Hit93.1’s Bronte Langbroek delivers powerful harassment message

Bronte Langbroek has spoken out about a matter very close to her heart: women receiving unwanted harassment in the street.

On Hit Riverina’s Breakfast show, Langbroek read out a powerful open letter which included reliving an experience she had. She spoke directly to her harasser, and urged a powerful message of the need for change.

“You might be sitting there listening with your mum, or your sister, or your partner… and they don’t know what you’ve done. But I want you to hear the hurt in my voice,” she said.

Langbroek bemoaned the fact that we still have to teach girls and women that its their responsibility to avoid predatory behaviour by walking in safe places, and “while the sun is still up” just so they can do ordinary things.

“I tried to ignore the things you were saying… I changed my direction to get away. But when you followed me, continued to bait me… you stole the right that I have to feel safe.

“You walked away before you could see the damage that you caused,” she continued. “You laughed in the face of a woman who felt unsafe to leave a store for fear of you waiting outside.”

Fighting through the pain of reliving the incident, Langbroek said she realised that to her harasser, it might all seem like a joke.

“I’m done with condoning this behaviour, I’m tired of the rhetoric that ‘boys will be boys’. I’m finished finding ways to disappear when I’m not the problem.”

She signed off; “before you think about doing this again… before you honk your horn at a girl whose just crossing the street… or cause a scene at a public place just because a girl is ignoring your advances. Think of someone doing it to your mum or sister or girlfried.

“I owe you nothing but you owe it to yourself to change.”