is in the real world. The first time I stumbled across pornography, I was only 13. I was mortified and overwhelmed. I had never seen anything like that before.

Almost every girl I know has received an unwanted graphic photo of a sexual nature. Harassment happens everywhere: at school, at work and even at home.

So how are young women like me and my friends expected to feel confident and powerful, when we are so often made to feel objectified and powerless? How are we meant to feel safe in either the virtual or the physical world?

I don’t have the answers. Is this really just what it means to be a woman?