On Becoming a Hollah Back Girl
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A few months ago my best friend was attacked while she was on the phone with me. We had been discussing her recent break-up and when she began screaming and cursing I wrongly assumed her anger was directed at the absent ex-boyfriend. After calmly telling me, “I’ll call you right back,” she was able to scream her assailant into submission and lock herself safely in her apartment. Several weeks later I was talking to another friend when the scene seemed to repeat itself. In the middle of a sentence she began inexplicably screaming at the top of her lungs. “FUCK YOU, YOU FUCKING MOTHERFUCKER! FUCK OFF!” My justifiable worry was immediately replaced by confusion. Who attacks someone in the middle of the afternoon on a crowded street in
Ah, yes. “Some dude.” Well, that explains it all. In my world, the first day of summer isn’t marked by the solstice, or the first day it’s warm enough to wear a sundress, or even the first night when sleeping without an air conditioner in oppressive southern heat is impossible. I, and most of my female companions, can tell it is summer because we get our first hollahs of the season. This is not to say that autumn, winter and spring provide a protective shield against the unwanted and unwarranted onslaught of sexual hounding—it just happens much more frequently in the hottest months of the year.
Every year I forget just how oppressive this sexual banter can be. Sometimes it’s a motorist honking his horn to get your attention. Sometimes these complete strangers have ideas about how much prettier I would be if I smiled a little more. When I walked dogs professionally at least one “dude” a day wanted to know how much it would cost for me to “put that leash on him.” One of my friends actually stopped all business in one of
It is, however, so much more than just a simple irritation. For those of you who think I’m hyperbolizing or overreacting, consider what it’s like to be made into a sex object unwillingly ten or twenty times every single day. Try taking it all in stride when someone is yelling sexually explicit commands at you while you’re on the phone with your father. Or your boss. Let it roll off your back when you’re on the way to the hospital or a funeral. Hollahs, I believe, are a form of sexual violence. Yes, violence. And it is a sort of violence that many women are subject to every day. Whether it’s having “some dude” rub his erection on you on the subway or simply a leer that lasts too long, hollahs turns their unwilling subjects into objects of sexuality and nothing else.
There is no polite way to respond to a hollah. This is what distinguishes it from more civilized modes of inter-gender communication. My first hollah this summer happened on the front steps of my house. I was late to work and while I was locking my door I was startled by some motorist leaning on his horn for approximately 30 seconds. I whirled around to see what the commotion was. An impending car accident perhaps? A child wandering in the middle of my busy city street? My eyes were still adjusting to the brightness of the sun, so it took me a moment to distinguish the noisemaker from the other motorists, and realize that “some dude” in his car was leering at me. And then, because I should’ve known better, I chastised myself and stared at my feet.
This, in my opinion, is the worst aspect of hollahs: they make the subject feel complicit. Arguably, this is because many women start experiencing unwanted sexual attention at such a young age that they simply internalize it. I started getting hollahs years before I even entered high school. For me, unwelcome sexual attention always seemed to be just another source of irritation that came along with being a girl. When I finally was old enough to develop a sense of sexual self I incorporated those feelings of complicity and, like many women, chose to remain silent.
I didn’t count, but if I had to estimate I would say I received roughly 400 hollahs this summer. Emboldened by my friends’ responses or just simply exhausted by feeling guilty for wearing anything more revealing than a Burka, I finally lost it one night. While sitting on my front steps with a male companion, “some dude” on his way to the bar thought it appropriate to lecherously leer at me, before asking me if I would like to abandon that “pussy” to spend the evening with him. I’m paraphrasing, of course. I loudly asked “some dude” what the fuck he thought he was looking at, and much to my male companion’s chagrin and horror, told him to get the fuck off my street. It didn’t seem to affect “some dude” in any way as he simply shrugged and continued on towards the bar. My male companion looked at me like I had an ax in my hand. At that point I decided I’d rather be scary than scared and have been a hollah back girl ever since.
—LP