For a young woman that has been verbally and physically harassed, campaigning against someone like Dapper Laughs was a no-brainer. The TV personality, real name Daniel O’Reilly, rose to fame during the ‘Vine famous’ epidemic that swept through Internet land, and even I at first giggled at him doing things like chatting to inanimate objects.
However, it soon started to turn pretty gruesome after he realised his target audience were immature blokes who still sniggered at the word ‘boobies’ and his most popular jokes were ones utterly dehumanising to women. Like the one where he insinuates he’ll have sex with a girl so hard that ‘by the end of the night she’ll need a wheelchair’.
It’s people like Dapper who have perpetuated the culture of laddism that’s now pervasive across university campuses such as mine at Cardiff. I’ve been told that I’m nothing but a pussy. A talking vagina who, especially because I dared to dress with even a bit of skin on show, is gagging to sleep with someone. I’ve been called ‘boring’ for condoning protective sex, and told that he’s ‘chivalrous’ because he’s asking for consent.
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All of which is why, when I first heard that Dapper was coming to speak at my student union in Cardiff, I started a petition and online campaign. I’ve never done anything like this before – I was more of a ‘rant-in-140-characters’ kinda girl – but I knew straight away that my Students’ Union needed to see that so many people opposed him performing, for something to actually happen.
Within five days of starting (and closing) the petition, over 700 staff and students had signed it. And since then, my social media has had an overwhelming response, the campaign has been covered by local and national news, and men and women have come forward in a stand for gender equality.
My name has been brandished around the media in the past week, and in the space of a few days I had literally become Dapper Laughs’ arch enemy. But what I want people to understand is that it was never a direct attack on him, but his outdated, sexist jokes. We are living in 2014 and there is still, bizarrely, a popularity for ‘humour’ about ‘showing a girl your dick, and if she cries she’s just playing hard to get.’
Dapper is that bloke that oozes sexism and misogyny that uninformed men and women laugh at because they either have no clue about the ominous undertones, or they’ve never been on the receiving end of comments and behaviour like that.
READ MORE: Being Sent Dick Pictures? That’s No Worse Than Sexual Harassment
A couple of years ago when on holiday, I was on a packed dance floor and someone began groping my vagina and bum quite aggressively, and when I left the situation the guy proceeded to follow me outside, grabbing my arm and pulling me back. When I tried to leave, he wouldn’t let me go and it wasn’t until a couple of men came over to see what was going on that he did. That was a terrifying situation for an 18-year-old to be in and I wish that incident had stopped there.
But since then I have been grabbed, groped, shouted at, catcalled at, threatened, flashed at, masturbated at, followed, had sexual rumours spread about me, and been called a slut, slag, whore, tramp, fat, ugly, disgusting, bitch – among other things. I’m only 21, so think how many cases of this sort of behaviour women have been subjected to in their lifetime?
It shouldn’t matter that I’ve been a victim of this kind of harrasment though. All that should matter is that it’s wrong in today’s society that so much sexual assault and harassment is now disguised as ‘banter’, and that it has become normalised part of society.
The response to the petition from people of all genders has been incredible, and it was truly liberating to see so many powerful, young women stepping forward and saying, ‘Hang on a minute, I don’t like the way we’re being treated here, and men like Dapper are perpetrators of this awful culture that I have been subjected to.’
But a lot of men haven’t liked it. Uh oh, us talking vaginas are actually speaking some sense, and it was, of course, bound to cause some backlash. I’ve certainly had to develop some pretty thick skin as The Daily Mail comments were hard enough to deal with, let alone being tweeted to and about every day regarding my personal appearance and personality.
I’ve even heard today that I’ve apparently had sex with a famous rapper, so you kinda get the gist of the sort of counteraction I’m dealing with.
A lot of people were confused with why I was doing it – they thought I was tarnishing all men with this stigmatisation, but I wasn’t. I know so many respectful and wonderful men that would never be a part of this sort of culture, and most of them signed the petition!
Another concern to some is that my action goes against ‘free speech’, but the point we were trying to make is not that Dapper Laughs should be banned completely, but that he should not perform in an academic venue that actually enforces ‘anti-lad culture’ and ‘zero tolerance’ policies.
The backlash proves that we still have a long way to go in terms of combatting the awful, mutant version of lad culture that we’re faced with. But regardless of people’s opinions on the matter, we’ve opened up a discussion surrounding feminism and gender inequality among young people, and it is restoring all faith I was starting to lose.
I’m frightened that – although I’m living my 20s in a world of sexual imbalance in which sexual assault has been normalised – my children will grow up in it, blissfully unaware that the unwanted advances imposed on them, or they are imposing on someone else, have merely become a part of their everyday life – and it’s all thanks to men like Dapper Laughs.
I’m hoping this campaign I’ve created may be the starting point for combatting extreme lad culture, especially at university, and that ALL young women will start to feel safe in the academic establishment that they pride themselves on being a part of.
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Follow Vicky on Twitter @VickyChandler
This article originally appeared on The Debrief.