Until we take indecent exposure crimes more seriously, male violence against women will prevail

My experience is not unique. Kitty Underhill, a model and speaker, spoke to me about an indecent exposure crime she was the victim of: “I was flashed when I was around 10/11 years old. I had some friends round for a sleepover but we decided to go to my nearest shop (less than a 10 minute walk away) to pick up ice cream. On the way over, an older man started following us. I felt him getting closer so I got my friends and I to cross the road. Just as we did so, he emerged from a parked white van and flashed us. We sprinted as fast as we could to the shop. I called my Dad to come pick us up and he took us home. He scoured the area trying to find him but didn’t have any luck.”

Kitty, like me, didn’t realise at that age that this was a crime. “It didn’t occur to me that that could be something to report.” She added that “after it happened we never spoke about it. I only remember it every now and again and I think it has caused a bit of underlying anxiety around my safety with cis men. Even now, it takes a lot for me to feel at ease with a cis man because I feel like the experience has infiltrated my subconscious; so whilst I wasn’t conscious of the effect it had on me at the time, it still feels like something that underpins my experience navigating the world.”

Sydney, 31, was the victim of an indecent exposure crime in the lobby of her building. A man had pushed his way in, and when she tried to avoid getting in the lift with him, he walked close to her and pulled his pants down. She closed her eyes, frozen in panic. Some time later, she tells me he “just started walking away, pants still down, and got into an elevator”. The incident has impacted her mental health. “My heart was racing as I was remembering the situation. Unfortunately, just a couple years prior to the incident, my boyfriend at the time brutally assaulted me in an act of domestic violence. My neighbours heard the attack and called the police, which I genuinely believe saved my life. As a result of the assault (and just the other lived experiences of being a woman) I had a pretty strong distrust and fear of men, which then only increased even further following this incident. I contemplated quitting my job because I feared being out late at night, and also because now the pervy comments or lecherous stares from male patrons at the bar that I used to be able to brush off just made my skin crawl. I like to think that as the time has passed it all has less of an impact on me mentally, but I know that it’s still there and will make itself known sometimes.”

Office for National Statistics (ONS) and Ministry of Justice data for England and Wales revealed that 10,775 indecent exposure cases were logged by police in 2020, but just 594 suspects were taken to court. The number of actual indecent exposure cases are likely significantly higher. Researching into this crime, I’m struck at the fact almost every woman I know has been the victim of ‘flashing’. It’s also clear to me, anecdotally and through personal experience, that most women would not consider reporting it to the police. We’ve internalised so much misogyny: that the police won’t believe us, that we’ll be blamed, that they’ll say we’re overreacting, that it’ll be chalked up as hysteria. We’ve internalised all this, because it’s what has prevailed in society. The case of Wayne Couzens is a symbol of this fear and has just cemented it further. His victims’ bravery, to speak up and draw the necessary conclusions, has been an antidote.

GLAMOUR asked The Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, for comment. “The awful truth appears to be that this man was following a path of escalating sexual violence,” he said. “He could and should have been stopped before his fatal attack on Sarah Everard. This case underlines the vital need to treat every case of violence against women and girls in a timely and professional manner and I’m determined to support and hold the police to account to ensure that nothing like this is ever allowed to happen again.”