whenever i see ladies talking to men on the street and anyone’s body language seems suspect, like maybe she’s leaning back and he’s leaning forward, or she’s not smiling but fake-smiling, or y’know, any of the other dozen flags, i always, always stop, stop talking to whoever i was talking to, get closer if i can, and watch/listen unobtrusively.  yeah maybe you’re having a fight with your boyfriend.  yeah maybe you and your brother just dont really get along.  maybe two friends had a stressful day.  and if everything seems kosher then i can just go about my business.  but if that is a dude that followed you out of a bar, or he’s an abusive spouse, or he’s waiting for the roofie to kick in, i’m ready to do something about it.

it’s not just sexual harassment either.  one time i spotted an argument and when i got closer realized that a woman was asking a young white man to please (she even said please) not use the word “faggot” in a hateful way.  and he was yelling at her because “this is america” and so on, getting a little threatening about it.  really all it took was walking up, standing next to her, saying “yeah, i agree with her” and once it was clear that he wasn’t dealing with a single woman he could just shout down, but that multiple people thought his homophobic horseshit was annoying, he shut the fuck up, backed off her, and stopped his macho posturing.  like magic.

anyway yeah being a good ally and just being ready to back someone up who’s getting victimized: it’s easy, pretty low-risk (because suddenly there are two of you, instead of a single, outweighed victim), and might make a shithead think twice about trying it again. idk just something to keep in mind.

edit: like just not letting shit slide is a good strategy.  say you’re a white straight dude and one of your bros says something gross about an underaged girl or makes a rape joke or something, like all it takes it saying “dude dont say that shit, that’s fucking gross AND it’s really boring”.  believe me he will take it a lot more seriously from you than he will from me