I’m a Celebrity star Maria Thattil hits back after being catcalled by a group of men: “Doesn’t make me feel safe”

I’m a Celebrity… Get me out of here! star Maria Thattil has publicly hit back at a group of men who catcalled her in a Melbourne carpark.

The former Miss Universe Australia took to Instagram to reveal she was “howled at” by the men on Thursday afternoon.

“I just parked my car and I was nervous to park my car because there were three guys in the carpark, it was kind of isolated,” Maria revealed in a video, where she appeared visibly shaken by the incident.

“I just parked my car anyway and I’m like ‘I’ll walk back to my building’ and straight away the catcalling [started], ‘Why you so fine?’, howling at me like I’m a dog.

“I literally just turned around and I’m like, ‘I just want to let you know I don’t appreciate being catcalled because it literally doesn’t make me feel safe’.”

The 29-year-old said she was pleasantly surprised by how receptive the men were.

“You know what? They actually apologised. They were like ‘you know what, no, actually we’re sorry’,” Thattil said.

Later, Maria shared another clip where she told her 237,000 Instagram followers that while she was relieved the group said sorry, she wasn’t “going to applaud mediocre basic behaviour”.

“I just think that we see enough, we hear enough. Women talk about it enough now that I think you have enough access to information to know cat calling isn’t f—ing cool and it makes people feel unsafe, so don’t do it,” she said.

“It shouldn’t take someone verbalising their discomfort for people in this day and age to known catcalling is a form of street hassrassment that isn’t cool.”

Maria, who appeared on the 2022 season of I’m a Celebrity, said catcalling shouldn’t be as “normalised” as it is, and pleaded with people to “think twice before harassing strangers”.

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Alana Mazzoni is a Senior Digital Content Producer at Now To Love, writing about all things pop culture, reality TV and beauty.