There are plenty, if not most, good and decent men out there who are respectful and treat not only women well but everyone around them. but they dont end up in the news or even being mentioned. They dont get talked about or even remembered.
Sure some men are terrible but IMO and experience, i wouldn’t blame it on their gender. Its more a personality thing
Sure, a majority of men are respectful. But when it’s a game of odds of being verbally berated or worse for declining some random guys advances I would sure as fuck not trust a random man coming up to me either.
I wonder if how bad they are at come ons is actually a factor. A normal guy approaching in a socially acceptable fashion actually gets some yes and eventually goes off the market temporarily or permanently whereas psycho joe presumably is always offending always failing.
But then you expect a terrible reaction from every guy. As you say, it’s a game of odds. I am sure that there are bad guys out there, but expecting every guy to be bad, or preparing for everyone to be bad, is just as discriminating as men expecting all women to be willing to date them.
It’s not expecting a terrible reaction from everyone, just acknowledging that there’s a slim chance of life-ending consequences. It’s not discriminatory against vehicles to avoid tailgating because of a one in ten thousand chance that they’ll brake too suddenly for you to react and you’ll crash, so it’s not reasonable to demand women to be happy putting themselves in a situation where they’ve got a comparable chance of getting stabbed by a nutter.
It’s by no means all men’s fault that there are nutters who’ll stab women for rejecting them, but they are real, and are much more common than women who’ll stab men for rejecting them (not least because of women being less likely to hit on men they don’t know in the first place). The problem makes the world worse for everyone, but denying it or saying we should pretend it’s not real because it would be sexist still leaves women with a disproportionate and quantifiable actual risk of death, which is a much worse consequence than having to only hit on women in environments they feel safe.
Its just often that you find what you expect and meeting strangers expecting or rather fearing that you’ll get stabbed may often lead to other social complications.
Normal situation awareness is very good to have and acknowledging that there are risks in any actions is the best approach to any interaction.
The question is how much weight you add to them. Tailgating is risky yes. So is driving, flying, traveling to foreign countries, changing career, investing money.
My point is not to ignore the risks, but to not let the fear dictate expectations. You are probably right about chances of a guy stabbing a woman are higher than a woman stabbing a man, due to rejection. But what are the chances of being stabbed altogether? People get rejected all the time. Most get sad. Some get angry. Some maybe very angry. But fearing for ones life because of it feels a bit overrated
The risks to driving, flying, etc. aren’t actively hunting you out. Nor are they trying to trick you into thinking they aren’t a risk. There’s a difference.
It’s like riding a motorcycle. Most people are reasonably careful, look before they change lanes, keep a decent following distance so they can react in time, aren’t looking at their phone, etc. But even when it’s a small minority of drivers that aren’t paying attention, you still have to treat everyone as potentially one of those, because one of those can fucking end you, and you can’t tell the difference until it’s too late.
People forget that nobody makes true crime podcasts about a guy who took rejection like a normal person.
That doesn’t make the crazy people not a problem, but obsessing on what you read online will give you a skewed view of what people in general are like.
Completely agree with you, I’ve met some amazing men before! The comic really drives home the fact though that the small amount of bad and violent men out there are why women have to always be at least a little on guard to protect ourselves when men approach us. And yes, no doubt there are bad and violent women out there too
Okay. The vast majority of men will not attack you for rejecting their advances. The news loves to cherry pick things that scare people and make them angry, because it increases viewership.
What’s the alternative? Men should never speak to women?
Oh shit mate, thanks for telling me that! Phew! I mean, I don’t watch the news, but my experience as a woman and all women I know is at least one extremely negative interaction with a man. Where we were legitimately in danger. But now I know it was all in my head, thanks!
The thesis of this comic is “women have reasons to be afraid of some men”. Responding to that with “not all men are bad” is a straw man, it’s responding to an argument that nobody actually made.
Are you being deliberately obtuse? The ‘not all men’ cry is the same as ‘all lives matter’. It’s deliberately ignoring the circumstances behind the phrase. Don’t be so silly.
It could be the clickbait title yes! But I feel there’s more to it than that. It’s also about who is more visible and who gets talked about the most as well as dis-respectfulness being a personality trade instead of a gender characteristic
Go talk to a woman, any woman. And believe what they tell you. Don’t explain to them that they’re just manipulated by the media. Listen to their actual personal experience. Then ask another woman. See if you find a pattern. It won’t be their tv viewing, I promise you that.
… I’m a woman. I’ve been raped, assaulted, groped, stalked, kerb-crawled, cat-called and intimidated. The majority of my female friends can tick off at least one of the above. As can their friends. And their mothers. And their sisters.
I am sure and I am trully sorry that you’ve been through it all! I’d be scared if I were you too. It doesn’t make it normal though.
If so many of your remediate network have been through the same, you must be living in a terrible place. The majority of females that I have discussed similar issues with have been based in either northern European countries or Mediterranean. What you describe would be extremes to mostly all the women that i have talked with
You’re missing the point that it isn’t living in a terrible place. It’s living in any place. It’s the normal, baseline experience of most women. The Mediterranean is one of the worst.
Women don’t talk to you about it because it’s normal to them.
We’re not females, mate, we’re women. And it’s not isolated to any country or socio-economic group.
These aren’t extremes. They’re the lived existence of most women. Like I said, that’s a list that most women can identify an instance of that they’ve experienced.
Your word choice and tone make me think that you aren’t a person any woman readily or candidly confides in.
Rape, assault, groping, what have you - that happens everywhere. It’s not just a bleak story of post-USSR landscapes and people being carted into trucks; it’s ordinary people. Pele with families, with white collar jobs. Suburbs and night clubs. Country roads and city alleys.
I’m not a broken shell of a person. I’m a woman in my late 30s who has experienced trauma at the hands of men I trusted, and from complete strangers. I’m a high income earner, I’m privileged. But every woman I know has experienced something on that list.
Listen to women. Wherever they are, whatever they look like.
Stop telling us. We don’t need to be told anything.
Well I’d hope these good people that you know would not be personalizing and taking away from the point.
One good person doesn’t undo another horrible person’s business. It is news because it’s about the victims in a situation. Let it be about them and not about some fragile guy feeling ‘personally attacked’ over what some other guy did. That’s feeding on someone else’s tragedy and making it about what it isn’t.
I am sorry if this sounds like I got offended or hurt by this. I personally am not involved in this at all. I’ve been in the same relationship for 15 years and not in ‘the game’.
I’m just discussing it on neutral grounds and out of interest.
What we haven’t even mentioned are the cultural differences between countries. Some places are more dangerous than others
Since you seem to be surprised people got offended or hurt, I will try to decode this interaction for you. Based on seeing essentially this discussion online over and over again.
I mean my take on this is the original post is essentially saying :
"Please be understanding of women turning you down in less than ideal ways (ie: Ghosting, etc.), they are afraid for their safety because they keep hearing stories of violence from men angry that women did not do what they wanted them to do. "
Then you essentially say :
“There are many good men too”. It’s also very easy to read into what you say “And we should be talking about how they don’t get talked about or remembered” even if you didn’t mean to say it that way
This is besides the point. It indicates that you either did not decode the original message right or lack empathy for the situation. I mean, it’s very likely the first, but the second is why people can get angry at a reaction like this. If you want to start a discussion on a different topic, why does it need to be in this thread?
What we haven’t even mentioned
There are a LOT of things we haven’t mentioned. I don’t understand why you feel the need to change the topic a second time in a thread asking for empathy.
Thanks for trying but I am afraid that I am indeed what you believe i am being misunderstood for.
We hear of fatal car crashes all the time but people still drive cars.
Its good to be carefull but it is dangerous to be scared.
Also, my point about local differences is not an attempt to change topics. I can often forget my carkeys in the car and go to sleep without locking my front door because it is a mostly safe country. Maybe some of the women being most vocal about this issue live in areas where men indeed are more dangerous than the average man.
Lastly, I am not trying to ask for sympathy. I am simply discussing the subject. I let people do what they feel is right for themselves while trying to explain why it does not sound logical to me.
There are plenty, if not most, good and decent men out there who are respectful and treat not only women well but everyone around them. but they dont end up in the news or even being mentioned. They dont get talked about or even remembered.
Sure some men are terrible but IMO and experience, i wouldn’t blame it on their gender. Its more a personality thing
Sure, a majority of men are respectful. But when it’s a game of odds of being verbally berated or worse for declining some random guys advances I would sure as fuck not trust a random man coming up to me either.
I wonder if how bad they are at come ons is actually a factor. A normal guy approaching in a socially acceptable fashion actually gets some yes and eventually goes off the market temporarily or permanently whereas psycho joe presumably is always offending always failing.
But then you expect a terrible reaction from every guy. As you say, it’s a game of odds. I am sure that there are bad guys out there, but expecting every guy to be bad, or preparing for everyone to be bad, is just as discriminating as men expecting all women to be willing to date them.
It’s not expecting a terrible reaction from everyone, just acknowledging that there’s a slim chance of life-ending consequences. It’s not discriminatory against vehicles to avoid tailgating because of a one in ten thousand chance that they’ll brake too suddenly for you to react and you’ll crash, so it’s not reasonable to demand women to be happy putting themselves in a situation where they’ve got a comparable chance of getting stabbed by a nutter.
It’s by no means all men’s fault that there are nutters who’ll stab women for rejecting them, but they are real, and are much more common than women who’ll stab men for rejecting them (not least because of women being less likely to hit on men they don’t know in the first place). The problem makes the world worse for everyone, but denying it or saying we should pretend it’s not real because it would be sexist still leaves women with a disproportionate and quantifiable actual risk of death, which is a much worse consequence than having to only hit on women in environments they feel safe.
“denying it or saying we should pretend it’s not real”
Good thing nobody here has said to do that.
There are a whole lot of people here telling women they are overreacting. How is that different?
I understand and agree to some point.
Its just often that you find what you expect and meeting strangers expecting or rather fearing that you’ll get stabbed may often lead to other social complications.
Normal situation awareness is very good to have and acknowledging that there are risks in any actions is the best approach to any interaction.
The question is how much weight you add to them. Tailgating is risky yes. So is driving, flying, traveling to foreign countries, changing career, investing money.
My point is not to ignore the risks, but to not let the fear dictate expectations. You are probably right about chances of a guy stabbing a woman are higher than a woman stabbing a man, due to rejection. But what are the chances of being stabbed altogether? People get rejected all the time. Most get sad. Some get angry. Some maybe very angry. But fearing for ones life because of it feels a bit overrated
The risks to driving, flying, etc. aren’t actively hunting you out. Nor are they trying to trick you into thinking they aren’t a risk. There’s a difference.
Maybe if men treated other men like they do women, they’d start getting more afraid of the other men.
Fuck no we’d be less afraid.
I think ill leave this discussion now
It’s like riding a motorcycle. Most people are reasonably careful, look before they change lanes, keep a decent following distance so they can react in time, aren’t looking at their phone, etc. But even when it’s a small minority of drivers that aren’t paying attention, you still have to treat everyone as potentially one of those, because one of those can fucking end you, and you can’t tell the difference until it’s too late.
This is a pretty strong analogy that sort of makes sense! Thanks!
People forget that nobody makes true crime podcasts about a guy who took rejection like a normal person.
That doesn’t make the crazy people not a problem, but obsessing on what you read online will give you a skewed view of what people in general are like.
Completely agree with you, I’ve met some amazing men before! The comic really drives home the fact though that the small amount of bad and violent men out there are why women have to always be at least a little on guard to protect ourselves when men approach us. And yes, no doubt there are bad and violent women out there too
That’s because not sexually assaulting someone isn’t something you get a medal for.
Ugh. That’s a long way of saying ‘not all men’. Fucking hell, guy.
Okay. The vast majority of men will not attack you for rejecting their advances. The news loves to cherry pick things that scare people and make them angry, because it increases viewership.
What’s the alternative? Men should never speak to women?
Oh shit mate, thanks for telling me that! Phew! I mean, I don’t watch the news, but my experience as a woman and all women I know is at least one extremely negative interaction with a man. Where we were legitimately in danger. But now I know it was all in my head, thanks!
I mean, yeah. Are you implying it is all men? Because that’s a super fucked up and sexist thing to believe.
The thesis of this comic is “women have reasons to be afraid of some men”. Responding to that with “not all men are bad” is a straw man, it’s responding to an argument that nobody actually made.
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Are you being deliberately obtuse? The ‘not all men’ cry is the same as ‘all lives matter’. It’s deliberately ignoring the circumstances behind the phrase. Don’t be so silly.
It could be the clickbait title yes! But I feel there’s more to it than that. It’s also about who is more visible and who gets talked about the most as well as dis-respectfulness being a personality trade instead of a gender characteristic
Go talk to a woman, any woman. And believe what they tell you. Don’t explain to them that they’re just manipulated by the media. Listen to their actual personal experience. Then ask another woman. See if you find a pattern. It won’t be their tv viewing, I promise you that.
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… I’m a woman. I’ve been raped, assaulted, groped, stalked, kerb-crawled, cat-called and intimidated. The majority of my female friends can tick off at least one of the above. As can their friends. And their mothers. And their sisters.
I am sure and I am trully sorry that you’ve been through it all! I’d be scared if I were you too. It doesn’t make it normal though.
If so many of your remediate network have been through the same, you must be living in a terrible place. The majority of females that I have discussed similar issues with have been based in either northern European countries or Mediterranean. What you describe would be extremes to mostly all the women that i have talked with
You’re missing the point that it isn’t living in a terrible place. It’s living in any place. It’s the normal, baseline experience of most women. The Mediterranean is one of the worst.
Women don’t talk to you about it because it’s normal to them.
We’re not females, mate, we’re women. And it’s not isolated to any country or socio-economic group.
These aren’t extremes. They’re the lived existence of most women. Like I said, that’s a list that most women can identify an instance of that they’ve experienced.
Your word choice and tone make me think that you aren’t a person any woman readily or candidly confides in.
Rape, assault, groping, what have you - that happens everywhere. It’s not just a bleak story of post-USSR landscapes and people being carted into trucks; it’s ordinary people. Pele with families, with white collar jobs. Suburbs and night clubs. Country roads and city alleys.
I’m not a broken shell of a person. I’m a woman in my late 30s who has experienced trauma at the hands of men I trusted, and from complete strangers. I’m a high income earner, I’m privileged. But every woman I know has experienced something on that list.
Listen to women. Wherever they are, whatever they look like. Stop telling us. We don’t need to be told anything.
I apologise for using the word female instead of woman. In my language they are the same word.
In regards to the rest I believe that we will never agree so ill just leave it at that.
Well I’d hope these good people that you know would not be personalizing and taking away from the point. One good person doesn’t undo another horrible person’s business. It is news because it’s about the victims in a situation. Let it be about them and not about some fragile guy feeling ‘personally attacked’ over what some other guy did. That’s feeding on someone else’s tragedy and making it about what it isn’t.
I am sorry if this sounds like I got offended or hurt by this. I personally am not involved in this at all. I’ve been in the same relationship for 15 years and not in ‘the game’.
I’m just discussing it on neutral grounds and out of interest.
What we haven’t even mentioned are the cultural differences between countries. Some places are more dangerous than others
Since you seem to be surprised people got offended or hurt, I will try to decode this interaction for you. Based on seeing essentially this discussion online over and over again.
I mean my take on this is the original post is essentially saying :
"Please be understanding of women turning you down in less than ideal ways (ie: Ghosting, etc.), they are afraid for their safety because they keep hearing stories of violence from men angry that women did not do what they wanted them to do. "
Then you essentially say :
“There are many good men too”. It’s also very easy to read into what you say “And we should be talking about how they don’t get talked about or remembered” even if you didn’t mean to say it that way
This is besides the point. It indicates that you either did not decode the original message right or lack empathy for the situation. I mean, it’s very likely the first, but the second is why people can get angry at a reaction like this. If you want to start a discussion on a different topic, why does it need to be in this thread?
There are a LOT of things we haven’t mentioned. I don’t understand why you feel the need to change the topic a second time in a thread asking for empathy.
Thanks for trying but I am afraid that I am indeed what you believe i am being misunderstood for.
We hear of fatal car crashes all the time but people still drive cars.
Its good to be carefull but it is dangerous to be scared.
Also, my point about local differences is not an attempt to change topics. I can often forget my carkeys in the car and go to sleep without locking my front door because it is a mostly safe country. Maybe some of the women being most vocal about this issue live in areas where men indeed are more dangerous than the average man.
Lastly, I am not trying to ask for sympathy. I am simply discussing the subject. I let people do what they feel is right for themselves while trying to explain why it does not sound logical to me.