I'd wager that half or more of the women here have been sexually assualted in a work or work-related situation. Most women aren't aware of how prevalent sexual violence against women is; and of course most men are absolutely clueless. When you wake up to the reality that there really is, de facto, a "war against women" in western, liberal societies and that the plight of women in the rest of the world is even worse...well, it's a reality that makes you want to take a gun and shoot yourself because it's almost too ugly to stand.

Surely the figures are not that high, kmellis? I'm certainly not one to belittle or defend any degree of violence against women in any way, but I am fairly confident the figures are nothing like 50%.

Of course, I've been wrong before, but some evidence would go a long way to convincing me.

What I'm also appalled at is the idea that people who are sexually harrassed at conventions have no recourse other than a civil suit. I can think of several anime conventions I've been at where people have acted inappropriately (but have not actually raped anyone) and the only recourse has been for people to whisper about and warn other people about it. NYC-based comics journalist (and former DC Comics editor) Heidi McDonald wrote about that in length:

There are certainly some creepy leches in comics. There's a fellow who has a high profile project to his credit. When he's sober he's a little odd. When he's drunk he turns into someone so grabby and obnoxious that I won't be around him when there's any alcohol around. Most of the women I know feel the same way about him, and men I know have ejected him from parties because of his bad behavior. Of course, I won't post his name here, but any lady who would like a warning is free to approach me at a con and I'll tell you who to stay away from.

I've also seen comic book groupies throwing themselves at comic book stars, with wanted groping the result. If people want to do that, it's their own business, but if it creates an atmosphere that I think is unsafe, I leave. That's the way it is when you're a girl or a woman -- sometimes you have to retreat to the higher ground.

I'd venture way more than half, kmellis. Once the subject comes up in a group of women, almost every one of them has a story to tell. And the ones who don't probably have a story too hard to tell.

Oh sure, I'd bet at least 50% of the women of MeCha have been sexually harrassed at work or in a work-related context -- I certainly have. I've also been sexually assaulted; unfortunately, I'm positive I'm not the only one here in that category, either.

I wish that someone would publish this scumbag's name already. If this guy isn't going to be facing criminal charges he should at least face mob justice at the hands of pissed off female comic book fans.

Well there is that whole "Innocent until proven guilty" thing we have here in the States... And since there isn't going to be a criminal trial, who knows when that'll be?

A few years back at a company sales conference at a country club outside of Boston a bunch of us were hanging out at the bar one evening. A certain sales person and I often hung out together through these things as we were both taken and being together tended to minimize being hit on by folks with a few drinks who were a long way from home.

Except this time. A guy from our Greek office would not leave my friend alone. At about 11:30 my friend said good night. After about 15 minutes she called me on my cell. She had only left because of the guy pestering her wanted to come back and join the party. I told he had left right after she had left and it was clear to come back.

After about two minutes she called again. She had been about to come back down but when she opened the door the dude was still in her hallway. I went immediately to her floor walked past him to her door and stopped, then I walked back and stood very close to him and said "goodnight". He left via the stairs.

Sadly this behavior is not that odd for things like conferences, conventions and vacation spots. Also, while it is apples and oranges I find women often much more aggressive in these situations. Some people just feel the rules don't apply away from home.

I really, really don't want to get involved here, because this is Metachat. So I'll say one thing, and then slink away:

What jrossi said.

"...but I am fairly confident the figures are nothing like 50%."

Maybe, maybe not. If it's not half, it'll be a third. It is far, far more pervasive than most people are willing to believe. I believe that if you include all varieties of sexual violence against women, you'll find that 3/4 of all women are survivors. I can't cite any particular statistics, but my own personal experience so strongly supports this statistic that I can't disbelieve it. When I volunteered as a rape crisis advocate, almost every woman close to me, and a good number of casual aquaintences, disclosed to me that they were survivors of sexual assault. In many cases, they had never told anyone else until they disclosed to me. I estimated 50% of the women here because I believe that sexual assult in the workplace or related accounts for probably the biggest portion of all varieties of sexual assault that women experience. The other big category is aquaintance rape, and then child molestation (by a relative or someone else close to the child) and stranger rape making up most of the remaining varieties.

On preview: what scody and jrossi4r said. I really don't have the words to describe what this experience was like when I was working at rape crisis. All these women close to me eventually disclosed to me, often out of the blue. And then I had many, many conversations with friends and casual aquaintances about this because both my (ex)wife and myself were volunteering and people were especially interested in a man doing this work. And in so many, most actually, of those conversations there'd be a woman who'd disclose that she was a survivor. Both from my rape crisis experience and personal experience, I also learned to recognize survivors, too, and there were many conversations I had with women where I knew almost immediately they were survivors and they were very close to disclosing to me.

What jrossi4r says seems true, but I think that it's only part of the story. A woman's willingness to disclose varies by generation and other cultural factors and it's my experience that there's a lot of women who have never discussed sexual violence against women with other women at all, much less their own experiences. So I do thin that there's a large portion of women that are as ignorant about the scope of this problem as men are. What's really sad about that is that most of them, of course, are survivors themselves and have no idea how not necessary their feelings of isolation and guilt really are.

But, being a man and being concerned that men account for 90% or more of all sexual assailants, I'm preoccupied with dealing with the fact that I used to be, and most men still are, completely unaware of how prevalent this is and, consequently, how different the world is for women than it is for men. There is a huge chasm between men and women in this regard, and a lot of the things that sustain a cultural misogyny rely upon this ignorance of men.

Look, I don't want to turn this into a big deal. And further, I really really hope that I am one of the least sexist people here. I really hope that.

But I just want to say this....

You guys? All you good guys out there? (And there are a lot of you here....) I don't think you realize how widespread the problem is.

And good on you for not knowing -- that means you're not the perpetrators.

But dudes... It's common. It's really, really common.

50% is by no means a high number; if anything, it's probably more likely to be on the low side.

(And let's not even begin to estimate the number of guys who have been violated in some way. There are lots of you too. Y'all just don't talk about it -- or intimate it -- as much.)

*thanks mpup*

*hugs everybody in a non-threatening way*

Note that I said 50% of the women here have been assaulted—I didn't say anything about harassment. But I'd expect that rate to be closer to 100%.

The majority of sexual assaults where the victim is male are child molestations assaults, of course. But the number of men who have been raped by other men is higher than most suppose; and certainly the number of men raped by women is much higher than most suppose...mostly because most suppose that it isn't even possible in the first place. Anyway, the FBI estimates that male rape of men and female rape of men are two of the most underreported crimes in the US. (Incidentally, spousal abuse by women against men exists but is thought to be radically underreported, as well.)

But let's keep this in perspective: the number of adult men who are victims of sexual assault is much less than the number of women who are victims of sexual assault.

dg's response is typical—most men are very, very clueless about this. And I think that this pervasive male ignorance on this subject is both innocent and not-so-innocent. It's not-so-innocent in that to some degree it's also a willful ignorance. It's willful both in the cases where non-misogynist men don't want to acknowledge the extent of the problem because to do so implies some responsibility to do something about it; and it's willful in the cases where the men are themselves assailants and they lie to themselves about it.

(And let's not even begin to estimate the number of guys who have been violated in some way. There are lots of you too. Y'all just don't talk about it -- or intimate it -- as much.)

No, we don't talk about it as much. I've been sexually assaulted several times (some of you are aware that I can't handle strangers touching me -that's why). And the reason I never talk about it is because no one gives a shit. We have support groups in metropolitan areas, but that's about it. There are very few places for men who have been raped to go to work through things. So we bottle it up inside.

What percentage of men are harrassers, have harrassed, or worse? Anyone know?

"What percentage of men are harrassers, have harrassed, or worse? Anyone know?"

I don't know, but I do know that it's a lower rate than you might expect given how much sexual assault there really is. A minority of men are responsible for a great many sexual assaults. But I don't know how small or large that minority is. That doesn't entirely get the rest of we men off the hook, though. There are ways in which many of us are complicit in one form or another.

Yeah, I thought so. And no, it doesn't get us off the hook. But if it is a minority of men, hopefully a significant minority of men, then there is hope the pattern can be turned around, and sooner.

Occasionally one reads a pop-culture reference to studies purporting to show that some large percentage of men would rape a woman if they knew they would get away with it. Are there legitimate studies that show that a beast lurks within?

(cmonkey, I give a shit. I'm really sorry.)

I have never been sexually assaulted or harrassed in the workplace. I am astonished at the figures being quoted, to be honest. 50% assaulted? 100% harrassed? That doesn't seem to be my experience, I've not heard any of my women friends complaining about harrassment or assault in the workplace either. Seriously.

Of course, in many ways any discussion about this is like trying to pin down jello... But in terms of the US figures for men and women, from this page: "Sexual assaults in the workplace are estimated by OSHA at 51,000 per year with other estimates as high as 500,000 per year" and "it is estimated that ten sexual assaults occur for every one reported"... so "Sexual assaults reported are over 500,000 but when adjusted for estimated unreported incidents the total exceeds 5,000,000 (annually)".

That's one interpretation of data. And the question of what constitutes assault and what constitutes harrassment, to whom, gets tricky. If you look around, the explanations of assault and harassment have a lot of overlap.

I'm very lucky in that I don't think I've ever been sexually harrassed to the point of where it bothered me. I'm also very lucky in that during my early twenties when I was catting about I never was sexually assaulted and I easily could have. The closest I've ever come was when I was trying to leave after a one-night stand and the guy wouldn't let me out of bed. I don't even remember where I met him. I had to dig my fingernails into his hands (which were pinning me to the bed) before he realized I was serious about getting up and leaving.

However, I know three guys who have been sexually assaulted, one of them by another woman. That's not usual, is that?

I tried to post this from work earlier, but MeCha was acting up again and it should go immediately after mudpuppie's first comment:

Oh sure, I'd bet at least 50% of the women of MeCha have been sexually harassed at work or in a work-related context ...
Which makes me wonder where the line is between sexual harassment and sexual assault or, indeed, if there is one. Technically, I guess that any unwanted sexual advance could be termed assault, but this begs the question of where do you draw the line between harassment and flirting?

I also don't want to get into a big argument, so won't say any more (mainly because I have to go out into The World now and can't respond further for some time), but this is a subject that interests me a lot and I wish it was something that could be discussed more openly without degenerating into nastiness.

Having got that off my chest, it seems that I am woefully uninformed on this (even more than I thought). If the figures that you are quoting (and I no longer have any doubt that they are true) are anything like accurate, I am truly and deeply ashamed to be male. I don't know what else to say.

Fuck. I hate hearing about this shit, especially from my friends. I want to go beat the fuck out of these dudes.

SCIURUS SMASH!

Count me among the 50 per cent.

Nuff said.

I have no idea if there are any remotely reliable figures specifically on workplace assault, which I personally would define as at least some sort of forced physical contact, or contact by "ambush" - unexpected grabbing, etc. And I have never asked any of my friends specifically about this... I do know that of my close female friends and family, most of them have been the victim of assult or rape, generally - all unreported. Of my male friends, (sadly, typically) I don't know.

Based on my own experiences and those of people I've talked to, I am entirely convinced that whatever is reported is the merest tip of the iceberg. Some things make me glad not to be a parent; how does one teach kids to grow up smart and assertive enough to sidestep most of this stuff without scaring the living shit out of them at the same time?

cmonkey, that makes me cry; anything like that is very isolating and horrible, but at least women usually can find solace and companionship in their network, when they look for it.

Sciurus, :)

I'd like to amend that to say "of my close female friends and family, most of them have been the victim of serious assult (sexual) or rape. I haven't spent a lot of time asking about every grab-happy joker who ever pawed them.

I've often been stunned by the amount of sexual abuse that women have told me about. And the most worrying aspect of that is that I don't really have any special insight, I'm not exactly the first person any woman would go to confide in.

So yeah, I reckon the real numbers are pretty astronomical.

This has been a sobering thread. I have been one of the "blissfully unaware" males, I must say. Whether that's willful or not, I dunno. Maybe. I have no first- or second-hand experience with it, at least among my "real life" acquaintances.

That said, I am hyperaware of my own behavior, especially in the workplace. I am hesitant to make any sort of physical contact or sexual joke, even with friends whom I know well and see outside of work. If anything, I am too cautious.

I was just at the sink making my breakfast and chatting with one of our (female) DBAs. While we're talking, a guy walked up behind her, unnanounced, and started adjusting her collar. She took it in stride, and they obviously knew each other, but I found it extremely inappropriate and it made me uncomfortable.

Thanks, TL, kmellis and everyone else, for this thread. It's been eye-opening.

I was blissfully unaware up to a point, and I'll admit that my behvior is not spotless and that sexuality is a murky scary jungle full of garbled directions for all involved. But I know several women who have told me that they've been sexually assaulted and I choose to believe them. The closest I've come to experiencing it is when I was 15 and walking to a friends house and a stranger in a car offered me money to suck him off, which I don't think really qualifies.

I've been affected by one such incident myself. I suppose the word "assault" best applies. It wasn't in the workplace, but he was a co-worker.

Well, jonmc, if that had happened to me, I'd have certainly counted it!

Well, bunny I'm pro-gay/bisexuality, and I'm more or less OK with prostitution even though I don't think it's a good thing per se. And at that age I was going through the usual struggles with figuring out sexuality, so a part of me was ambivalent about punishing some dude cruising for sex. But the more I thought about it in the cold light of day, a grown man who stops a random teenager on a major thoroughfare at 9am and asks for a blowjob isn't likely looking for good clean fun as they say.

jonmc's proposition is probably not all that outlandish to the women here (to help support the statistic). I can remember many similar sleazy come-on incidents aimed at me and my female friends -- most of them 7th grade through high school. Perps were sometimes peers, sometimes slightly older guys, sometimes much older guys. I'd say that kind of thing is common enough that it's something young women have to learn to handle/be aware of/ignore.

I haven't been assaulted, but I have been stalked, when I was 19. That was no fun either.

Yeah... this where it all gets confused. I wouldn't class that as assault, but as harrassment, I guess. I mean, living in the city (in the U.S.) it was pretty much impossible to walk anywhere any time without verbal assault. But for the sake of trying to keep things close to the bone (hahaha...urggghhh) and not pad or inflate a problem that is more than shocking enough even when most narrowly defined, I'm personally pretty much sticking to actual physical molestation of some kind for "assault".

This is not to say that there isn't a lot of verbal (and other non-physical) stuff that isn't just as bad or worse, depending on the circumstances, but just to sort of fend off the sort of rationalizing wherein someone might think, "well, according to these people, complimenting someone on their outfit might be 'assault', so really there's no problem like what is being suggested".

jonmc's proposition is probably not all that outlandish to the women here (to help support the statistic).

Well, this guy wasn't yelling 'how bout a blowjob, baby?' and peeling out laughing. He actually beckoned me over and asked me if I wanted some money, then calmly made his request. It made me feel kind of sleazy, but I think it freaked out my mom when I told her more than it bothered me. Although I still the guys behavior was weird and creepy.

Just to be clear, jon, that's the kind of thing I'm referring to as well -- not the shoutout on the street, but an actual attempt to solicit a sexual favor.

Also, taz, I agree that that shouldn't be equated with assault. I mention it because it's also common.

Yes, I'm completely putting a whole lot of incredibly disturbing, possibly traumatic things right out of the picture just to keep to point. I've experienced what you described, jon, a number of times, as well as guys exposing themselves, packs of guys following behind me and yelling threatening and obscene things and scaring the fucking shit out of me, and horrible phone calls, and pretty much everything in the book (except stalking! yay!), but for the reasons I mentioned earlier, I'm personally only going to use the word "assault" to describe unwanted applied intimate physical contact in the absence of consent.

When I was first reading this, I thought, well I've never been sexually assaulted or harrassed. Reading jon's post twigged me back to several incidents -

- stepping off a bus when I was about 13, being approached by a sleazy middle aged man who asked if I wanted to go to the park ... when I looked, I guess, naive, he came to the point" want a blow job?". This made me feel dirty and confused

- having my balls grabbed at a party by bisexual friend of mine. Never thought anything more of it. Harrassment?

- being shown around an orthodox greek monastery in Syria by a priest, having the priest lead me into some dark recess on some pretext and then grab my balls and plant a big wet one on my mouth (he had to stand on tiptoe, and I am not tall, heh). Assault, probably -- but delightfulyl conforming to one of the oldest stereotypes in the book and it makes a good after-dinner story.

Anyway: are these harrassment? Sexual assault? The first was entirely non physical yet probably bothered me the most, which is to say, a little. I didn't and wouldn't spontaneously think of them as harrassment or assault, and therefore I wouldn't have said "me too" to a post that said, x% of men have been assaulted, etc.

Do we diminish serious sexual assaults by situating them in a pattern of more petty annoyances, or do we tackle the entire issue at once?

[I wonder if men are more subject to random, physical, non-sexual assaults -- the number of times I have been randomly hit, punched, chased, threatened, etc, by men, in a non sexual way, vastly outnumbers any other kind. I guess this opens the whole rape is power not sex issue which is a bit of a derail]

Um, what all of y’all said. All of this falls under the rubric of “testosterone poisoning.” I’m disappointed, but not entirely shocked that such behavior is so prevalent. For some reason though, it always surprises me to see this. I just don’t expect people to act the way they do. I just assume that most folks are as rational as I am and am frequently proven wrong.

If unsolicited sexual advances toward women are the norm for many women, another form of testosterone poisoning seems to be irrational aggression towards other men. I’ve lost count of the number of times when a vaguely sarcastic or flippant expression of frustration or irritation on my part is rejoined with vocal threats of violence. Invariably, I’m left shaking and confused.

I think we've basically taught men that the only highly emotional states they're allowed are anger and lust. I don't think it's testosterone as much as conditioning.

And I think I would personally define the harassment/assault/not-a-huge-deal lines here: If something physical happens and I'm seriously worried about being overpowered or physically harmed, it's assault. Some dude making creepy comments on the street probably wouldn't seem like "assault" to me. Sexual harassment would have to take place in the office; if the dude making creepy comments were my co-worker, it'd be harassment.

I get catcalls and sexual comments and strangers flirting nine times out of ten when I leave the house, no matter how I'm dressed or what mood I'm in, so I just kind of chalk those up to "normal life."

Obviously, though, that puts those definitions in constant flux. And I think it gets back a little to what kmellis was saying, about the world being different for men and women based on this issue, because the fear of being physically overpowered by a guy is generally much more of an issue for women than it is for guys. Pieisexatlythree is right about guys showing random aggression toward each other, but imagine worrying about that if 80% of the guys you pass could beat the shit out of you, and if you knew that huge percentages of your friends had been beaten by such men.

I don't know, I'm rambling a bit.

I don't think it's testosterone as much as conditioning.

I agree that conditioning and how a boy is raised to become a man plays a huge role, but let's not discount the hormones too much.

I remember a "This American Life" program where they interviewed some FTM transsexuals who said that when they first went on "the T" they experienced such an overwhelming desire to jump the bones of almost every person of the gender who they were attracted to that it scared them.

On the other side, I have an MTF friend who has become so much more mellow and less prone to fits of anger and aggression since she became full of "the E." She hates the way she acted as a man so much that when faced with a medical decision--go off the E or get new kidneys--she's chosen to stick with the E and just watch her kidneys very carefully until she can raise enough money for the operation to shut off her T production for good.

I think it's how you are raised to deal with the T that marks the difference between a man who is a bit forward sexually and a sexual agressor.

occhi, I wouldn't deny for a minute that women have it tougher in this arena than us guys. I think what we're trying to communicate is that, oftentimes for both genders, it's dangerous out there.

Yeah, jonmc, but I think my point was more that's it more of a constant worry for women, and in my personal experience, that's something guys don't really get.

I was walking with a gay male friend the other night in a semi-dodgy area of town, and watched him tense up as we passed an alley filled with semi-dodgy guys, and it occured to me that even as a gay man (who presumably would be more worried about getting beaten up on the street than a straight man might), he had been walking through that neighborhood fine until he saw something that might be a threat. I had been tensed up the entire time.

And actually the first time I became aware of how big of a gender divide there was on this was an AskMe about a woman wanting to roadtrip solo across the country, and someone brought up sleeping in her car at reststops. I could not ever, ever, EVER imagine feeling comfortable doing that, and I remember most of the women saying the same thing, while the guys called all of them weirdly paranoid. I had the same discussion with a bunch of real-life friends, again gay men, and they all thought I was nuts for considering sleeping in my car dangerous.

And it made me think how many constraints women's lives have that guys don't realize, and that many women (myself included, often) don't consciously recognize.

On another discussion board a guy was complaining about women acting nervous when he walked behind them late at night, and how he'd sometimes run up behind them quickly to annoy them, because he felt annoyed. This was a guy who, from previous comments, seemed totally nice and empathetic and intelligent. And I can't imagine *not* understanding how terrified many women can be when walking alone late at night, and how different my experience in the world would be if I didn't always have that worry.

And TL, I agree with what you're saying, and didn't mean to dismiss hormones entirely. But it does seem like giving guys more outlets for those feelings than sports, violence, and sex would serve them well.

Sexual harassment would have to take place in the office

I think harassment can occur anywhere where people are in a shared situation -- classroom, volunteer gig, church, club, traveling party, etc.

All of *that* to say (man, I'm longwinded this morning): What I'm getting at in a roundabout way is that since I carry that fear around, I tend to assess the levels of danger quickly, and would use that to define whether I'd been "assaulted." So the example above of a friend grabbing the guys' balls -- was there a threat of actual rape? Without it, it doesn't seem like that big a deal. The woman in the story in the original post, however, seemed to feel herself seriously in danger of rape or assault, even though the action (grabbing body part in view of others) was more or less the same.

And on preview:: Yeah, Miko, I agree. I just basically meant that some guy ogling me on the street doesn't really seem like an actionable offense, whereas my boss doing it would.

True, occhiblu; and also, when we ascribe a lot of our behavior to hormones (or evolutionary psychology, or whatever else is presumably pre-ordained and beyond our control) we tend to start viewing those behaviors as somehow inevitable. Which leaves us at a dead-end, with no solutions. Though there is always some biological basis for behavior, and likely for gendered behavior, it doesn't make much sense to point at biology and stop there. Culture tells us that biology isn't destiny. I think it makes more sense to define problems in terms of factors that are within our control to change -- and in this culture, there are an overwhelming number of factors contributing to sexual violence that are clearly not merely the result of biology.

As to the sleeping in your car question: I am one of those women that doesn't, apparently, have enough fear. I do keep myself pretty safe, and I'm always aware of my surroundings; and I'm absolutely not naive when it comes to knowing what sorts of things can happen to women. Some have happened to me, some to friends. But it hasn't caused me to live with a constant tension, and I don't normally fear walking on dark streets or going places alone. Yes, probably I should; but I treasure my lack of fear.

Yup, and to stick my nose in wrt testosterone and aggression, there's been no definitive link shown in humans (yes, yes, plenty of anecdotal stuff, but plenty to the contrary as well). Co-incidentally, I was reading a very recent review on hormones and aggression on my way home from work yesterday (my good friend wrote it and does multi-species aggression studies).

And absolutely, biology isn't destiny.

Miko, I think for me, at least, it's a balancing act. I don't think I've ever not gone someplace I wanted to go because I was scared of walking by myself at night, but I certainly do a mental run-through of the route and take the most well-lit, well-trafficked streets.

Or for example, the other night, I decided to grab a cab because I just was too tired to feel like I could safely walk either past the projects or enough blocks out of my way to avoid them in order to get home. On the other hand, the few blocks I had walked to get the cab, through one of SF's ritzier neighhborhoods, didn't bother me in the least.

So it's certainly contextual, and a lot of it comes from the fact that I live in a big city, and I live in a neighborhood that's teetering between "used to be drug-infested and still has gang shooting problems" and "new chi chi boutiques and $100/head sushi places opening all the time."

I also wonder how much I've been warped by reading a loooooooot of women's magazines when I was younger. I actually finally stopped reading them because I was getting so tired of being told how much danger I was in all the time -- how what my doctor wasn't telling me was going to kill me, how signs I was ignoring in boyfriends were going to lead to them killing me, how new government policies were going to kill me, ad nauseum. And I think it's interesting to read through a lot of what's on Snopes, and see how so much of it is directed at women. There's certainly a cultural fear that I think women pass on to each other -- "Don't wear a pony tail when you're out Christmas shopping, because rapists will use it to pull you under a car!" -- that's likely not really based in fact.

And then it hurts guys, too, because it intensifies the idea that all men are dangerous.

On post-preview, another example popped into my head: Ikkyu2 asked me the other day why I tended to go to a movie theater that's not actually the closest one to my house, and I realized it's because the walk seems safer (and a bit nicer), and I just don't want to have to worry about all the random dudes hanging out in front of liquor stores after dark that I'd pass walking to the closer theater. He kind of laughed and said, "I'm a guy, I don't have to worry about that stuff."

It's not like it's a huge difference in how far away the theaters are, and the one I go to is a bit nicer anyway, so all in all it's not any real imposition on my life, but it's just that I'm making constant calculations like that without even really realizing it -- and that's kinda sad.

biology isn't destiny.
I agree. I didn't mean to make a blanket statement above regarding biology. In fact, I flatter myself to think that I don't suffer from this phenomenon, nor do any of my friends.

Yeah -- I know what you mean about the women's magazines. I've given them up, too, because they are so full of negative messages; they basically peddle anxiety of every kind, probably because anxiety is so good for advertisers.

I guess I actually think that inculcating fear in women is simply another form of oppression. As long as we are being sensibly cautious, there is not much use for actual feelings of fear. Bad things happen to people whether those things are preceeded by fear, or not. There is some utility to fear, of course, if it causes people to increase their safety by taking precautions they wouldn't otherwise take. But it also means that sometimes we will miss out on experiences due to fear.

Hitchhiking, or picking up hitchhikers, is a great example. I love hitchhiking, but I have only ever done it on Martha's Vineyard (where it is an honored tradition for people from all backgrounds -- I have had 100% positive experiences). I fully endorse the idea of hitching, and would often love to hitch on the mainland myself, and to pick up people I see hitching. However, I will probably never do this -- because I'm afraid to. I think that my fear stems from the possibility that the person would have a weapon, though, than that they would bodily overpower me. If there were no chance of a weapon being present, I'd be far more comfortable with the idea. And I'm not sure it's just men that I'm afraid of here -- I've never picked up a female hitcher, either. So, basically, my fear of wackos with weapons prevents me from enjoying this kind of cool mode of travel and meeting people.

But I know I make decisions like your movie-theatre decision all the time. So I suppose I am making decisions to protect my safety, and even if my parameters about when and where I feel safe are very generous, they are still probably less generous than most males'.

I guess I actually think that inculcating fear in women is simply another form of oppression.

Abso-fucking-lutely! :-)

It's not like it's a huge difference in how far away the theaters are, and the one I go to is a bit nicer anyway, so all in all it's not any real imposition on my life, but it's just that I'm making constant calculations like that without even really realizing it -- and that's kinda sad.

Occhiblu, I agree. I almost always try to go to things in nice neighborhoods because of that. Even so, if it's late at night and the streets are a little empty, then I review what I know about self-defense before leaving.

I guess we aren't debating numbers anymore, but I have been assaulted before, too. And I expect that I'll be assaulted again someday. At least now, that person will try, and because of aikido I might be able to break his forearm.

Great post, TL!

*big hugs to all the bunnies*

I guess I actually think that inculcating fear in women is simply another form of oppression.

I have a different take on the oppressive fear of stranger rape.

I don't know if anyone's reading this thread anymore, but I'd like to mention something that I feel strongly about and that's that there's all this fear in parking lots and similar when the real threat is in the work and home and other supposedly "safe" places. The vast majority of rapes are aquaintance rapes which, yes, include dating situation but also include many other situations where the rapist is someone known to the victim and who is (relatively) trusted.

And yet think about the enormous energy put into worrying about stranger rape. A rapist stalking a neighborhood will terrify everyone and be front-page news. Women are terrified every time they walk in a parking garage, or on a city street at night. And this is not where the real danger is.

I get angry at all the attention and energy given to stranger rape because I think that it makes women less safe, not more safe. And I believe that it's an avoidance of dealing with the bigger problem because the bigger problem is scarier and harder to address. Men like to focus on stranger rape because the stranger rapist is to most men a very alien person. Someone who rapes a woman he's dating is not so comfortably foreign. And women like to focus on stranger rape because living in fear of all the men close to them is intolerable, while the fear of stranger rape and ways in which women deal with it are manageable in comparison.

Now, when go off on this rant, I always get a little worried that I might be giving the impression that I'm devaluing the experiences of the innumerable women who've been stranger raped. I don't mean to do this at all; as a rape crisis advocate and as a friend I've dealt with survivors of stranger rape and it is truly horrible and it certainly is a big problem. But for every woman who's been stranger raped there's four who've been raped by a date, friend, aquaintance, or coworker or the like. And while everyone is talking about how to be safe in dark parking garages, no one is talking about how to be safe in your own home. Or office.

Back to Miko's point, I certainly agree. And yet it seems like I'm doing my own fear mongering in this comment. But the thing is, the threat really exists. This is a pervasive problem, it's not as if the fear of sexual assault is vastly more common than sexual assault. It's not. Sexual assault is common. Absolutely the fear is another form of oppression and in its own way just as damaging. But let's look at this as if we were talking about Nazi Germany and antisemitism. The fear of the Nazis and of antisemitism was itself terribly damaging. And, yes, many individual Jews probably refused to accept that their lives must be dominated by fear and they fought it and kept a dignity and that was good. But wouldn't it have been a little ridiculous for someone to focus on dealing with the problem of fear by teaching people how to deal with their fear rather than eliminating the actual cause of that fear?

I'm a big believer in not allowing oneself to be dominated by fear and I'm a big believer that there's also a cause-and-effect relationship to being fearful and being assaulted. You're more safe when you're not terrified. But there's just something in me that rebels at talking very much about ways for women to deal with their fear when I think we should be talking about the fact that there is, in fact, a kind of a "war against women". We have to stop being ignorant and complacent about this. It's not a woman's fault that she's fearful. It's the fault of the rest of us that we let this violence against women continue. (To be clear: I am not saying that Miko's comment was meant in any way to imply that it's a woman's "fault" if she's fearful.)

Hey, look on the bright side: at least with acquaintance rape, you're fairly sure they're not going to kill you afterwards (or during).

/black humor *sigh*

I'm really in a different world now, and though it would be foolish to say that there isn't any danger at all, it's now so far from what I have to keep in the back of my head 24/7 that it's the palest possible ghost of a concern... It seems to me that only when you get the extravagant luxury of feeling so (relatively) secure do you really realize how overbearing it was before, despite how well you felt like you were dealing with it. I'm grateful for the confluence of circumstances that have pretty much lifted that weight from my mind, and really angry about... well, so much - but mostly that this feeling should be so rare and precious, when it ought to be a natural state. (agreeing with the nazi/fear idea.)

at least with acquaintance rape, you're fairly sure they're not going to kill you afterwards (or during)

Isn't there some statistic that the overwhelming majority of women who are murdered are murdered by their SOs?

oh yes! I think that's true... but I was really talking "acquaintance-acquaintance" rather than husband/boyfriend.

taz, you mean like a co-worker (getting back to the harrassment in the workplace issue) or someone you meet and make friends with at a convention?

Yes, exactly. Someone you "know" in some way, but not a man you have chosen to live with, marry, etc., which I would think of as "domestic rape" I guess, if it happened. gah. Trying to talk about any of this stuff is just... wow, so hard. But in my head, I have all the delineations perfectly clear for what they mean to *me*.

... a guy was complaining about women acting nervous when he walked behind them late at night, ...
I hate it when that happens, because I feel like I have been tried and found guilty of being a rapist without trial. I guess after reading this thread, I can understand why women do this a bit more. I honestly had no idea that women have to deal with this shit to such an extent. Is this primarily a US phenomenon, or are women the world over living wih this much fear? One of taz's comments up there indicates that she doesn't live with this to such an extent now - is this because you have moved from the US?

Men really are bastards, aren't they?

Yes, it's mostly that, dg, but also, not being single, being smarter/less naive, and much more confident/assertive I guess.

dg, I find it hard to believe that the US is notably worse than elsewhere about this, especially when you consider that in many regards the cultural status of women is better here than in some European countries. Frankly, I think that if the stats indicate that it seems worse here, it's just because it's reported and taken seriously where in most countries, it still is not. Things have changed here in the last twenty years. A good barometer of how seriously sexual violence against women is taken might be laws against so-called "marital rape". (I use the term "aquaintance rape" as suggesting-to-others alternative to "date rape", which has strong "it's not real rape" connotations, but in general I'm really annoyed that people feel the need to use different names for what is simply "rape".) A lot of US states didn't recognize rape within the context of a marriage twenty years ago, but my impression (perhaps false) is that a good number do these days.

I'm not saying you're wrong, kmellis, but situation can make a huge difference; I live in a city that is approximately the same size as the one I left in the U.S., and it's competely different. I'm not at all ready to say anything about Europe versus the U.S., but I will say that there is a vast difference in my daily experience in this particular place as opposed to where I used to live, most other things being equal.

Also, kmellis, I guess my original comment way back was based on my own observations here (Australia and NZ) that, while sexual assault and rape do happen here (obviously), I honestly don't believe that the statistics quoted in this thread apply everywhere. I admit that, as an "average male", I may be missing out on some information and that this could also be partly wishful thinking. Certainly there is evidence that these crimes are far more prevalent in some countries than in others, but that goes for every crime you care to name. The discrepancy between the reporting of crime as opposed to the actual occurence of crime is a massive issue in all crimes in some countries, as well - if only because what the US considers a crime, other countries consider a male birthright.

You should also consider that there are significant parts of the world that are neither the US nor Europe, also.