[CW: discussion of rape culture and violence]
This reminds me of an article about online (heterosexual) dating that I read a while ago. It listed men’s and women’s worst fears about meeting someone from online. The highest ranked fear that men had was that their date would be fat, whereas the highest ranked fear that women had was that their date would turn out to be violent and kill them.
I think that says a lot.
(via kaitg)
Its interesting also that these fears sit subconsciously until woman are asked to exams their responses to men. We women will operate with this fear in mind, the way we protect ourselves, make sure our friends know where we are when we go on a date, words that we use while interacting with men, all in hopes they will not kill us, but simultaneously love us.
I think bell hooks made a point about this in her series on love. Something along the lines of how can women hope to love and receive love from men when at the foundation of our relationships there is this strong fear of men. You can’t build true trust when your foundation is crumbling under you.
The scariest part is, once you recognize this fear, and face it, how do you address it when there is evidence of “good” men abusing, hurting, and killing women everyday?
(via becomingchichi)
I was in my early 20’s when one of my homegirls broke this down for me.
I was in a broken relationship, and one of the things was that bugged me at the time was that the girlfriend at the time would freak out whenever I got angry - I never yelled, never throw or hit things, mostly, I just needed some time to cool out.
“Why does she get scared when I’m angry? I’d never hit her!”
“But she doesn’t KNOW that. She can’t assume that. Look at how many dudes are out there pulling shit.”
And that stuck with me for a hot minute. The relationship was broken on so many levels anyway, but that fact still remains, as a man, I can’t fault women for assuming the worst in order to protect themselves, especially how the world’s patriarchy and misogyny rolls.
(via bankuei)
I’ve had continual discussions with Tchy about this, and I don’t expect to stop. It’s fair to say that there’s no one in the world that I trust more, and he has been extremely careful with me, but… the fact remains that he leans quite a bit towards the masculine, and this means that that fear is always there. The news of transmasculine folks abusing/raping people doesn’t help that fear any. :(
I’m learning not to apologize for it. It’s not my fault (nor, really, is it his) that I’m scared of dude-type people. But it’s always there. Which is another reason why I get so pissed off when trans men try to make transmisogyny about them.
(via kiriamaya)
This is an incredible thread of responses. I’ve seen this quote before, but not the dialogue that built up around it. The part about loud=violent hits home particularly hard for me. I am terrified of getting into irl arguments with men, especially when they get loud. It’s always going to sit in the pit of my stomach.
(via mizbingley)
That part resonates for me too, although from a completely different angle. Despite being more terrified of sexual violence than I am of anything other than my own brain, I do not hesitate to yell, confront, get up in the face of, threaten, even hit men twice my size and many times my strength. Faced with a threat of violence from men, I will either imply or state “I dare you to.”
I also, as previously established on this blog, have a death wish.
To me, that encapsulates everything about the violence, especially sexual violence, coded into relationships between men and women in our society: for a woman to assert herself in the face of maleness may require the woman in question (such as me) to be perpetually suicidal.
(via 14kgoldnyc)
Reblogging for commentary. I have been frightened and scared by men being loud with me, even if I don’t think they’ll be violent. Like people have said above, it’s just a latent response in your brain to fear violence from men.
I went out to dinner with someone a couple of weeks ago (LONG story, was supposed to be a group dinner but it ended up just being me & a strange man) and I told him I blogged about feminism and politics, and he went off on me. He told me feelings were bullshit and women just wanted special privileges, and then he said, “Women don’t give men enough credit for not being violent psychopaths. That’s what we are, deep down. We want to rape and pillage, and we don’t, and women don’t give us enough credit for that.” I burst into tears. That shit was terrifying.
(via stfuconservatives)
I too am reblogging this for the amazing commentary.
When supposed feminist ally men deny this very basic, simple truth - that’s how you know they are an ally to no one.
This all gets taught to women at a very young age, how dangerous the world is when you’re in it being a woman. I’ve been struggling to write about something that happened with my daughter a few weeks ago, how to form the words, but this is possibly the best context.
We were in the wine shop, in line to pay, and she was so excited to get her lollipop (in the time honored tradition of wine stores everywhere). A man two people ahead of us started fighting with the woman behind the counter about how much money he’d given her. As I was moving her behind my body, my daughter froze, and when I say froze, I mean wasn’t moving a muscle except to shake.
It sorted itself out pretty quickly. We paid and left.
Once we got back into the car, she started crying. I asked her what was the matter, and she said, “Mama, I was so scared. When men get angry they shoot people.”
That’s a direct quote. When men get angry, they shoot people.
I asked her, “Baby, why do you think that?” She replied, “on NPR, that’s what happens. When men get really mad they kill people. That guy was really mad, what if he had a gun? What would you do?”
The talk we had afterwards was difficult; no one said parenting was easy. But this is the life we live as women. If my 9 year old understands it, then men of the world, alleged feminist allies, Nice Guys, random douches on the street, and even actual non-dangerous men: so can you.
(via someauthorgirl)
I’ve reblogged this quote before, I think. But reblogging now for the amazing commentary.
I was having a discussion with my father and brother the other day. We were talking about receiving threats of rape or violence via the internet. Their whole argument was “just ignore it and walk away from your computer”. Amazing solution. Can’t believe I never thought of that. It’s so clever because we all know that when you leave your keyboard the threat of violence disappears.
Urgh.
(via lavenderlabia)
(via benedictatorship)
The Sherlock fandom is like this crazy drunk that wakes up for a while, raises hell, screaming the entire time, and than collapses into a coma and mumbles nonsense in its sleep or months.
(via bbcsherlockftw)
I hate that feeling when you randomly feel depressed. There is no warning, no apparent reason. It just happens. You feel empty, and you feel hopeless. And you just feel tired. As if you never want to move again. Then when someone asks you what’s wrong, you can’t say because there is nothing that comes to mind. Then you start thinking of what it could be, and you realize just how much is wrong.
This post is perfect
(via nottoolong)
i think my favourite thing about people who don’t like snickerdoodle cabbagepatch is that we can all almost instantly recognise if someone’s talking about him even with names like boilerdang crimpysnitch
bendynoodle crumperbunts
Uh, correction: the best thing about whenpicnic remembersnacks is that anyone who has spent five minutes on tumblr can recognise his name even if it is warped beyond all reason.
(via benedictatorship)
Interviewer: “You and Simon Pegg, Chris Pine and Zachary Quinto had a much tweeted about night out. I haven’t got the pictures.”
Benedict: “My favourite one was the … we were remodeled into the Zoolander jeep with shakes going… *starts dancing in seat*”
That’s the best impersonation of that gif I’ve ever seen
(via benedictatorship)
I wish Professor McGonagall ended all her classes by snapping her fingers, saying “McGonagone” then strutting out.
(via benedictatorship)
You know, you act like such a lonely man. But look at you. You’ve got the biggest family on Earth.
(via ksica)
When I was little I thought being an adult meant not having a bed time but I’ve come to realize that it just means being in charge of my own bed time and it turns out that I am not equipped to handle that responsibility.
(via nottoolong)
My mother-in-law really needs to shut the fuck up about grandchildren.
Especially ON MOTHERS DAY.
You know what? My husband and I have decided that we don’t want to have kids until we buy a house - because in this area and this economy, there’s really no way to buy a house if you don’t do it before you have kids. I don’t give a shit if that’s not how you did it - you bought your house for $40k! TOTAL! If you want grandchildren so fucking bad, BUY ME A HOUSE. OTHERWISE, SHUT THE FUCK UP.
And you know what? I REALLY, REALLY WANT KIDS, OKAY!? This isn’t some plot to screw you out of something. I get sad and depressed sometimes because I think it will never happen. But I want to give my children better than I had. My whole life I wished we owned a house. My children will never feel that way. This is what I want in life, but sometimes I lose hope. And your bitching really doesn’t help matters.
I don’t even want to think about the shit I’d get if we couldn’t have kids. My goodness. There isn’t any room at the table for another kid anyway, so stop your fucking whining. My life, my family, my fucking uterus.
