Emily May moved to New York City after college with the intent of working for social change. Initially, she focused on anti-poverty work. But it was her experience of street harassment that became the catalyst for her cofounding what is now a global nonprofit—Hollaback—which May now leads as executive director. She was with a circle of friends in 2005, all living in New York. And one after another, they shared stories of being harassed on the street. May shared her own story. One of the men in the group then said, “You live in a different city than we do.”

As May explains, the man’s comment opened her eyes.

He helped me understand movements to address domestic violence and workplace harassment,” she says. And she realized, “If it is not okay in the home and not okay in the workplace, why is it okay on the streets?”

May resolved to change that—to bring a voice to those being harassed and to shift the perspective on street harassment. With a group of friends, she launched Hollaback, providing an online platform for women to share their stories of harassment as well as offline organizing for individual and system change.

Read the full article by Jeanine Becker about sexual harassment from the Stanford Social Innovation Review