I'm not your baby! The iPhone app that gives women the perfect withering one-liners to answer embarrassing catcalls

PUBLISHED: 16:50 EST, 17 September 2012 | UPDATED: 16:51 EST, 17 September 2012

A new iPhone app has been launched to help women deal with embarrassing instances of sexual harassment.

From catcalls to leering colleagues the 'Not Your Baby' tool provides withering one-liners to tackle a range of compromising situations.

Users are instructed to enter information about their scenario, including the setting and the identity of their harasser in order to get the appropriate advice.

Virtual support: A new iTunes application has been launched to help women deal with instances of sexual harassment

All of the responses are generated based on submissions from other users.

Toronto-based Metropolitan Action Committee on Violence Against Women hopes its invention will offer virtual support to thousands of women worldwide.

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An example shows if the user selects ‘boss’ as the offender and the location as ‘social situation’ the app states: ‘Get a trusted person outside of the workplace to call you every so often and check to see how you’re doing.’

Developer Andrea Gunraj told The Torontoist: 'A lot of people said they had a hard time thinking of responses [to harassment] in the moment.'

Virtual support: From cat calls to leering colleagues the 'Not Your Baby' tool aims at helping people avoid a range of compromising situations

She added that she hopes that the gadget will not only prevent instances of harassment 'before they happen, but also during and after they happen.'

Figures for sexual harassment are hard to obtain as it's estimated that only one in ten incidents are ever reported.

However METRAC reports that in 1993 Violence Against Women Survey by Statistics Canada found that 23 per cent of women experienced workplace sexual harassment with young women at highest risk.

While a 1995 survey found that eight out of ten young women were harassed in secondary school.

Not Your Baby also includes facts and personal stories of harassment, as well as legal definitions and community resources.

It is currently available for free in the iTunes store, for use on iPhone, iPod Touch and iPad.

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Comments (4)

The comments below have not been moderated.

So let me see if I understand this . . . a woman gets whistled at and propositioned while walking down the street. She asks the offender to wait a moment, she gets out her phone, opens the relevant app, enters the particulars: type of location, type of offender, type of comment, then the app will give her the appropriate response to make. Wow, there's nothing like a quick comeback, and that's nothing like a quick comeback.

- trooper , Sa Kaeo, Thailand, 18/9/2012 02:12

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At my age, I'd kill for some cat calls.

- lola , toronto, 18/9/2012 01:27

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I do not understand cat calling. No girl has ever walked away from being yelled/beeped at etc and though "Wow, what a really lovely charming guy", we just think you're immature and creepy and NO ONE is impressed...

- therethere , London, 18/9/2012 00:04

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If they call you baby, ask them how much they are coughing up for child support.

- theatre inexile , Toronto, Canada, 17/9/2012 23:40

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