A UK mother and daughter sharing their story about feeling unsafe in public spaces with a reporter faced an ironic interruption when an aggressive man sat between them and refused to leave.
Gill Jones and her daughter were seated on a park bench discussing their recent night out, where a man's sexual harassment directed at Jones' daughter, Beth Fletcher, led to a violent brawl. ITV News was conducting the interview for a story highlighting the charity Tomorrow's Women and a campaign to create more safe spaces for women.
The man ignored polite requests to allow the women to continue their conversation and became verbally aggressive and threatening, forcing the interview to halt and the group to leave for safety.
"I was starting to get a little bit scared to be honest, having experienced what we experienced a few weeks ago. I wasn't sure what was going to happen and how that was going to escalate," Jones said after the group relocated to an indoor location and resumed the interview.
"You could just tell the lack of respect when it came to people in general and their personal space but to women in general - he had no respect whatsoever," Fletcher added.
Tomorrow's Women recently announced a women's only night in a Birkenhead club, spurring hundreds of negative comments online.
"We've had so many hateful comments from men," Kate Chadwick from Tomorrow's Women said. "I think all those comments just show the reason why we're doing the event. They are very much proving our point."
Research by Tomorrow's Women found 93% of women feel unsafe being out alone at night, while 82% feel unsafe in bars or clubs. Government data shows nearly a quarter of women in the UK aged 16 to 24 experienced sexual harassment last year.
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