Unwilling models

This past Saturday, I was riding the bus with my little three-year-old niece in the city of Phoenix. I ride this bus about three times a week. My father and I usually ride together, since we go and visit my little angel and we take her to church with us. On that day, he was absent because he had to work.

I let my little niece pick the seats, and we ended up sitting in one of those moving seats. Our bus was a double bus, and the seats are uncomfortable because they move at every turn the bus makes, oftentimes jolting you out of your seat, or throwing yourpackages on the floor. Of course, any three-year-old loves the thrill of such musical seats, but aunties, not so much!

We had been riding for a few minutes when I kept hearing the sound of a camera clicking,over and over. I thought it was anooying, but shrugged it off and got busy talking to my niece.

Then out of the corner oy my eye, I saw it. Or rather, I saw him. A man in his early to mid-fifties was sitting across from us, not directly, but close enough that he almost faced us. This man was brazenly holding up his phone and snapping pictures after picture of my little niece and me. My first reaction was disbelief. Surely this was not happening. Not here, in America. In Mexico, where I come from, women and girls are harassed on a daily basis on the bus and subway. It is a common phenomenon.

Here, men are not as emboldened. Yes, I have had my share of men who begin to strike upa conversation on the bus, light rail, or when sitting at the bus stop, and while I find them annoying, they are mostly harmless.

But this was different. This character was taking pictures.Unwanted pictures. My precious niece's innocent litlte face being photographed over and over. I was outraged, but I was ashamed too. It was as is this man's dirty deeds covered me in shame and embarrassment,as though I had done somethingto provoke him. I was dressed for church, for goodness' sake! Long skirt, coat because yes, we do get a little cool weather in Arizona. So why were we targets? Did this man guess I am meek and would probably not make waves lest I cause a stir in a crowded bus? Did he take we were fair game because no one had dared to stop him before? How many other times has he gotten away with his behavior?

More importanrly, and most alarming, what did he intend to do with the pictures? Post them on a adult website, look at them while sitting at home, pretend we were his wife and child to coworkers?

All these thoughts ran through my mind, but I was paralyzed. I gazed out the window and instructed my niece to look the other way. I contemplated what to do: tell the driver, tell my fellow passengers, confront the man directly, grab the offensive phone from his grasp, and smash it over his head? I pondered. I thought. I hesitated. I did...nothing.

To my utter shame, I did nothing. I did not yell at him, I did not raise the alarm, I did not march and slap his face. I did what I always prided myself on being: I acted like a good girl.

In this case, being a good girl was not the answer,because I was dealing with a pervert, not a gentleman. Being a good girl means I thought this was all going to turn out well, and that somebody would step in and do something. No one did.

Whoever waits for others to step in for them is doomed. People don't always want to get involved. Some battles we must fight alone, afraid and without anybody having our backs, but they are the ones who turn us into lions. The battles we wage by ourselves are the ones that teach us who we are, what we are capable of doing, and what we are willing to fight for.

I failed my battle, but I am determined to not fail the next one. I will not bow down anymore and wait. Waif for what? Knights in shining armor are not always around the corner. We must become the change we want to see. As simple as that.

I have been reading on the subject of photo harassment, and one study conducted by sunshine.co.uk, showed61% of men who were surveyed admitted to oggling women they did not know.Half of those who snapped a forbidden pic were in a relationship, and only 1 in 8 admitted to getting caught.

Over half fof men oggle women, but being in a relationship does not even stop them from snapping away. I wonder if the man who snapped our pics was married? Does he have daughters, nieces or sisters? Howwould he like it if this happened to them? Would he even care?

In the end, we cannot expect such type of people to care. We cannot expect people on a bus, a collective mass of strangers who share space for a few minutes, to care. If they won't,let us do it. Let us care. Let us keep our eyes open for these types of evilmen and their deadly phones, and if we see them engage in this type of sinful hobby, let us confront them and make them ashamed of who and what they are.

We must be the change, the no-nonsense leaders who will stand up for the meek, the scared, the voiceless.

From now on, I vow to become one who defends instead of one who shrinks back. No more cowering for me.