Holla Back - History

History

Seven New York City residents, four women and three men, founded the organization in 2005 after a well-publicized occurrence of street harassment prompted them to discuss their own encounters. After being ignored by the police, a woman named Thao Nygen uploaded a photo she had taken of the man who had intentionally masturbated across from her on the subway. This photo appeared on the front page of the New Year Daily News, and inspired the seven New York City residents to apply this same method to all forms of street harassment. The women told story after story of their experiences with street harassment, experiences that were surprising to the men in the group because they had never dealt with harassment of that kind. They collectively decided to do something about the issue of street harassment, an issue that affects women, girls, and LGBTQ individuals every day.

Hollaback! has held many events around the world designed to raise awareness about street harassment, including film screenings, lectures, demonstrations, and book talks.

On October 28th, 2010, the New York City Council held the first hearing ever on street harassment. Council Member Julissa Ferreras, who chairs the Women’s Issues Committee, called the hearing in order to stress the importance of joining forces in order to take action specifically in New York City. Each panelist recommended three steps towards eliminating street harassment: 1) A citywide study, focusing on the impact of street harassment and girls; 2) a citywide public information campaign that educates all genders and ages that harassment is unacceptable is the second point of action proposed; and 3) establishing “harassment-free zones” in schools in order to raise awareness and support of the movement. Emily May was among the speakers at the hearing; she encouraged women to speak out against street harassment.

After this hearing, New York City legislators invested $28,500 in Hollaback!. This investment gave the organization the infrastructure needed to report street harassment incidents to New York City's 311 information system.

As of August 2012, mulitple branches of the Hollaback! blog exist in other U.S. cities including Atlanta, Baltimore, Berkeley, Houston, Des Moines, Chicago, Columbia, Philadelphia and Portland.