I could not make this shit up if I wanted to. Between the headline, the bullet points, the accompanying image, and the fact that CNN thinks this is even worth putting on a news site, I just want to punch things.
Especially because it's an abject failure as anything even remotely resembling a news story—which would require, for example, not framing it as if there's some big fooking debate about whether street harassment is "creepy" or "a compliment."
It would also require, as another example, pointing out that women who object to catcalling and women who "appreciate" it aren't actually taking "both sides," because they're respectively objecting and appreciating catcalling for the same reason: Because it objectifes them. And if there's something worth discussing about that, it's why there are women whose self-esteem, such as it is, is predicated on being objectified by men—which, naturally, is given a wide berth, except for the tantalyzingly-close-to-actual-news mention of a Rutgers University study which suggests that street harassment actually increases self-objectification and feelings of personal insecurity in women. Huh.
But some random woman would feel "dumpy" if she didn't get catcalled, so that makes "Creepy or a compliment?" a perfectly reasonable headline.
Fook.
[H/T Tata.]
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