Feel Good Friday - Hollaback!

I've been looking for ways to be a better ally to the Black community and that's what led me to today's Feel Good Friday organization, Hollaback!

Founded in 2005 by a group of seven young people in New York, Hollaback! is "a global, people-powered movement to end harassment in all its forms."  Here's how they do it.

Hollaback! offers FREE bystander intervention training to help you learn how to respond when you witness someone being harassed. I took the training a few weeks ago and highly recommend it. They teach you five methods you can use, known as Hollaback!'s 5Ds: distract, delegate, document, delay and direct. You can read about them at the bystander resources section of their website. It was helpful for me to learn that there are ways to be supportive without directly confronting the harasser.

Other training offered by Hollaback! includes conflict de-escalation, responding to and preventing harassment, and resilience - both in the workplace and in the face of Covid-19. In addition, Hollaback! has trained over 550 young people to become site leaders in their communities so they have the skills to launch a site and take on-the-ground action. Learn more about customized resources and site leaders.

Since the early days, Hollaback! has expanded to 21 cities in 16 countries. You can find your nearest Hollaback! office at this link or check out their online resources to learn how to deal with harassment in the workplace, on the street and online.

The final program to share is HeartMob, a platform created in 2015 to help end online harassment. People being harassed online can ask for the immediate support they need and the HeartMob community will respond. To date over 7,500 actions have been taken to support more than 1,600  people.

To get involved with Hollaback! and their work, you can join the HeartMob or sign up for a free training. I took "Bystander Intervention to Stop Police Sponsored Violence and Anti-Black Racist Harassment" and the schedule for that is here. You can also make a donation, and follow Hollaback! on Facebook and Twitter @iHollaback, to amplify their message and help them end harassment in all its forms.