I’m utterly sickened by this story of a man trying to talk to a woman on a train

What can we as a society do about the relentless harassment of women by terrifying men? Menacing men, threatening men, priapic men. Something must be done — and quickly. I reached this conclusion after reading a deeply distressing article by the Guardian columnist Daisy Buchanan, who announced that she has imposed a curfew on herself after a series of deeply unpleasant incursions by bestial males. ‘I can’t believe women have to live like this in 2015,’ Ms Buchanan lamented, having revealed that she has also given up dancing in case the same sort of thing happens when she is on the way home from wherever it is she dances.

I am going to repeat the full details of the assaults made on this youngish woman — not for gratuitous reasons, but because I think people need to know; they need to be shocked out of their complacency, they need to face up to the enormity of the problem, no matter how traumatising that might be.

The latest incident happened when Daisy was on her way to her yoga class. A man outside the studio said to her, ‘Hello — I keep seeing you around! What’s your name?’ Yes, I know. It beggars belief that this sort of thing can still happen in this day and age. Luckily, on this occasion Daisy had her wits about her and mumbled an answer so that the man left not knowing for certain that she was called ‘Daisy’. But she was clearly numb with fright.

Worse, though, are the bastards on trains. No sooner had Daisy sunk into the seat and taken out her paperback than she felt a tap on her shoulder and a male voice saying: ‘Hello! What are you reading, then?’

I felt physically sick when I read about this transgression and I have had to break off from writing this article to vomit again.