One day after International Women's Day, a picture of a "Wall Street finance broseph'' apparently 'humping' the defiant Fearless Girl statue has gone viral.
The woman who took the photograph of the unidentified man, shared it on social media, explaining that she and some friends had gone to see the statue in New York that evening with friends.
![The Fearless Girl stands across from Wall Street's famous Charging Bull.](/web/20170312081128im_/http://www.canberratimes.com.au/content/dam/images/g/u/w/c/0/o/image.related.articleLeadwide.620x349.guwbzh.png/1489299709607.jpg)
"Almost as if out of central casting, some Wall Street finance broseph appeared and started humping the statue while his gross date rape-y friends laughed and cheered him on," Alexis Kaloyanides said in the post. "He pretended to have sex with the image of a little girl. Douchebags like this are why we need feminism."
![The Fearless Girl.](/web/20170312081128im_/http://www.canberratimes.com.au/content/dam/images/g/u/w/c/0/p/image.related.articleLeadwide.620x349.guwbzh.png/1489299709607.jpg)
She went on to explain that there were about 15 or 20 others also watching.
"We all shouted at him to get lost, check his privilege, etc," she said. "They were gone within 30 seconds, but managed to make complete asses of themselves."
The image has been shared nearly 20,000 times on Facebook since Friday afternoon.
In an interview with Inside Edition, Kaloyanides said: "He was gone within 20 seconds, but it just ruined the mood of the scene. There were people there talking about empowering children and women and for then to have this 20-something showing his entitlement, defiling the statute… it was utterly revolting."
She added, "This is just further perpetuating a mentality of 'boys will be boys,' and that 'it's OK, it's a joke, just brush it off …' This young man likely has a mother, a sister perhaps, a girlfriend, a wife – who knows? I'm getting tired of making excuses and laughing it off. I for one am not gonna laugh it off any more."
The bronze statue, called Fearless Girl, was installed opposite the Wall Street charging bull statue in New York the day before International Women's Day by $2.5trillion asset manager State Street Global, to promote gender diversity in Wall Street, according to CNN.
Although Fearless Girl is part of a seemingly empowering campaign, it has been criticised as only "superficially charming" and a "PR stunt" with one writer noting that the company has only three women on its own 11-member board of directors, a total of just 28 per cent.
Fairfax Media