Groningen’s Nightlife Facing Safety Problems
- Viola Duroni
- Sep 29, 2024
- 3 min read
Updated: Sep 30, 2024
"I will just keep walking and ignore him," Liza thought when, from the corner of her eye, she saw a middle-aged man wearing a black hoodie right behind her.
When she turned, he followed suit, so she made another turn, but he copied her again. Liza then started running home. Finally safe at home, she stared at the strange man through her ground-floor window, hidden behind the curtain, waiting for him to leave.
Liza Kolomiites, a young master’s student from Ukraine, is unfortunately one of many people harassed during a night out in Groningen.
According to a sexual misconduct survey published by the website Sikkom.nl earlier this year, 61% of the 1,231 people who filled in the questionnaire declared that they had been victims of assault or groping, while out in Groningen at night in 2023.
For Liza, it had been a regular night out as many others. It began with a couple of glasses of wine at a friend's place, just two streets away from her home. She had finally had a peaceful evening after the last COVID-19 wave. After midnight, while she was walking home with her headphones on, the man started following her.
When she reached her home, Liza tried to simulate a conversation with another person in her apartment, but the man was still standing outside of her window: "You shouldn't be afraid of me" he shouted through the glass of her window. She locked her door, and waited for him to leave. He waited outside her door for five minutes, before leaving.
Unfortunately, this is not the only harassment that Liza has experienced, she told The Glass Room. "I have had numerous other episodes, such as guys being touchy the moment I first got here in Groningen when I was only seventeen."
According to Liza, at first sight, Groningen is a safe city, nothing like those big cities around Europe. However, after recent events, she has changed her mind.
"Probably after Covid, the situation got worse. Maybe drug use is a part of the reasons why, but I think that this problem doesn't relate only to Groningen and the Netherlands, but it relates to every city in every country,” she explains.
For these reasons, some people are trying to make a difference. This is the case for Martijn Schokker, a sexual education expert from the Centre for Sexual Assaults in Groningen (CSG).
Martijn and his team offer free courses for club staff, teaching them how to recognize sexual assault, what to do in such situations and how to create a safe environment for the people who are visiting the club.
"The large amount of victims is shocking, but for us those aren't new numbers,” Martijn says. That is why, according to Martijn, a couple of years ago the municipality of Groningen started to raise more awareness about this specific problem, leading the CSG to offer these courses.
"I think this is just a start" Martijn says. "Our courses will not solve all the problems, but they will surely help to create a safe nightlife environment. If more and more clubs will participate, it will be much easier to react, recognize and handle cases of sexual assault. It needs to be a movement where we all are more responsible."
When Liza was asked whether she now feels more scared to go out, this was her answer: "I am more scared, and I would say that I am definitely more conscious. But I don't want those crazy people who do bad things to dictate whether I can or cannot have fun on a night out."
Although asking for help can be useful, Liza thinks that, realistically, it is almost impossible to get immediate help in sexual harassment situations. "Most of the time, people who grab, touch or follow girls can simply get away with it."
"My advice would be to do more of what we are basically doing now,” she concludes, referring to talking about personal bad experiences, in order to make more and more people aware. That way, Liza thinks, people will be able to take the necessary preventive measures.
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