Curfew for Men!

This is pretty much all about physical attacks and worrying about that.

I didn't mean that they were the same amount. I meant that when you've got a population of nearly 70 million and a few thousand men are the random murderers and a couple of hundred women are then is it really worth arguing over 0.000001% or 0.0000001% of the population? Completely made up figures to show what I mean in an extreme way.

The Google results were the first page of Google, of course I can press next, next, next a few thousand times and find all the results but I even said it was extremely limited research. My point was that both men and women were victims of random attacks on streets which we all know is the case yet we seemingly pretend it isn't.

My point was simply is the actual risk to women of being physically attacked on a street by someone she doesn't know as high as the perceived threat and thus the scaremongering that is conditioned into you? I honestly don't believe it is. Men are more likely to be physically attacked on the street at random than women are yet women are conditioned to practically expect it o happen to them for some reason.

That's not an attack on women or anything like that. I know that if I pass a group of young men on the street I'm very unlikely to have them do anything but I still crap myself so I fully understand the worrying and panicking, if I worry then of course you do for exactly the same reasons.

Now on the issue of horrible comments directed at women on the streets that's a completely different thing. We all know that happens, I haven't really witnessed it as an adult but that's most likely due to my lifestyle, I don't need to witness it to know that it happens and happens enough that pretty much every woman I know can tell at least one story of having had something shouted at her. Not all that the same disgusting level but that's not important is it, if you don't know someone don't randomly shout ANYTHING at them.
I'll never understand what goes through a man's head when he shouts something at a woman, what response he's expecting or what thrill it gives him etc. I don't get it at all I really don't.

The main point of my post was that these are two seperate issues and need to be treated as two separate issues. You won't educate a murderer not to be a murderer but you can educate a man not to be a bellend who shouts things at women. It should be explained in schools how it affects you, how hurtful it is and how you don't enjoy it. Wives should tell husband's, it should feature in TV soaps more often with the women upset and telling people how it's affected them etc because I think that there is a chance the knuckle draggers who do it can be taught why they shouldn't do it. Sadly many do it because they don't realise the hurt it causes, thats knowledge that can be educated into them.
Once you seperate that issue from the issue of women fearing for their lives when walking you can rationalise the actual risk of that and realise it's very small. That's a good thing surely?

My post wasn't a 'not all men' post, it was more of a 'the risk of violence against women isn't as high as women unfortunately fear' post, ie the risk is actually more of the non violent emotional harm from disgusting comments.

I've got a question, if the comments went away overnight and nobody made them ever again would you feel safer from violent attacks? And if the comments went away but you would still worry then what would make you feel better when walking apart from banning men from being outside?

 

The fact that it's "Not all men" is irrelevant when it IS all women on the other side of things.

The responses in here are depressing but not in the least bit surprising.

 

Hi. Nice to meet you.

Now you do.

 

I think I do yes, that men get attacked more because men put themselves in the position to be attacked more. You're probably right on that but that doesn't mean that if an equal amount of men and women went out walking that women would be attacked more, we can't just guess and assume.
My point is simple, shouting and making comments to women is wrong, it can hopefully be educated out of people. Murderers and attackers will not be changed, they cannot be changed. Seperate the two issues and we can at least get rid of one of them right?

 

Would you really not walk alone in the countryside in the middle of the dau @ SuperTyke?

 

My worry comes from experiences I have faced. I know that for a fact as I used to walk home alone all the time in my first two years of uni and didn't worry until I had some encounters with men on the way home and decided to start getting a taxi instead. Same with the bus thing, I used to always sit next to the window as I thought it was really rude to take up two seats. Friends used to always tell me to not and even random women advised me to not leave space for anyone to sit next to me but I still did as, like I say, I thought it was rude to take up two seats. However, multiple encounters with men sitting next to me for no reason made me compromise and start to put my bag there too if there are plenty of empty seats. I still move it and move up if the bus is full but there's plenty of people I know who wouldn't. Our fear isn't always of attack, the harassment is enough to make us not want to go somewhere alone, especially at night. Women aren't walking along just thinking 'I might be kidnapped or killed' it's also 'I hope that man doesn't come near me and start saying stuff to me' 'I hope he doesn't grab my bum or boobs as I walk past' 'I hope he doesn't come over with his d*ck out'. Plenty of things that are really common occurrences to be fearful of, without it being a full on 'attack'. I have had a lot of really, really scary encounters with men whilst alone and with female friends, things that are perfectly good reasons to stop me going there alone or at that time, to avoid those things even if I knew for a fact (which I obviously didn't) that they wouldn't result in my murder or kidnap.

It's all these things that feed into the 'conditioning' and you don't seem to be appreciating the link between the two. I think you think women are just worried about it because they've been told it might happen and heard of a few occurrences but not because of everything else that feeds into it. If none of those things happened to me I probably wouldn't think about it that much.

As you like a really bad metaphor:
People might be afraid of being run over but the likelihood of it is small. However, if loads of times when you are crossing the road cars started purposefully speeding up towards you when you are crossing, or swerve over the road to the opposite side towards you when you've cleared the side they are supposed to be driving on, sometimes clip you slightly as you are crossing but not enough to knock you onto the floor, the driver beeps really loudly as you are in the middle of crossing even though they are nowhere near you and so doesn't actually hit you. All of those things would make you fearful of crossing a road, especially if you see news stories of people who have been run over on the road that you cross where those things happen to you. Yes, the chance of you being knocked over is still small but you might start avoiding doing it if possible or take extra precautions of crossing at safer times of the day. If none of those things happened to you, you probably wouldn't be any worried about crossing a road, other than the usual looking both ways first.

 

As I keep asking what is it that you want? I don't sexually harass women, I have never assaulted a woman. Other than banning me from being outside what can I do that would make you feel safer? Because it seems to me that as always with these things we are attacking the people who don't commit these crimes for no reason. Sure no men would make you feel safer but do you really want that?

 

I think you are taking the opening post far too seriously, literally no-one wants that and never has. I want men to stop acting like creeps and like they are god's gift to women who should be flattered if they give them (unwanted) attention. If that's not you then I don't want anything from you, except to call it out/offer support to women when you see it and bring up any male children you may have to not treat women in that way. You're reading this and thinking 'what do you want from me?!' whereas I hope some people are reading it and thinking 'sh*t, I've slowed down alongside women before' or 'I thought women liked it when I told them they've got nice tits when walking past them, I'd better stop doing that'. You're not the only user of this board or the internet and whilst the posts you see may not mean anything to you, that doesn't mean that they don't to someone else.

 

Isn't this exactly what I've said though? That the murderous rapists and the absolute tools who do what you've said aren't necessarily the same people and that we can and should be educating those people?
I know I'm not the only user on this board but others have said in this thread that ALL men can change their behaviour to make women feel safer and that this is a reason for us to do it, that's why I asked how?

I also think that the whole idea of a politician making such an absurd comment in the first place is reprehensible. If she was serious she is a very dangerous person. If she was saying it to get a reaction then honestly why is that reaction positive? Would it be a positive reaction 'to provoke debate' if she had said all black people should have a 6pm curfew? Of course not. She would have been out of a job before the end of the day. For some reason it seems ok to make sweeping statements about white males and there can be no come back. I personally think that is wrong and harmful and instead of actually helping to get to the root of the problem it gets people's back up for no reason at all.

 

I haven't tried to make out that I/we have it worse. Women have it worse as women have to put up with the sexist comments, the ones I've repeatedly said are reprehensible.

 

That's right -
and to add insult to injury women who are attacked/abused are often held responsible for the attack - 'they shouldn't have been out at night' or 'what do they expect dressing the way they do?'
Also it's not only women who feel uncomfortable in certain situations - same-sex couples are often abused as are people of BAME heritage.