As Roberts walks through the streets of New York over a 10 hour period she is subjected to constant harassment. The 10 hour walk was edited down to a two minute viral monster. It was first released on October 29. The creepiest segment features a man walking silently right alongside her for several minutes. In an interview with The Guardian, Roberts says that she didn’t even show the worst instances of harassment in the video.
In an interview with The Washington Post, Roberts spoke about her experiences in making the video:
I felt like crying and I have occurrences in my past of sexual assault, so I wasn’t even aware necessarily of all the times people were saying things to me. I was just going over in my head and reliving, unfortunately, these memories while I was walking. I wanted to break down in tears.
She goes on to say:
I called my mom just so I could hear that she loves me and that I was putting myself forward as a face for this cause because it’s something I really believe in and I needed to hear that she was proud of me, which she is.
The one drawback to the video is that Roberts didn’t exhibit some of her martial arts skills on her harassers. On her website, she writes:
My goals right now are about involving my martial arts training with my acting. I started Taekwondo at the Toledo Martial Arts Center (www.toledomartialartscenter.com) when I was 9 and earned a black belt before training in Atemi Jutsu at the Traditional Martial Arts Society in Pittsburgh (www.tmas-dojo.com).
She adds on her site that she has a BA in Theater from Kutztown University. Roberts says that she “moved to New York immediately after graduating.”On an episode of Fox News’ train wreck show, The Five, resident “liberal,” Bob Beckel said:
She got 100 catcalls, let me add 101. Damn, baby, you’re a piece of woman.
You stay classy Bob Beckel. Roberts’ cameraman, Rob Bliss, posted the Beckel video on his Facebook page with the words, “I don’t even…”
According to an interview with The Washington Post, Rob Bliss, who walked ahead of Roberts and recorded her with a camera concealed in his backpack to help create the video, says he’s also been threatened.
He told the Post:
I’m getting some blowback, but not nearly as bad as Shoshana. Right now she’s getting a lot of threats and things like that and it’s just so sad. It’s like the video is now being echoed in real life.
