Transport for London’s new posters say “Intrusive staring of a sexual nature” will no longer be tolerated on buses and tubes. Rising East reporter Carissa Svedberg visited Stratford station to ask Londoners what they think of the campaign.
Igo, 15, says she has encountered unwanted staring on public transport. “It’s scary and your heart starts beating really fast,” she recounts.
However, Sabri, a young man, thinks stares can easily be misinterpreted. He says, “I feel like [staring] can easily be interpreted the wrong way when people are spacing out. It might just be the odd chance that they are facing someone when they are zoning out.”
Staring has been a recent cause for debate with people unsure whether it should be considered a form of harassment or not.
See the video below for Carissa’s full vox pop on TFL’s anti-harassment campaign and whether staring is sexual harassment.
The campaign
Senior British Transport Police officer Det. Sarah White told The Telegraph ‘It’s human nature to stare at things. However, it’s very different when someone is staring, leering, or there’s a sexual motivation.’
‘We will record them as crimes, and we will investigate them – and we have had successful prosecutions in that field”, she added.
TFL, the railways, the police and women’s safety groups were behind the campaign to ‘stamp out sexual harassment on public transport’ launched on 27 October 2021.
However, only with the controversial new posters on staring has the campaign gained some notoriety.
As well as staring, the campaign is aimed at behaviours generally understood as sexual harassment such as catcalling, exposing, pressuring, touching, staring and upskirting.
It also includes ‘cyber-flashing’ which means sending or showing sexual content without consent - as even happened recently in parliament when an MP was seen watching porn in the commons.
TFL’s head of transport police said “The primary aim of this campaign is to challenge this behaviour, sending a message to offenders that it is wrong”.
Find out more on tackling sexual harassment here and learn more about how you can be an active bystander.