No, Steve, That’s Not Prejudice
But never let the truth get in the way of a good minimisation
Recently, a writer whose work I sometimes visit wrote a story on Substack called “Yes, Amber, There’s a But” — based on his comment on another writer’s story. Allow me to follow suit.
I’ve considered writing about this topic for some time now. I even have a draft saved on the subject. But I hadn’t completed it, as I questioned my motives and the usefulness of the piece.
Additionally:
- The sort of men who will even bother to read this sort of story generally don’t need to hear it (looking at you Simon, Dave, Paul, Tony and the other decent men of Medium).
- It might sound like clickbait, which I try to avoid.
- Who — really — cares about my habits, except those who know me?
I note that Steve is certainly overall more rational than many men who call women prejudiced for holding a fair and well founded fear of the opposite sex, and yet he appears to be closed to the realities women experience.
We cannot tell the safe men from the unsafe men. I’m not sure why that’s so tricky for some to grasp.
Maybe it’s just a man thing? But then, I know my husband gets it, my son less so.
Perhaps he doesn’t have a daughter (I have no idea, this is a simple guess) — often men start to realise just how dangerous their own sex is when they have a teenage girl to protect.
Maybe it’s an age thing. The realities begin to seep in around the age of 40, and truly permeate once you’re in your 50s.
Or maybe, on this particular topic, he’s just prejudiced.
So what is prejudice?
Please note, as always, I am talking about men collectively. I already know it’s not all men. I’m married to one, I birthed one myself and two of them emerged, just as I did, from my mother’s womb.
Prejudice is a preconceived opinion that is not based on reason or actual experience.
Oh, if only 9 year old, 18 year old and 30 something year old me had indeed had preconceived notions about men, I could have avoided so much terror and misery, up to and including being almost murdered.
But no, I base my current, learned behaviour not at all on preconceived notions, and very much on reason, stats and actual experience.
As a girl, I was trusting to the point of occasional stupidity. As a basically honest person, I assumed everyone around me was sincere too. It took decades for me to truly understand and accept the reality that men — as a sex — are far more predatory, violent and harmful than women — as a sex.
Even after being assaulted several times, and harmed or frightened more times than I could count, I STILL didn’t make the connection that nearly all of the violence and attacks were coming from just one sex.
It took me many decades to even think about researching the stats, and what I found absolutely horrified me and truly surprised me. I was astonished to discover that men are responsible, as a sex, for around 98% of all violent crime, across all cultures, ethnicities and creeds.
I thought about it all for a while, and then wrote about my own experiences.
Reality Doesn’t Care How You Feel
So when another commenter on Steve’s piece pointed out that being afraid of men when men are dangerous is actually a normal reaction, and a manpanderer leapt in to instruct the commenter that women must reframe their trauma and not be nasty to the menz, I stepped in to offer support and encouragement.
Commenter: When you’ve been hurt enough times by a particular type of person, it’s not a huge surprise when you start to become wary around them, or begin to fear and dislike them…even if it’s just subconsciously. Someone who’s been bitten by multiple dogs isn’t going to just go up to one and pet it, even if they might have done so in the past.
My response: Yes, it’s not only acceptable, it’s logical and rational to be suspicious of the sex that has repeatedly harmed you. As a wife to a decent man and the mother of another, I know neither one of them would be remotely perturbed by being avoided by a woman. Every woman, and man, has the right to avoid danger as they see it.
And only an abuser or a person with no understanding at all would ever tell you that it’s your job to unlearn the defences your brain has in place to avoid being raped and murdered. Do whatever you must to stay safe.
Never forget, you are the only person in the whole world who you know for a certainty is not lying to you and has your best intentions in mind.
Steve Steps In
Steve then popped in to the thread to inform me that it’s illogical and irrational to treat a category of humans that has billions of people in it as dangerous because a “handful of them mistreated you”.
After making a comparison of my views to that of a racist homophobic bigot, he helpfully pointed out how emotional and short sighted he has decided it is for me to fear the opposite sex.
The same sex who have tried to rape me, sexually and physically assaulted me, choked and headbutted me and otherwise made my life far more terrifying than it had to be.
What a silly little woman I am. Thank God there was a man available to school me in my own safety. I’m sure he’ll be right there to help me the next time another man does something dangerous. No need for me to think for myself, use my reasoning and experience and choose the safer option. Steve has the answers.
So I’ll just reframe that trauma, and also ignore the statistical evidence and reality I have lived with for five decades.
Because….
Well, who the hell knows? For no apparent reason at all.
You Said WHAT?
I had to step away from that comment for a while. I felt clean, justified rage rise in me as I read it.
Being chronically abused as a child has a few lifetime repercussions, and one of them is to affect one’s ability to regulate emotion.
It took me a long time to learn to hold my tongue when I was rightfully roused. But these days, for the most part, I do.
Had Steve bothered to read my story “Women are Human”, which I linked to, he might have learned something about my experiences.
But he’d already dismissed me — and so this story was born.
My Final Response
This was my final comment. And it is my final answer on this subject.
No. It’s logical. And it’s not prejudice.
When men as a sex commit around 98 percent of all violent crime (and they do) and when 99 percent of the people who have harmed you across three different continents were men (and they were) and when the sex of men are documented throughout history across every culture, ethnicity and creed as being dangerous and predatory (and they are) it’s not remotely prejudicial to avoid men in an effort to stay safe.
It is irrational to call a learned response based on facts and reality prejudicial when it comes to making decisions that affect my own body and safety.
And to be clear, I work with men and spend time around men regularly, but will always choose a woman over a man to sit beside, talk to, as a server, definitely for intimate medical care.
In any and all interactions when there’s a choice, I will unhesitatingly pick a woman I don’t know over a man I don’t know.
Because, statistically, provably and irrefutably they’re far (far) safer on every level.
Yes, that’s logical. I am absolutely allowed ethically and pragmatically to choose the safest option that makes me comfortable where possible.
Recently, at work, I was given a sweet little certificate for making the most positive impact on everyone. A bit daft, but it was meant well. The men I spend time with during any part of my day are given the same respect and politeness as the women. They do not know that I have a perfectly rational aversion to dealing with men, and avoid them when possible. When it’s not possible, I am an adult about it.
You can choose to believe that picking the safest and most comfortable option is prejudice if that makes it easier to understand. But I prefer reality.
What a shame 9 year old, 18 year old and 30 year old me didn’t know what 55 year old me knows.
You can’t tell the safe men from the unsafe men. Avoid where possible.
So Thank You, Steve
Thank you for reinforcing how clueless so many men are — even otherwise reasonable members of that sex — about the factual realities of women’s lives.
I don’t expect you to take any of this on board. If you respond at all, it will be to double down. That’s fine, you’re allowed your opinion, however devastatingly wrong it is on this occasion.
Thank you for your deeply offensive response to my truthful and rational stance. You are, of course, also allowed to be offensive. We all are. I will fight for your right to be as offensive to me as you like.
You simply could not have made it more clear to me that you haven’t the faintest inkling of how frightening the sex of men are so often to women. Of how we live our lives shaped by that fear, of the very real damage and repercussions women experience continually and of the trauma so many women endure at the hands of the opposite sex.
And one final thought to contemplate.
The question is not, ever, why do some women fear or hate men? Because we already know the answer to that.
The question is, how do so many women — despite being beaten, raped and assaulted, terrorised and traumatised — manage to stand up for men, stand beside men, care for men, share your lives, your homes and your sorrows?
The question is, how do so many women — despite all the statistical and historical evidence that men harm women every day in every conceivable way — still manage to love and trust so many men?
That’s the question I’d like to know the answer to.
Because if we could bottle that forgiveness, empathy and compassion, we could fix the whole damn world.
Sources:
https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/violence-against-women
https://www.ourwatch.org.au/quick-facts/
https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/pub/85-002-x/2018001/article/54978/02-eng.htm
https://www.newscientist.com/article/mg23831740-400-the-origins-of-sexism-how-men-came-to-rule-12000-years-ago/
https://fs.blog/2020/01/positive-side-of-shame/
https://www.womensaid.org.uk/information-support/what-is-domestic-abuse/domestic-abuse-is-a-gendered-crime/
https://ncadv.org/statistics
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4628110/
https://link.springer.com/article/10.1023/A:1018868913615
https://xyonline.net/content/sexist-humour-and-rape-jokes-five-key-points
https://www.smh.com.au/lifestyle/life-and-relationships/this-is-why-sexist-jokes-are-dangerous-20190310-p5131w.html
https://gap.hks.harvard.edu/sexist-humor-and-rape-proclivity-moderating-role-joke-teller-gender-and-severity-sexual-assault
https://encompass.eku.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1013&context=etd
https://medium.com/r/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.newscientist.com%2Farticle%2Fmg23831740-
https://medium.com/writers-blokke/whenyou-claim-cancel-culture-doesnt-exist-781c851de5ef
https://www.apa.org/pi/about/newsletter/2018/09/harmful-masculinity
https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/why-the-patriarchy-is-killing-men/2019/09/12/2490fa7e-d3ea-11e9-86ac-
https://www.ling.upenn.edu/courses/Fall_2011/ling001/Frazer-Miller-2009.pdf
https://debuk.wordpress.com/tag/passive-voice/
https://web.stanford.edu/class/linguist156/Bohner_2001.pdf
https://journals.openedition.org/ejts/6359
https://www.macleans.ca/opinion/lets-finally-call-violence-against-women-what-it-really-is/
https://www.wbur.org/cognoscenti/2019/01/28/the-language-of-sexual-violence-doreen-arcus
