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 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