Backhanded compliments

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My found poem is made up of multiple quotes found from the instagram page @catcallsofnyc. There is an artist who writes on the streets of NYC, in chalk, the sexual comments made to women. The quotes can be nauseating and heartbreaking having most of them being made to young girls. My method was to pick out some of the quotes that really hit me. I spaced them out and grouped certain quotes next to each other because I felt they had similar meanings. The quotes on the page are all backhanded compliments. The last line was a comment made on one of the posts that I felt I needed to include. It goes to show that men think it’s ok to yell at women if they compliment them. But these comments cause nothing but discomfort and sometimes fear. In a group or even with a parent girls are being singled out and yelled at by men in vile ways. No matter the age, girls will be cursed at and sexualized. Reading this hurt my heart. live near the city and have had many altercations like these but sometimes I can still be astonished by what is said. The woman who experienced these interactions also included the story behind it which I didn’t include. The stories they told were almost all the same. After getting cat called the women are often saddened and feel almost violated. Some altercations give me shivers or women being grabbed while just walking down the street. Men have this expectation that women owe them something after being complimented. Having it so women can’t walk down the straight without the fear of getting verbally harassed.