‘Ask For Angela’—Could This Be A Great Way For Bars To Help Prevent Sexual Assault?

If you ever hear someone ask for "Angela" in a bar, there may be a problem.

"Ask For Angela" is part of a campaign called #NoMore in Lincolnshire County to raise awareness of sexual assault.

It was reportedly rolled out alongside another campaign, Lincoln's Pubwatch, that coordinates with law enforcement to make bars safer. A lot of people meet new people at bars, or connect with them in person for the first time after meeting on social media.

We wanted to do this in a more organized way, and worked with Lincoln's Pubwatch scheme to get the bars in the area to take part. We'd seen that a few individual pubs had done similar messages saying that if people's dates weren't going well the bar staff would help and call them a cab.

Most of the time we see precautions, protocol and discussion pertaining to sexual assault in the workplace or in schools—but public spaces like bars are where people often face this issue as well.

While alcohol doesn't cause sexual assault, aggressors use alcohol as a weapon or an excuse in about 50 percent of sexual assaults

This is where the bars step in.

If any man or woman feels unsafe in a bar, a strategy recommends them going up to the staff and asking for "Angela." That way, the staff can discreetly call her a cab or remove them from the potentially dangerous situation.

Not everyone is on board with this—with some tweeting that becoming a victim can be avoided by making better decisions or taking better precautions, and others saying that highly publicising this will eventually make the strategy useless once "Angela" is no longer discreet.

What are your thoughts? Should bars use this strategy, or something similar?

[via Aplus]