Just turned around and walked out of friends house. May have over reacted!

[SafeMouse]

Me (5'0 female) has a good friend (6'2 male). Every few weeks I go to his house for a few drinks and a catch up. This has been going on since 2019. We bubbled together during lockdown as we are both in single households.

Every summer I walk down to his. Its across the otherside of town about a 25 min walk. Part of the way is through a bit of a badly lit seedy area. When it starts to get dark I get an uber. Have for 5 years.
EVERY single bloody year when I start getting ubers I get 'lazy' jokes and teasing. I have patiently explained why I'm not comfortable walking in the dark. I have explained it in the context of Sarah Everard. I have made light of it. I have got annoyed. I've snapped. I've even had the uber drop me off a street away so he doesn't see.

Got to his tonight and get the 'haha, I saw the uber, feeling lazy today are we'?
I put my coat back on and walked out.
I'm now sitting in the pub at the end of his road wondering whether
A) go back and explain again for the 50th time why I don't walk in dodgy areas in the dark
B) order an uber and go back home.

I'm a little bit thinking I've overreacted but it's been the same joke for 5 sodding years with obviously no attempt to understand.

My DF would be over 100 if he was alive, and he knew. He was a truck driver and things were obviously very different over 60 years ago technology wise. If he came across a car broken down he’d pull over and offer his help as he was very handy with cars. He regarded it as part of the unwritten rules of the road and his profession. Bit old school.

Until the day came when he stopped and it was a woman driver who was obviously terrified that he had stopped and approached her. Now DF wasn’t a big man at all, 5’8” and 10 stone and very mild mannered so he’d never considered that he might be seen as threatening. He was horrified that he had inadvertently frightened someone, particularly a lone woman. He didn’t stop for anyone after that, he said the look on the woman’s face was something he’d never seen before and he didn’t want to frighten someone else like that ever again.

if an old fashioned bloke got it 60 years ago there’s no excuse these days.

Did he apologise?

I think he thinks this is your 'inside joke' as friends. Have you tried explaining why it's not funny.

No though I’d be more offended that he wasn’t picking me up and worried for me. If he’s so energetic why doesn’t he walk you there and back - is he not manly and protective enough of the women in his life ?

if have left too and given him a speech about not caring for his friends.

I must watch too many romantic movies because the fact you’re such good friends and he’s now upset and that you’re tiny and he’s very tall is the basis of all the cliches that would make a great romance movie. Oh and he’s also wealthy.

I want this to have a happy ending where he realises how insensitive and uncaring he’s been and you make up passionately. You then solve the problem by moving into his more expensive home with wine cellar.

the end

Saw a post tonight from a guy where a girl asked a guy about bad dates and he said (Am paraphrasing!) ‘I don’t mind so much I get to know what doesn’t suit me in terms of dating, at least I get a night out or some food or drink, what’s the worst that can happen?’ and she said ‘ I could be raped or murdered’

Yes, I've seen that quoted a fair few times.

You know, @stayathomer, I'm of a generation in which this was NEVER spoken aloud. Not even amongst women - it was all oblique warnings about bad men doing something to you. Then, as 'consciousness raising' seeped into female awareness, we might quietly mention specific dangers or fears when in female company. It's not surprising some men haven't thought about it: nobody said anything to them!

The pace of change often seems agonisingly slow to me (not helped by the fact that it has to be almost entirely driven by women, against obdurate resistance) but this change is happening now! The realities of 'bad men' and the exact 'somethings' women fear are now firmly in conversation, in the media, in the arts. Roll on the day when all the 'not bad' men truly get it and take some responsibility 🙂

YANBU. Quite apart from anything else, he sounds like a bore.

It is good you finally stood up to him. The jokes are doubly disempowering and quite disgusting. It isn’t gentle ribbing at all. He sounds incredibly immature and unable to put himself in women’s shoes. Shame on him for being so wilfully ignorant all this time. I agree with someone else, who said on this rare occasion it would be beneficial to show him the thread.

He’s sat at home and you’ve travelled to him for the past few years so surely it’s him who should be feeling lazy?
personally I’d go home and find new friends. He doesn’t deserve your time if you feel like you have to lie so he doesn’t make you feel uncomfortable x

I'm glad he wanted to talk Op, you feel safe being in his house drinking alone with him so he's not a bad guy. Explain why it's different for women and hopefully he'll take it onboard and be a better friend in future

I’m getting frustrated with all the posters saying “you need to explain it to him”, as if the OP never thought of that. She tells us in her very first post that she has tried to explain it a dozen different ways, so if he doesn’t get it by now, he’s either thick or a goady prick.

OP, I just want to point out that this supposed “friend” sees your safety as so unimportant that he never thinks to come to you or see you home. Not only that, but he insults you for protecting yourself! A true friend would be glad you’re safe, not looking to wind you up about it.

Sorry, but I don't think this is true.

The idea that a woman might need to be walked home safely at the end of an evening (rather than walk home alone) is not a new one in the slightest. Men have always known what women fear - in large part because they are the ones perpetrating the actions that we fear.

When men have daughters and make those (horrible patriarchal) jokes about policing who she dates when she grows up, it's because they know full well what teenage boys and men are capable of.

The "man vs bear" thing a few months ago came out of a video where a man was asked whether he'd rather his daughter was in the woods with a man or a bear. That man knew the danger too - he didn't instantly say, "The man of course, what could go wrong?" The whole point of that thought experiment was that even men realised that both options potentially posed a serious danger.

They are not naive and ignorant in this, and pretending that they are actually gives them a free pass they do not deserve.

Fuck explaining it to him. He knows already, he just thinks it's unimportant.

👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻

To give another example - the recent clip of Saoirse Ronan on the chat show with Eddie Redmayne etc.

When she said, "That's what girls have to think about all the time", the men weren't confused. They didn't ask her to explain what she was talking about, because they knew exactly what she meant. They were embarassed at having their joke put under the lens of women's lived experience, but that's not the same as being ignorant.

Men know

Show him this...

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cp8x266myzyo

I had a conversation with my DH about it once when we were watching something and they mentioned the keys through the fingers "trick". He said to me something along the lines of "who does that??" and was really shocked when I said that I used to do it every day, walking home from work in the dark. Was shocked that I'd take a taxi from outside one train station further away from home, than take the train to my closest station and walk the rest of the way home.

Most men are totally oblivious to the fear we are made to feel when we are out alone.

I took it that they were stunned into silence by the notion that women have to think like it, but that is a very good point also.

My DH (6'4") does the same. He understands that a women may feel intimidated or scared by having him walking behind her so will always cross the road.

And OP, no you most certainly didn't overreact. Your friend has had enough time and warnings now to know that he needs to either educate himself or at least understand your views. And he needs to accept your views on this subject, end of. No arguing or 'yes, but' conversations, just accept it and apologise for being a bit of a dick.

So he gaslight you. What a surprise. A misunderstanding, what bullshit. You explained 50 times before and he can see it's dark outside. As others have said he doesn't ensure you get home safely, he checks afterwards that nothing happened, that's not the same thing. He's minimising. He might stop with the insults going forward, but he won't change his way of thinking or his beliefs, at best he'll just keep quiet about them in future.

Someone posted surely Uber is safe. Who drives Ubers/taxis/minicabs? People. Ordinary people. They're not safety/security checked. Even if they were, that just means they haven't come to police attention yet, it doesn't mean they haven't or never would in future do anything untoward. Every time you pay for such transport you're getting into a stranger's car and hoping for the best. Bottom line is you can't guarantee your safety anywhere, because people (mostly men) are the danger and they're everywhere. There's no guaranteed safe option, just the least risky one.

If he was a good friend he would see your concerns and walk to meet you or go to you.

Totally unacceptable for a man to speak to a women like that! Make sure you get your finances in order and LTB he'll never change and you're worth more than that. Good luck

He's lazy for not being a gentleman and walking you back then! But even without the obvious safety concerns, he shouldn't be trying to make you feel guilty for taking an uber if you wanted to.. do we need to justify our reasons?
I'm surprised how ignorant he is appearing on this matter, even if he is trying to present it in a jokey way.

Well done OP.
Let this be a teaching moment for him and a chance for you to reframe the friendship.
Stop going to his.
At the very very least it should be 50/50 but he owes you many trips, so let that be the situation going forward.

Do the www.freedomprogramme.co.uk so that you learn to doubt yourself less.

He is being a complete d**k.