I had a coupla different things I was tempted to blog about today. One was an update on my mental health. One was a reaction to something that's been going on for two days in the feminist blogosphere. Frankly, I know you people don't want to read about any of those things, but cut me a break. I can't overhear hilarious and inappropriate public conversations every day, no matter how hard I try.
So, instead, I would like to talk about a little sidestream to the feminist kerfluffle. (Which was about whether a certain [web?] comic promoted "rape culture" and about how hard it is for some men to understand that, for example, if a woman on public transportation is reading, listening to her iPod, or staring blankly out the window--in fact, if she is doing anything besides making repeated eye contact with you, smiling, and attempting to engage *you* in conversation--she doesn't want to talk to you *no matter how cute you think she is* and you should not even consider invading her space/consciousness and trying to pick her up. If it is not a clear social situation [and riding the bus is not a social situation] and the woman is not throwing out clear signals that she wants to socialize, don't attempt to make her socialize, *no matter how cute you think she is*. If the universe really wants her to be the mother of your children, the universe will arrange for you to meet again in a situation where she won't think you are a pushy, skeevy creeper and possible rapist.) So, uh, yeah, there was a lot of talk about boundaries and what makes women feel invaded upon or unsafe in public.
And what surprised me was a bunch of women saying that it bothered them if they were alone on an elevator and a man got on and spoke to them. For me, if I'm alone on an elevator and a guy boards, it makes me feel most safe/unthreatened if he does the little nod and a "good morning" or "hey" or whatever appropriate greeting, then turns towards the door and doesn't say another word. Similarly, if I'm walking down an empty street in one direction and a guy passes me walking the other way, a nod and a brief greeting as he goes by seems most non-threatening. It seems to be almost an etiquette thing, wherein the man, knowing he could be perceived as a danger, acknowledges me as a human being, shows his intention to be pleasant/civil, then leaves me the fuck alone.
It sorta reminds me of hiking where the unspoken rule of politeness seems to be that when you meet up with a person or people going in the opposite direction on the trail and someone needs to step aside, you always nod, smile, and/or say "hi" but don't engage in any other interaction. Oh, at most you might make some innocuous comment like, "Nice day, huh?" There seems to be some analogous awareness that, out in the woods, everyone makes the effort to *show* they don't mean to be perceived as any kind of threat.
So, yeah, I was surprised to hear some women say that even being briefly greeted when they're alone made them feel more, not less, threatened. So I was wondering what you all felt. If you are a woman, what, if any, behavior makes you feel most comfortable when you're alone in an isolated situation with a strange man? And, guys? Are you aware of being perceived as a potential threat when you're alone with a strange woman and, if so, what (if anything) do you do to mitigate that?
xoxo
4 comments:
There's a woman in my building quite clearly among the camp for whom any sort of male presence whatsoever (in a shared elevator, by the mailboxes, you name it) is perceived as a physical threat, and for whom any sort of motion, noise or glance in her direction, "hello", "hi" or otherwise, is received as an irresistible provocation to panic. You just can't help but feel sorry for her, but I will tell you that any inclination that I might have once had to be generous towards her phobias has evaporated completely. I'm not even sure, if she were to run screaming in my direction about an ongoing physical assault, that I would even believe her. She's clearly insane, and I can't accept any accusation of gender-biased societal oppression to explain the extreme to which she's taken her paranoia.
But, yeah, I do get why women have to walk the world in fear. There put four guys in a New Hampshire cruiser this week who walked into a woman's home and hacked her to death with a machete, so it's not like it even takes a parking garage or dimly lit nighttime park setting to introduce the danger.
I've always been fascinated by Camille Paglia's opinion that women have been sold a lie, that they can be safe and equal in public. Her observation was that in our human history, it's most often been only the threat of reprisal by a woman's male family members that would offer any modicum of protection to a woman at all, and even that mostly just in retrospect. To her, it's a woman's responsibility to maintain that vigilance and guard, and never to wind up alone in a dangerous setting with an unknown male. Not, I'm sure what most feminists want to hear, but it's one woman's opinion.
For my part, as a 6 foot plus male, I honestly can't imagine what it must be like, though I do have great sympathy for the predicament. As for when it's ok to try to engage a strange woman in public, just as with a coworker in the workplace, I always chuckle to recall that SNL skit with Tom Brady--it's ok if you're Tom Brady.
We have a public walking-biking-shove stroller-et al. path in my town, which I frequent. So do a good number of women. The usual protocol there is a small smile and a "hi" or similar greeting, *unless* the MOTOS is obviously occupied with pet-child-cell phone-iPod. Much the same seems to apply on local sidewalks, but note that these are not enclosed spaces. In enclosed spaces I try to behave civilly without crossing any boundaries.
It seems to me that the idea of women *needing* male protection flirts with a sexism of its own. But that's Camille all over.
Psh. You know how I feel about Tom Brady. If he started chatting me up on the T, I'd be all, "Go play with your supermodel, douche." :-)
(And Julie Lugo just made a stellar defensive play on my TV. That's about as likely as Tom Brady chatting me up!)
As for your crazy neighbor, PTSD is a bitch. One would think there would be some combination of therapy and medication that would allow her to not freak out at the mere presence of 49% of the population, because that's a sad way to go through life.
As for Camille Paglia, I find that a sad and defeatist attitude. I don't think that it is impossible to teach our sons not to rape women, not to nonconsensually touch other people. Oh, sure, there will always be a certain percentage of sociopathic mentally deranged individuals, but I don't think they make up the vast majority of perpetrators of sexual assault.
I guess I see it as the question of whose responsibility it is when that "certain percentage" finds themselves at a moment of opportunity against an insufficiently-defended person. It's obvious to fix blame on the literal criminal, and we civilized people all rightly do just that, but it's more subtle to find the line where a reasonable expectation of public safety crosses into an expression of lousy personal judgment. Or, put another way, there's an asterisk for things like walking through the Bronx in a Sox cap after a Twins victory while whistling a happy tune, and I think Camille's point is that we as a society, and women as a vulnerable class, have to decide for themselves where that line might be without always blaming everyone and everything else but themselves for the way the world, sometimes, simply, is.
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