Almost 45 percent of women between 15 and 25 sometimes choose a different route because they feel unsafe, compared to 20 percent of men. On our reaction platform NUjij, readers described situations in which they felt unsafe: “He gestured that he wanted to cut my throat.”
BewonerRegioUtrecht was at Utrecht University when the city was gripped by a serial rapist who had been active since 1995. This NUjij user felt, and still feels, unsafe at times:
“I luckily never met the serial rapist, but the route from the Wentgebouw of the university to the bus was not pleasant if the practical was running late and there was hardly anyone left.”
“Around the house, I also didn’t walk comfortably. During the day, I even regularly cycled around, because the young roosters (a certain type of young people) were often hanging out on the short route to the supermarket. Or even in front of that supermarket, and then I preferred to go to a neighborhood further away. They addressed women intrusively, made suggestions that didn’t seem so pleasant to me, and were simply annoying. The problem was widely known, but besides setting up some ‘neighborhood fathers,’ I never saw anything being done about it.”
“I recently felt unsafe again when my bus was delayed. Standing there alone, with your laptop on your back, waiting for the bus in the dark. Unfortunately, that happens a few times every winter.”
Reader Gem_Stone decided to take refuge in a snack bar as a precaution:
”Ever since I was allowed to go out for the first time at the age of sixteen, my parents urged me never to go home or anywhere else alone in the evening. My mother was almost kidnapped as a child, my aunt was followed by a man as a young girl, and on the way to school, a group of girls and I were followed by someone in a car on a forest path that we had to take. A classmate was raped in broad daylight at the age of fifteen.”
”I myself was once followed during the day by someone in the center of Den Bosch, where I was studying at the time. When I was one street away from my house, I went into a snack bar because I didn’t want the man to know where I lived. Fortunately, the snack bar owner understood my situation and let me take shelter there for a while, so I could get home safely.”
NUjij user die_andere_ellen could not go out alone because of an annoying person:
“I once asked a colleague to walk with me to my car because I felt too unsafe in the center of Rotterdam. The catering establishment where I worked had been bothered for weeks by a homeless man who constantly came onto our covered terrace to (sexually) intimidate our guests and to beg for money. Many guests walked away because they found the man too intrusive.”
“We called the police several times, but they did nothing. The man would leave when he saw us coming in our work clothes, but would be back half an hour later.”
“After the evening cleaning, the man was heavily under the influence banging on the glass doors, and after I had sent him away six times that evening, I was fed up. I wanted to set the alarm on the terrace doors and waved him away with a face full of frustration, and the man lost his temper. He banged so hard on the windows, started screaming, and gestured that he wanted to cut my throat.”
Tinkeringbell mainly looks out for animals and dangerous traffic situations:
“I mainly feel unsafe on the street when I see people approaching who don’t have their dog on a leash, or when I unexpectedly encounter a dangerous traffic situation. Like almost being run over by a cyclist on a fat bike, or cars that first seem to stop for a zebra crossing and then seem to pull away again.”
“Oh, and if the forest path counts as a ‘street,’ I don’t always feel safe there either. Especially in the evenings, I am wary of wild boars (when they have young, it is really somewhat risky to encounter them) and recently there were reports that a wolf had also been spotted. That later turned out to be just a rumor. But that’s not really a nice idea either.”
Not everyone who ‘looks scary’ is also scary. NUjij user Valentine_Michael_Smith regrets that he is often seen that way:
“Although I live in a big city, I don’t quickly feel unsafe on the street. It helps that I am tall and fairly sturdily built, I think.”
“It’s rather the other way around: it has happened several times that I was walking down the street in the evening in the winter with a leather jacket and that a woman walking alone crossed the street when she saw me coming.”
“Sorry ladies, I really wouldn’t hurt a fly, but I understand that you can’t see that on me. This doesn’t feel good. I wish I radiated something like ‘this man is okay,’ but I wouldn’t know how to do that.”