#why loiter

[pakistanigal]

Gender, Urban Development and the Politics of Space

While at one level the contemporary ‘urban transition’ in the Global South offers scope for advancing gender equality, barriers to female empowerment remain widespread, especially among the urban poor.

Though not directly related to Pakistan, the content of this article is relevant to how significant female participation in the public space is; to how many dimensions there are to women’s right... how women’s rights and representation is legitimately important not just for women but for everyone.

It may help everyone understand how important it is to support women’s presence in the public space with campaigns such as #WhyLoiter and #GirlsAtDhabas.

[fearlesscollective]

Why Loiter?

"‘Girls at dhabas’ sounds like an anomaly, but some rad women in Karachi are claiming spaces for women." - Shubhra Dixit

“We need to redefine our understanding of violence in relation to public space—to see not sexual assault, but the denial of access to public space as the worst possible outcome for women. What we might demand then is that women’s right to be in public space be unquestioned.” – Why Loiter? Women and Risk on Mumbai Streets

http://www.thequint.com/waterqooler/2015/08/05/gender-hang-out-with-these-girls-at-dhabas

[vedris]

While foregrounding violence has put women's issues to the national agenda, it has also meant that violence becomes the only language in which one can engage with questions of gender in public space.

Shila Phadke, Sameera Khan and Shilpa Ranade, Why Loiter?: Women and Risk on Mumbai Streets

[vedris]

Our desire then is to replace the unchosen risk to reputation and the unwanted risk of loss of respectability with a chosen risk of engaging city spaces on our own terms... At no point are we ignoring or even minimizing the violence, both sexual and non-sexual, that might potentially take place in the public and lead to physical as well as psychological trauma. Even as we ask for women's right to engage risk in public space, we do not disregard the responsibility of the state and its mechanisms of law and order in dealing with public violence. Instead, we suggest that they deal very firmly with the aggressors of the violence and not tie up the victims of violence in endless blame games, inane dress codes, and relentless moral policing.

Shila Phadke, Sameera Khan and Shilpa Ranade, Why Loiter?: Women and Risk on Mumbai Streets