Is this a feminist issue?

[allhailtheaubergine]

Due to a mix-up with parking instructions, I ended up walking about a kilometre along a mostly deserted city beach at dusk last week.

I noticed a man on the beach between me and my exit and immediately felt nervous.

This is an illogical reaction.

I have no personal experience that could cause me to be nervous of men. Quite the opposite.
The vast, massive majority of men are decent people.

There is no way he felt nervous of me. We are just two people on a beach, so why did I feel nervous of him? I would not have felt nervous of a woman. In fact I would have felt reassured not to be alone.

I am trying to decide - is it because I have been brainwashed to fear men on some level? Or is it because many men are capable of causing harm to women in a way that women are not? Is it because I am a scardeypuss who needs to get a grip?

Really? good grief! I think my mum and her nervousness probably made me all the more reckless in my teens. I used to sleep in my car in a carpark when I'd had a drink and couldn't drive home.

Oops, and sorry about the faulty link, and thanks to the poster who put up the proper one.

I'm not sure what my reaction is TBH.
Factually thought, young males are at greater risk of violence in public places than women, I believe so I guess your reaction was illogical coming form that POV?

However, I think it was an entirely natural reaction for self preservation and an instinctive and primal one.

To address the fact that women are objects of male violence on large scale - yes, they are. But in the vast majority of cases these women are attacked by men they know so it is not attack from a stranger.
Statistically, the home is the most dangerous place for women and children when it comes to violence.

So, in essence, yes I guess your reaction was illogical but also perfectly natural.

Gosh. Just read the Schroedinger's Rapist thing. Found it utterly depressing.

It reminded me of the time that my younger brother and I were walking through a busy town centre and a young woman tripped and fell just in front of us. I immediately went to help her, and my brother started to and then stopped himself. This surprised me as he is a very thoughtful and kind person. I asked him why he held back, and he pointed out that for a young woman sprawled on the pavement, having a 6'4, pierced yob in a band t-shirt and a shaven head looming over her is not remotely reassuring. Not only did he not want to frighten her, but from his own point of view he didn't want any misunderstandings, and helping a woman up from a pavement is a physical thing best done by another woman not a man.

Personally, I don't feel nervous about men I don't know being near me in a deserted public space because I'm scared I might be raped. I'm actually far more fearful about being mugged, as that is something that has actually happened to quite a number of people I know, male and female.

The only woman I know in RL who has been raped was attacked in a domestic space by a friend of her family.
(That's not to say there aren't other women who have experienced rape/sexual assault in some form among my RL friends and acquaintances, but they haven't told me about it).

Even so, although our fears are probably hyped up to a large extent by the media (which gives the impression rape and violent crimes perpetrated by strangers are far more common than they are....*) it's perfectly understandable that we still feel them.

*although under-reporting of both may well skew this assumption.

Yes, HC.

that link didn't work are you disagreeing with my point/agreeing ?

The thing is, though...why are so many women so keen to spend so much energy trying to educate men? Why is it our responsibility to stop men threatening us? Isn't that what we pay schools and police for? But I like it as description of how this feels.

The link was put up again properly by beachcomber.

I'm not sure what your point was - that it's sad that blokes are sometimes feared when their intention is benign? To which my reply would be "yes, but to be expected in the larger context of a patriarchal society and VAW" (ie. patriarchy hurts men too). Whether you constitute that reply as agreeing or disagreeing I don't know.

I remember chatting to a guy who told me how he and his mate came out of a house after a party, just behind a woman walking alone. They were walking closely behind her, and after a few minutes, she suddenly ran like fuck. And he was all hurty feelings as he'd intended her no harm and was just minding his own business, going home. But she wasn't a mind-reader. And had their intentions been ugly, a lot of people would have said to her "but what were you doing walking alone at night etc etc".

my point was that its gonna be quite hard as a mother to know my son will have to deal with that sota stuff all of his life like I said because he's big & male,

like either way can't win, I can understand people are anxious, but cuase a bad apple ruins it for everybody he's gonna be tarred with the same brush for the rest of his life.

I think that's a bit dramatic. If the worst is that a man isn't automatically trusted by every strange woman he meets, it's not so very bad.

I'm not sure why you're playing the mother of a son card - so am I.

I think that's a bit dramatic. If the worst is that a man isn't automatically trusted by every strange woman he meets, it's not so very bad.

I'm not sure why you're playing the mother of a son card - so am I.

what a disgusting thing to say I'm only making a point someone else made this point further up the thread but everyone has pounced on this, I'm onlt making the same point.

That reminds me of something that happened to me recently which scared the bejaysus out of me. I had stopped my car to look at the map and had my hazards on, and suddenly the passenger door opened, I looked up and screamed - pure instinct and got ready to pull away dragging the bloke with me if necessary and injuring him. He looked slightly panicked, waved his arms shouting "sorry, sorry, your music was too loud to hear me", I turned the music down, and he explained that he'd seen my hazards and had come to see if I had broken down and needed help. I was v. apologetic, but afterwards (after I'd stopped shaking for about 20 minutes) I thought, FFS, I had no need to apologise, wtf was this wanker doing opening my car door anyway, so what if my music was too loud, why didn't he just wait outside until I lifted my head up when he could have signalled to me in a non-threatening way, or if he didn't want to wait, just fuck off and leave me alone? In a context where women get car-jacked, opening the car doors of a lone woman driver, is fucking stupid and nearly got him injured - I was seriously about to put the car in gear and push down on the accelerator, because I thought my life might be in danger and would prefer to take preventive action to save it and ask questions later.

HaughtyChuckle, the best thing you can do, is bring yoru DS up to respect women and make him aware of the fact that he is going to be an object of fear to them because of the prevalence of violence against us, but that he shouldn't take it personally. If you do your job right, he won't have a problem with the fact that lots of strange women will fear him, he'll understand why that is.

Disgusting is also a bit dramatic .

That must've been frightening, Hex.

I said to this guy who was offended by the woman running that he could've reduced her anxiety by slowing down or pausing to let her get ahead, or even crossing the road. Those would've been tiny things for him but would've reassured her somewhat. But it never even occurred to him, of course, that she'd be worried until she legged it.

As HerBeX said, what a young man ought to grow up knowing is that women are going to be cautious about being approached by men in public places, and there's good reason for that. Public but lonely places, like roadsides, most of all (not so much a crowded shopping centre, but allhailtheaubergine's brother was right, and anyway, he knew his sister was able to help). A man who has genuine good intentions will know this and keep his distance, and not be offended if a woman does the same.

I've got to wonder if the man in HerBeX's story would have opened the car door if the driver had been another man. I kind of doubt it.

Absolutely TT. I suspect another man might have decked him actually.

Disgusting is also a bit dramatic hmm.

what you said was low and disgusting and blatantly targeting me when another person had made this point.

Herbex what you say is right, but its seems all a bit damned if you do damned if you don't. I' dont want to be that parent that puts all the sins of other men on his shoulders IYSWIM i've seen the products of that all to often.

I don't mean approaching I mean just being there and people crossing the road etc

Teaching him that women will be scared of him sometimes because of the context of their lives HC, isn't dumping all the sins of the world on him.

It's just giving him the insight he needs to be a decent man.

Its a fine line to tread though I've seen it done wrong too many times and has probably jaded my view.

I was talking with you, not someone else. I was only targetting you in as much as I was replying to you, after all you were asking me what I meant by my response further up thread.

I don't think it's a particularly fine line tbh. I don't really know what you mean by that.

If you make it clear that analysing something on a group basis is different from blaming every individual within that group, you're not going to confuse anyone. You're just helping them learn to think. (Something our education system conspicuously seems to have failed to do in the case of a large number of people...) Obviously you have to do it in an age-appropriate way, but the line between making a child feel guilty for being white/ heterosexual/ male/ able-bodied/ young/ middle class/ western etc. and simply giving them some empathy and insight, isn't at all fine unless you're a complete loon. You've obviously known some loons in your time.