After muddling through twenty years of my life without having to endure one of the most humiliating experiences a woman can face, I became confident it would never happen to me.

But last week as I was walking home from work, four or five college boys in a white car ruined my lucky streak — I have finally been catcalled.

So what’s the big deal? Isn’t that supposed to make me feel attractive?

I mean, what better compliment could a gentleman pay me than by whistling at me out of an open car window and slowing down to lean out and make crude remarks that should never, ever be uttered unless you are itching for someone to slap you with a sexual harassment suit?

I can think of plenty.

I’ve been told boys only catcall women they think are hot, although I’d have to give these boys the benefit of the doubt as to their perception of my good looks — they began whistling before they even saw my face.

Way to jump the gun, boys. A piece of advice: Next time, wait until you’ve made sure the woman you’ve made the target of your “affections” is actually as attractive as her behind. I’m sure you all got an unpleasant surprise the second I looked back.

Regardless of the role beauty plays in boys’ urges to catcall, I don’t feel any more attractive than usual.

Actually, I feel lousy. Part of it could be the fact that perhaps I should have expected this sort of behavior in my neck of the woods — I live deep in frat country, home of boys who, for the most part, wouldn’t touch feminism with a 10-foot pole.

Part of it could also be the fact that I did absolutely nothing to provoke this sort of behavior from them.

I was wearing nothing out of the ordinary, and any part of my body that could be seen as sexual was well hidden from view, unless they all had hand fetishes. I highly doubt that, though, since I clearly heard one of the boys yell, “Lift up your shirt!”

But what really got to me was that those boys didn’t seem to care who they were yelling at — they yelled simply because they could do it and get away with it.

I have not once heard a boy reprimanded for reducing a woman down to a walking pair of breasts with a nice ass and then yelling lewd comments at her about it.

All catcalling is good for is turning women into objects whose sole purpose is to gratify lusts and desires, and no one seems to care when that happens.

I will say, however, that catcalling doesn’t seem to be a widespread epidemic on our campus. For that, I’m thankful. But the fact remains that sexually objectifying women is acceptable in our society — our tolerance of this attitude skews the way men view women and even the way we view ourselves.

An article by Meredith Tax (“Woman and Her Mind: The Story of an Everyday Life,” 1970) sums up well the reality behind catcalling and its effects on women. “What catcallers do is impinge on her. They will demand that her thoughts be focused on them. They will use her body with their eyes. They will evaluate her market price. They will comment on her defects, or compare them to those of other passers-by. They will make her a participant in their fantasies without asking if she is willing. They will make her feel ridiculous, or grotesquely sexual or hideously ugly. Above all, they will make her feel like a thing.”

And that’s exactly how I felt. I don’t care what those boys’ intentions were — I was dehumanized that day, forced to look at my everyday vulnerability to acts like this simply because I am a female.

I don’t exactly appreciate it that I need to be alert at all times when walking or running by myself, especially late at night, because something much worse than a stolen wallet could happen to me.

It angers me that even when I wear clothes that modestly cover my body, others can still make me feel like I’m naked in front of them and it’s my fault they’re looking.

There are many ways men can show women proper respect while letting them know they think they’re “all that.” How about starting by smiling and saying hello?

If you can’t take the time to treat her like a person and talk to her, she won’t take the time to care what you say at all.

Hey boys, next time you’re driving past me, if you still feel the urge to shout maybe it should be something halfway appreciative like, “Hey baby, I heard your GPA is really high. Wanna study sometime?”