Approached by 20 men in two hours: Reality of being a woman alone at night

Cree Haughton tried walking alone on a busy street at night to see what would happen

As a young woman, I’m all too familiar with the challenges we have to face to keep ourselves safe.

Given my lived experience, it wasn’t surprising to me when our survey exposed how scared the majority of us feel in various aspects of life.

Earlier this year, ITV News interviewed more than 1,000 young adults.

Our report found that more than eight out of 10 young women feel unsafe walking home alone in the dark.

And more than six out of 10 feel unsafe on their own in a bar.

The sad reality is that when I saw the results, I expected the numbers to be higher.

I wanted to demonstrate, in a real and tangible way, what it can be like when you are alone as a young woman at night.

To do this, we used a secret camera attached to me, two producers who were also filming and a security guard watching over the whole thing for our safety.

I walked alone on a busy Cardiff street at night in a vulnerable situation to see who would offer me help.

I was approached by men 20 times in just two hours.

My cover story for them was that I was looking for my friends.

The vast majority of the men responded: “I’ll be your friend”.

Out of all of these interactions, only one man offered to help me.

I chose Cardiff because South Wales Police Force had recently announced, thanks to a new initiative, a 30% drop in violence against women on the nightlife scene.

I’m totally aware in this instance that none of the interactions would have warranted police intervention, in fact, some of them were quite pleasant people.

But I think what the exercise shows is that it is not necessarily just the threat of more serious sexual assaults that make women feel unsafe.

The fact that 19 out of 20 men used me being alone, lost and vulnerable as an opportunity to ask for my contact details, rather than to offer me help, is quite concerning.

Some men even approached me with strange requests: “Do you play tennis? I will give you free lessons.”

A lot of them did not respect my personal space.

And one man got annoyed when I rejected his advances.

Although most of the interactions were harmless, the relentless nature of the approaches when you are on your own is exhausting.

You have your guard up for every approach in case that person is the man who takes it a step too far.