Surely I am not the only woman who would chose the man, not the bear?

[Idpicktheman]

You know that, would you rather meet a man or a bear in the woods thing?

I would choose the man.

I've hiked in the Rockies where there are bears. If you come across a bear, you have surprised and startled it. All the stories I heard of people being attacked in the Rockies were of people who have surprised bears with their appearance. I blew a whistle every couple of minutes when I hiked to make sure a bear was not surprised by my appearance. Therefore I think if I met a bear in the woods, there is a good likelihood it would attack me.

I also walk in the woods a lot in the UK as I live in a semi-rural area. I regularly come across men and they either ignore me or say hello as they pass and carry on walking their dog/ cycling/ or mountain biking.

So whilst there is a chance a man would attack me, I think the probability is that they would not.

But whilst there is a chance the bear would amble off and leave me alone, the probability is that it would attack me.

So I would chose the man.

( I realise the point of this though experiment is to show that women think this through, because both can be dangerous to them, whereas men instantly say' well, I'd chose the woman obviously' because women are not a danger to them : but I have seen a lot of women instantly saying ' the bear!' but, being literalistic about the actual answer, in all honestly, the bear is more likely to attack you than the man.)

Exactly!

I struggle to believe that all of the women saying that they’d rather come into contact with a bear, are so comfortable going out to secluded areas alone at night where there are no bears.

If they’re not, then there’s a reason for it and that’s because they’re worried about their safety.

All my bear encounters have been in populated enough areas that the bears have not been surprised by my presence. If anything, they have stalked me, hoping I get careless with my food.

I did once. I left it unattended for about a minute while I was moving some things around. The bear stole the contents of my icebox while I watched it eat. It even knew how to open jars. When it was done with its meal, it walked away.

An encounter with a man a who stalks me in the woods is not going to go as well.

If I were out walking in the wild woods where there was even the faintest prospect of enountering a bear, I'd have a gun with me.
😎

How many of you walk around alone at night time? If you don't, why not?

Imagine having a 24-hour period with no men at all. What would you do?

Indeed, it's a lamentable reality that women find themselves confined by an unwritten curfew imposed not by legal decree, but rather by the pervasive threat of male aggression.

The simple freedom to navigate public spaces without fear should be an inherent human entitlement, yet it remains tragically elusive for many.

But saying that option A is more dangerous than option B doesn't mean option B isn't dangerous. Obviously men are a threat to women. No-one has said that the only thing to worry about in life is bears! If I say I'd rather lose an arm than a leg, it doesn't mean I'm cool with losing my arm.

But women aren’t saying that. They are making a judgement about which is less risk. Not no risk.

I agree with all of this.

It’s one of the reasons I get so angry with people who think being a woman is a social construct, and not related to biology. ( as my ex male boss did).

Women are at risk from men because straight men like having sex with women.Men are bigger and stronger than women and so can force sex on women. Both these things, straight men like sex with women and are physically able to force sex, are rooted in the biological bodies of women and men. There is no getting away from that.
We can try to create cultures that discourage or permit men to sexually attack women, but all that is doing is trying to influence that biological root. It can’t change it. It can’t eliminate it.

And, as this poster points out so well, the fact that straight men want sex with women and can force it on women, affects how all of us women experience the world and limit and organise our lives.

@Lwrenn, Yellowstone is a drama based on a rancher family (and their cowboys) who live on Yellowstone Ranch in Montana. It's a great show (On Paramount+ and maybe some other streaming platforms), very violent in parts but strangely compelling with gorgeous scenery and a fairly good script. Worth watching I'd say but not for the faint of heart.

Oh and I'd say man without a doubt but would rather not encounter either tbh.

Yes me too. Sometimes I am feel like I am living in some sort of alternate universe when on MN (and sometimes SM in general). There's a whole set of other women living in another universe where 95% of men are predators. That is so far from my experience I struggle to get my head around it.

That can't be right. Only people who have no idea about bear attacks and what a bear can do to you would think that. Bears literally rip people into pieces and the attacks can last a,long time and when they start throwing you around and ripping you into pieces they generally don't stop until they are sure you are dead. Bear attacks are fucking grim.

I have never been sexually assaulted.

I'll just leave this here:

https://www.mirror.co.uk/tv/tv-news/horrifying-death-couple-eaten-alive-30886184.amp

And this :

https://music.amazon.co.uk/podcasts/226b18ec-31b0-49c2-8ab0-55021a8f025b/episodes/fa8314af-4e9f-4b23-aee7-43feeb15b608/real-survival-stories-grizzly-bear-attack-ambushed-in-the-rockies?ref=dmshh_IuJC38K9MY8c7yiPWFSWDrgUt

I thought the point was that women had to think about it first and consider the risks from each, whereas men would unhesitatingly choose the woman rather than the bear.

Thank you so much! I appreciate that! I will give it a whirl! X

I love the idea that women can be raped, come forward, wait for 2-5yrs and go to court without being able to have any therapy at all because it might be used against her and still watch the man/men get off scott free, yet you think me telling PC plod a man is standing in the woods is going to do anything?

What do you think, I should approach him and drop a pin for the location, run back to the car drive to the police and say "a man is standing dressed in black in the woods and my dog doesn't like him". Yes, to women it makes perfect sense it doesn't feel safe, the law and priorities in that police station will say different.

Why does this man think this is acceptable?

Yes, you are saying I should change where I walk, which I have said I have done and still there are men in these other places - 10 miles a day every day takes me to a wide range of places. At least once a week a man is in a public place hiding/lurking/acting weirdly. It is not WOMENS FAULT.

Well aren't you the lucky one.

None of those things sound worse than being ripped to pieces by a bear.

It wouldn't matter that the bear did none of those things. You'd be dead after being mauled and thrown around for a period of time until you were literally in pieces and the bear was sure you were dead.

I do appreciate and agree that most men are ok, but it's not hard to see why women have concerns about the ones they don't know when 1 in 10 men in this recent study of nearly 2000 men admit to having committed sexual offences against children

www.humanrights.unsw.edu.au/sites/default/files/documents/Identifying%20and%20understanding%20child%20sexual%20offending%20behaviour%20and%20attitudes%20among%20Australian%20men.pdf

When 1 in 5 women report having been sexually assaulted during their life.

When almost every woman you speak to can recount a story about the first time as a child wearing their school uniform they were hit on, flashed or groped by an adult male.

This thought experiment isn't actually asking you to decide on whether you want to be attacked by a bear or a man, it's proving the point that what should be a very very simple decision, because of course being alone with a man should be safer than being alone with a bear, actually provokes a reaction where we do a mental pros and cons list of each scenario.

How fucked up is it that women are questioning whether they'd rather be torn apart quickly by a bear or raped and murdered by a man, when asked the simple question 'would you rather be alone in the woods with a man or a bear?'

Lol koalas now sound just like the men we are all avoiding in the middle of the woods scenario.

But the point isn't that you will definitely be attacked by either and are therefore choosing which way to die, it's about assessing the risk of which is safer and least likely to harm you.

Statistically you are much more likely to be attacked and/or killed by a man rather than a bear. But stats are stats and doesn't mean that in every situation you will be safer with the bear, or indeed the man.

There was an additional video where a grown man tried to tell wome they were privileged to even think the vear would be the better choice. Because his mother had been attacked by a bear and worte a book.

He tried to use his mums horrific experience to make women change their opinion. Except it turned out that his mum also wrote a reddit post about it despite being mauled by a bear and having horrific injuries, she still said she was more distrustful of humans, than bears. So his point fell flat.

I appreciate people saying 'the bear will kill you. I would rather be raped and alive than dead', if man is walking through the woods and comes across a woman and rapes her, theres a good chance he would also kill her. So it's not 'would you rather be killed by a bear or raped by a man'.

If you read the comments on those videos, it's shows the thought experiment. Women saying things like 'no one will ask me what I was wearing if a bear attacks me', 'no one will say I wanted the bear to attack me and changed my mind after', 'People won't call me a liar and tell me I am ruining the bears life', 'theres zero chance the bear will film its attack and then share with all its friends so they can all use it as a wank bank'

These are all experiences that women have over and over again with men.

The fact that men get defensive and tell women they are making the wrong choice and get all hurt by it, rather than reading those comments and really realise what its like for women is a big part of the though experiment.

Men's feeling being hurt, to them, is more important about looking at the reasons women are saying what they are saying.

The point is that you need to think about it.

There are men that understand why the answer is bear and there are men that are the reason the answer is bear.

How many of those young men you mention were assaulted after dark by bears?

The other poster was right in questioning why you wouldn’t report someone potentially stalking you in a forest, or disguising themselves along your regular route. If true, this is very worrying behaviour and a disaster waiting to happen and you absolutely should report it.

I don’t believe that you encounter men acting suspiciously this frequently btw, but you are of course free to feel that way. But if you are truly worried then report it instead of complaining about it online.