I am breaking the silence about a violation that I have experienced more than a handful of times. These lewd acts are random personal-space invaders coming at you on the street: public masturbation.

Public Masturbation, definition: a man, always a man, standing or sitting in a public place, masturbating while looking at live subjects.

Now, I know this subject is uncomfortable but this is obviously a problem in which very rarely- but prominently enough for me to see them- men can only (or preferably) get their jollies in public while watching passersby. Here are a few examples of various expressions of this  crimes that I have eye-witnessed, to my great regret:

• Man whacking off in car as I passed by with girlfriends near our off-campus apartments in New Brunswick, NJ. We scream. He drives away.
• Again in hub city, NJ, on the same street as before, while walking with a group of girls, we notice that the young man walking behind us is having more fun that we are– and he’s alone, with his pants open getting down with his bad self. Again we scream, we run into our apartment and lock the door.
• At a bus stop in Jerusalem’s city center (oh no! not the holy city! oh yes…) while some random girls  and I sit and wait, a man stands right in the middle of Jaffa street facing the bus stop, whips out his wang and ‘goes to town’ (pardon the pun, i couldn’t resist). The girls scatter- myself included. I decide it is a good day to splurge on a taxi.
• And lately, twice to be exact, a construction worker working outside a building across the street from my apartment building  stares at me while I pass and pleasures himself. He does not stop looking at me and touching himself. I drive away.

This act infuriates me. It scares me. It disgusts me. It disarms me. It objectifies me. It silenced me… Until now.

I want to be clear that this violation- being stared at and used in a live-fantasy unwillingly- is not personal or related directly to me, nor is it happening just to me. The act is directed at me because I am female and because I am in public. It happens to us because we are born and because we leave the house without a man by our side.

This last and latest violations hit me hard because it happened outside of my house and in my neighborhood, where kids walk around alone, because it is usually very safe. For that reason, I called the police.

The police are supposed to protect and serve but ever since NWA came out with “Fuck tha Police”, we’ve known better. So I was wary. When I called (imagine me saying “I’d like to report a man masturbating in public please” in Hebrew. oh no, not the holy language! oh yes…) a nice woman police officer (read, former frecha) took the report and my name and number in case they couldn’t find the house. She said they were sending a car. I don’t know if they ever did.

Before that day, I had never done anything in response to these invasive incidents because this is not an act you can easily fight. I didn’t respond because I feared that anything I do or say at that moment to stop it will actually encourage it. It doesn’t seem to warrant a violent reaction, and it’s so gross, who would want to get close enough to throw a punch?! Running away, escape, is the only option left to you and at that moment, all you want is to get the fuck away.

So calling the police isn’t the ass beating that this perverted fool deserves but it’s better than nothing. It did not make me feel safe. In fact, after calling be police I felt vulnerable, particularly because this was happening across the street, and I felt like I could easily be named as the caller, being the victim. I was scared to leave my house that evening.

I hope the police car came to the street. I hope, in the very least, based on my description, they got the guy kicked off of this particular job site, so that he won’t be around anymore.

I also hope, if nothing more comes of it, that I’ve opened up a discourse on a violation so foul and so humiliating that we never speak its name. The silence is part of what allows this and similar acts to go unpunished- objectifying us and violating our feeling of safety in public. If we start to talk about it, breaking the silence can free us from feelings of guilt, maybe someday inspire a solution and remind us that we are not alone.