Image: Facebook/Marie Laguerre
After telling a man who harassed her to “shut up”, a 22-year-old woman was slapped in the face by the man, in front of a cafe in Paris, France last week.
Marie Laguerre was walking home when she chanced upon an unnamed man who made “dirty noises, comments and whistled” in a “humiliating and provocative manner,” she wrote in a Facebook post she shared last Wednesday, July 25, a day after the incident.
Because she was tired and it was supposedly not the first street harassment she experienced during the day, she said “shut up” to the man, afterwhich both went on their respective ways. At this point, they were already at the area of a cafe on Rue Burnouf.
The 22-year-old woman was unaware that the man, who was by now at the other side of the cafe, suddenly grabbed an ashtray from a nearby table. He threw this at Laguerre, who was way at the opposite side.
Next, the man followed Laguerre. He then slapped her on the face, in front of the cafe customers. While some customers stood up and called back the harasser, he walked away as if nothing happened.
Laguerre shared the CCTV footage of the incident, which has gone viral, on her Facebook page. So far, the video has garnered over 1.5 million views, 8,800 likes and reactions, 1,900 comments and 6,900 shares.
The harasser’s slap, which caused Laguerre to lose her footing and almost hit her head on the cafe terrace’s barrier, left her with a headache and neck pain, as reported by Le Parisien last Saturday, July 28.
The French woman went home in shock after the incident. Twenty minutes later, she was determined to file a complaint, so she went back to the cafe to find onlookers who are willing to testify against the man.
The 22-year-old said she is no longer comfortable in her neighborhood and that her adrenaline and stress level rises whenever she is out on the street, the report stated. Laguerre, who claims to be a feminist, said that what happened was a result of men thinking that the street belongs to them, and that women have no business being there.
An investigation on the incident has been launched but the identity of the attacker has yet to be identified, as of this writing. JB
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