Feminist post wheeeeee

“A woman’s worst nightmare? That’s pretty easy. Novelist Margaret Atwood writes that when she asked a male friend why men feel threatened by women, he answered, “They are afraid women will laugh at them.” When she asked a group of women why they feel threatened by men, they said, “We’re afraid of being killed.”

I've seen this post on Tumblr lots and lots of times before. It has a whole lot of commentary too, but I didn't want to copy and paste all that, but if there's any men reading my blog, I encourage you to take a look. [x]

It's true though. You don't think about it or always realise it but that's what the fear is, a lot of the time. My best friend won't go down to the parking garage at my house by herself in case someone rapes/kills her. I tense up whenever I pass a man when I'm out, if it's after 6pm. I feel uncomfortable sitting next to men on public transport. My friends and I are all taught to watch each other get into our cars and not go until the other person is safely inside.

Ect.

I remember when I had this whole existantial crisis, when my friends started getting facial hair and getting tall and becoming, dare I say, 'men'.

I'll admit partially it was just like, wtf, we're too young for this, these people are idiots. But there was something more to it. I remember one guy, that is quite seriously strong and I remember feeling actually intimidated by them and that's a sucky feeling.

It's one of those gender issues that's really at the heart of it. Men and women are not the same, so what do we do about it?

I think acknowledgement (by men) is what's really needed. Women know this stuff, we're raised to know this stuff, it's just general psyche, even if we don't always realise it, cos it's that ingrained. But men need to know, in a way that is productive. In a completely healthy society, one without rape and physical threat from men, what needs to happen isn't that men are no longer the physically stronger sex, that's just biology, I think it's neccessary that in general, while men are going to have that advantage and the capacity to use it in destructive ways, that they are taught directly by society and what is deemeed socially acceptable, so that that fear will go away for women.

And if that's too much to ask for, I think men stop needing to be 'but what about the menz?' when it comes to things like women's spaces, or mocking women for always traveling in groups, or acknowledge the bunch of restrictions or inconveniences we have to put up with in order to feel safe.