Being afraid for one's safety is women’s everyday life and even if they live in rather safe countries, there is always a thought of what could happen if they are being followed, being watched or if someone is planning to kidnap them or worse.
No matter how cautious they might be, sometimes circumstances that they don’t have control over lead them into a dangerous situation. For TikToker Dray, it was her work email that had her full name in it that caused trouble, so she believes that companies shouldn't give name tags or public emails displaying employees’ real names.
More info: TikTok
Woman's work email has her full name in it and now she is scared of a man who decided to ignore her message but contacted her on Instagram instead
Image credits: thatgirldray_
Dray works at the gym as the administrator and shared an experience she recently had when a man wanted to sign up for a membership. She called him through the work phone and scheduled an appointment for him to come in to finish with the paperwork through the work email.
The problem is that the work email has Dray’s full name and her name is not common, so it’s fairly easy to find her online. So the man did.
The woman is convinced companies shouldn't force customer service workers to wear name tags or reveal who they are in any other way
Image credits: thatgirldray_
The customer contacted the woman through her personal Instagram telling her that he would come to sign the papers and that he found it easier to find her on social media and respond there instead of answering the email he got from her.
The message scared Dray because not only was this inappropriate, but she'd had that happen before and when she called the police, they found out that they already knew about him as he had committed crimes before.
She got very scared when a customer messaged her on Instagram because she knew he found her after seeing her name in her work email address
Image credits: thatgirldray_
Before doing anything about this current guy who had messaged her, Dray decided to try to find out more about who he was. Turns out, they had a mutual follower, so the TikToker wrote to the woman and received a concerning reply, confirming her suspicions that the guy was up to no good.
She found out that the man had harassed the woman’s brother’s girlfriend and now that this man knows where Dray works, he may assume that she lives nearby, he can come over whenever and she doesn’t even know what he looks like.
Especially when she found out that he has harassed other women as well
Image credits: thatgirldray_
Image credits: thatgirldray_
While women who saw the video related to Dray and feared for her, many men pointed out that the TikToker has her real name on social media and couldn’t understand how it was any different from a name tag or an email. They went as far as contacting her on Instagram and leaving sarcastic messages saying that they would stalk her or come to see her.
Dray had to film another video explaining that random men on social media don’t bother her because that’s the only thing they know about her, which is her first name. The guy from the gym knows her full name, where she works, and the city she lives in, which means he is now an in-person threat.
And because she had a similar situation of having to report a man to the police when he found her on Facebook after seeing her name tag
Image credits: thatgirldray_
You don’t know how a person will act in real life, if they will grass you, if they’ll threaten you with a knife or follow you home. Men may not be so sympathetic towards Dray because they experience stalking and harassment less often.
A survey by Gallup revealed that “In many high-income countries — including New Zealand, Malta, Italy, France, Australia, and the U.S. — men are considerably more likely than women to say they feel safe walking alone at night in their communities.”
That time the man was already known to the police
Image credits: thatgirldray_
Stop Street Harassment conducted a national survey and found that 65 percent of women revealed they have experienced street harassment compared to 25 percent of men. Also “Among all women, 23% had been sexually touched, 20% had been followed, and 9% had been forced to do something sexual.”
While among men, the “most common form of harassment was homophobic or transphobic slurs (9%)” because “a higher percentage of LGBT-identified men than heterosexual men reported” to have experienced street harassment.
According to the National Sexual Violence Resource Center, “Nationwide, 81% of women and 43% of men reported experiencing some form of sexual harassment and/or assault in their lifetime.”
It's not the messages themselves that are scary, but the fact that this man knows where she works
Image credits: thatgirldray_
Women are more often targets of harassment and violence, so why aren't they afraid of all people thinking they are all potential threats? Because statistics show that in most cases men are the perpetrators.
For example, the Australian Bureau of Statistics analyzed the list of the 53,570 sexual assault offenders between 2010-11 and 2019-20 and 97 percent of them were male. So women’s fears are supported by research, although they don’t need it as they know it from experience.
He can then find out which car is hers, wait in the parking lot or follow her home
Image credits: thatgirldray_
Because unfortunately for women, everyone seems like a threat
Image credits: VIK hotels group (not the actual photo)
You can listen to the story in the video below
What may not seem a big deal to some, to Dray, is very alarming because she knows the possible horrible outcomes that can follow if a man knows where she works, which car she drives, where she goes after work and where she lives.
It’s a scary thought, but how do you think name tags and email with full names in them could be replaced? Do you think replacing them with something else would make women feel safer? Do you think it would make stalkers give up? Let us know your thoughts in the comments!
People in the comments were scared for Dray as well and many of them were sharing similar experiences
