In thinking that if you won't go out alone at night because you've got a vagina, you are actually a bit pathetic?

[solidgoldbrass]

Because, statistically, if you have a vagina, you are far more at risk of being murdered if you stay at home If your home has a man in it. Yet time and time again there's this 'Waa, waa, I need an armed escort or a male owner to protect me if I'm ever going to set a foot out of doors after dark. It's so unreasonable to expect me to use public transport or walk anywhere...'

Everyone should do a risk assessment based on their knowledge of the area and personal ability to defend themselves. No one s pathetic for wanting to be safe.

Recently there have been violent muggings in broad daylight in my local park. Until the perpetrator is caught I don't go there alone with my daughter. I actually think that my perception of personal risk is different now that I'm a mother. If anything happened to me that I could've prevented then it wouldn't only affect me would it? I am no longer reckless with myself.

I've lived in three major cities in Europe and I've always felt safest in the city rather than the suburbs.

I think that it would be sensible for self defense to be on the ciriculum of secondary schools for all children.

I live about a mile away from a road where a woman was punched in the face, had her boots, tights and underwear torn off, her attacker then stamped repeatedly on her face, ripped her dress entirely open and then dragged her facedown along the pavement by her ankles before leaving her for dead. She was found later by a passerby but died before the ambulance could reach her.

The person who did this was 6' 4" and she was 5' 1" and he had been reported to the police previously for a similar attack on a teenage girl who thankfully escaped and survived.

That's not going to happen to me at home (unless, God forbid, someone breaks in), so I'll take whatever precautions I see fit when and if I chose to go out at night (or in daylight) and I don't think you should be calling people pathetic for doing something that makes them feel safer, whatever that something may be.

I remember the recent Eammon Holmes thread, and his repeated comments that a girl who was raped didn't take a taxi and in his view she should have. I said there and I will say here, taking a taxi is no guarantee of being any safer than walking alone. I was driven past the place I wanted to go by a driver who ignored me shouting and banging on the partition to attract his attention and then was annoyed because when he did stop I wouldn't stay in the taxi and go back to the right place. Nothing happened to me but it scared me to feel so trapped and helpless.

If this is about the 'friend walking home at midnight' thread, I think the bigger concern was the badly lit country lane and the general exhaustion of the friend in question.

in a very cold blooded way, yes, you are right

a woman is way less likely to be attacked out by herself than she is by someone she knows

however, have a little mercy for the extent to which women have been socially conditioned to live in fear, and the calculation that some make that they don't want to be told they brought it on themselves by going out, should they be attacked

i know that it is unlikely, and that i should not be afraid, but i have already been attacked, once, over twenty years ago. after a looooot of hard work i am just now getting to the point where i can walk home at night throught my quiet neighbourhood from the train station 10 min away without having a fucking coronary

i can't tell you how angry i feel about all of it

in any case i don't judge anyone

Posts like the OP's that have no real thought or diplomacy applied to the writing of the post are really unnecessary and show a complete lack of respect to MNers who have had traumatic experiences

Totally agree with sparkle

bemy I am so very sorry to hear what happened to you. You are an incredibly brave lady x

OP I think it is time to hang your head on shame for writing such a stupid and pathetic thread - you obviously have no concept of the real world and how awful it can be. Crawl back into your silly little hole.

But the thing is, my husband is a lovely chap who almost definitely isn't going to attack or rape me.

And if I am in my car I am also highly unlikely to be attacked or raped.

And walking in the daytime when there are lots of people around makes it fairly unlikely that I will be attacked or raped.

And if I am walking at night with my enormous husband, I admit that there is a slightly higher possibility of being attacked or raped, but not quite so much as if I were alone.

Which only leaves me walking alone at night - the most likely scenario for being attacked and / or raped. A fairly small chance, I'll grant you, but one which I don't feel terribly pathetic for choosing to eliminate.

The sun shines out of my arse, so I can walk anywhere in the middle of the night, no matter how poorly lit. I am also physically strong enough to withstand being hit by a car. You whinging pissy weaklings who don't like walking on country roads with no pavements and no lights should all be more like me.

You always seem so angry and combative,SBG.
Surely,it is about assessing risk and doing what you feel comfortable with?
Ok,I agree about expecting an armed escort from a male.Although,I have never encountered that myself. But,I think it is wise to take sensible precautions when out on your own at night,yes. Why take the chance?
Oohh,look at me,here I am,walking through a dimly lit alley at 3 am! Whoah,I am fucking nails,I am! Arrrgh,look at her,in a bloody TAXI?? You PUSSY!!

Is that you on your way home,SGB?! (slow claps)

I suspect if fewer women took responsibility for their safety when out the statistics would be very different.

Why does it bother you so much what others perceive as risky? What does it really matter to you?

If you are under the illusion impression that you would be safe as houses walking home alone after dark then good for you, you do what you like.

Or in your world is a woman pathetic to have these concerns unless and until they are actually attacked?

Statistics? - Bollocks, I know where I am safe and where I feel at risk of being harmed and I will act accordingly thanks.

And your headline on this thread is vile, SGB.

Yes every man in every home is a wife beating nut job

YABVVVU Yes when anyone goes out at night especially late at night, they should take safety precautions so they are not at risk of harm. For example using well lit areas and not walking along deserted unlit spaces, getting a taxi if you are alone, or walking back with a group of people.

I think your OP is pathetic by the way

outofbody thats a bit foolish of you tbh, having a vagina has nothing to do with it, you have to assess risk and prevent yourself coming to harm, what the hell is wrong with that!

Nothing to do with feminism and all to do with preventing harm and injury, I want to be alive in one piece. Believe it or not there are some nasty people about, and you have to be cautious and not put yourself at undue risk whether you are male or female.

Wonder if that poor young man killed for no reason other then in the wrong place at the wrong time (and possible being the "wrong" colour) on Boxing day had a vagina?

Some times it is not very safe.

Oh and by the way I go out at night I do not sit in doors terrified but I do make sure I am aware of what iss going on around me, and have a phone with me.

I'm just terrified of the dark, makes me legs not work properly

if that makes me pathetic then so be it

not a nice op and not a good way to start a reasonable discussion

If I lived with a rapist then, yes, I would risk walking down that the back alley alone at night, but I don't! So I reckon I am safer at home.

If this is conected to the other thread, where most of the posters thought that the wife should be getting a lift home then i agree with you.

Where i live it is more dangerous for males than females. It annoys the hell out of me when the women i work with, who only have sons, say to me that they wouldn't let their DD's go out and about, the way that i do, because they are girls, but would be happy for their DS's to.

It is about risk assessment, though. There are areas of my city that you have to risk assess depending on all of the catergories in the equality act, not just gender.

I can totally understand why it would annoy you that others think that they can tell you, what to do and how you should feel, just make sure that you aren't doing the same to other women.

The OP is a man. Only a woman would understand.

Ripeberry- are you sure? SGB posts regulary on the feminist boards. I always thought SGB was female, by her posts.

Really the op is pathetic, there is nothing wrong with risk assesment and take precautions to prevent harm and injury. I would rather be safe than prove a feminist point!

There are women who are idiots as well Ripeberry!!!

OP. I see from your profile you are a lady and you are free to walze around at night where ever you fancy.

I'll look after myself and not take the risk if thats ok. I say that not as a woman but as a person. I encourage my 6 foot 2, buit like a (yummy) tank to not walk in certain places on his own.

Look, as a woman, facts are facts. I'm fairly strong, but in all honesty any half-way built boy or man over the age of fifteen or so is stronger, and bigger, and faster, and if I were out without my aforementioned pepper spray and taser, and one of them wanted to hurt me, he probably could.

Most men are not going to hurt women, or anyone else. But I think in a way it's always in the back of a woman's mind that it could happen, hence the caution. It is for me, at least.

It would be interesting if this thread were started with the purposes of discussing how we might empower women to feel safer, or what measures we could take to make sure all people are protected, and what we could do to make streets safer or just educate people to be less violent in the first place. That would make for a good discussion.

But I feel (and please correct me if I'm wrong) that the OP started it to sneer at all of us deluded fools, all of us "mundanes" in our hetero-monogamous relationships who are afraid of the big bad exciting world and are instead living at home with our knuckle dragging male partners/husbands who probably beat the piss out of us. That about right, SGB?

How disappointing.

YANBU - bloody annoys me. It also annoys me when people express dismay that my dds are walking home from after school activities alone in the DARK! After all it's early evening and everybody knows that as soon as dusk falls the streets are paved with rapists.

I see where you're coming from but disagree. I think the risk maybe small but the possible outcome is horrific.