Once upon a time…

Once upon a time, there was a young man walking down Wisconsin Avenue.  He was near Mocha with a friend of his; just casually strolling along, when a man came up to him.  The man started loudly saying, “oooh what’s your name baby?  You’re lookin’ good.  You look like a movie star!  What’s your number? Hey, talk to me.  Boy, you’re lookin’ good.” etc. etc. etc.  The man continued shouting these things at the young man, following him for two solid blocks.  The young man was flattered–look at all compliments and attention he was getting!  After the two blocks of incessant barking, the boys skipped merrily away and they all lived happily every after!  /sarcasm /sarcasm /sarcasm bleeding out my ears

Now if you haven’t figured it out already, this fuck up of a fairy-tale did not involve two young men, but rather, two young female students walking along Wisconsin Avenue.  But what would be the difference if it had been two men?  Reading this story, were you more alarmed, more taken aback, more skeptical?  Were you WTF-ing at the fact that the characters being harassed were men?  If it had been women, would you have shrugged, recognizing that this kind of shit happens all the time?   

While fairly-tales aren’t real, real life exhibits situations like this on a routine basis for women—to the point where many women have become numb or expectant of situations like this.  Is this the type of reality we want to live in?  One where women are afraid or uncomfortable alone in public?  Where some men believe it to be their right to verbally harass women?  A reality where these things are normal?  Suffice it to say, the choice has already been made and here we are—in the 21^st century and women, although having made great strides with the women’s movements of past and current generations, still must order their lives around the threat of male harassment and violence.

I don’t take walks at night.  I don’t feel comfortable in the city alone, even in the daytime.  I walk with the hope that some jerk won’t look me up and down, nudge his friend, and say quite loudly while piercing me with his dominant gaze, “You’re gonna be a fox when you get older!”  This is not a compliment.  His statement was not genuine.  He saw me as an object with his statement being directed at his friend, adding points to his tally of “macho” masculinity, securing firmly for him a place as a man in this world that says he must objectify women and demean them to gain stature.  So what do I do?   I hold my head down and continue walking, allowing in me an internal fire to rage.  This happens often.  I wonder what it will take for that fire to escape my body…or else, I wonder when the time will come that it will incinerate my skin, turning me into ash in the face of my harassers.  For now, however; I lie dormant.

I want to yell and scream at each and every one of my harassers, FUCK YOU! (and okay, I do this now, quite often actually, yet I still have to quell the urge to physically fight back, which is tough.)  So fuck you, little man, for making me see little hope in humanity.  Fuck you, for making me see how close I can get to violence (and not liking it a single bit).  Fuck you, for ruining my day, my hour, my minute, or even my moment.  Really, what gave you the right!?

Call this a rant.  Call it whatever you want.  But I’m gonna call ‘em when I see ‘em and if you can’t see the shit that goes on in this world, in our nation, in your city, in your quaint little suburb because your too blind to the systemic oppression of women that goes on today and has gone on for years, decades, and centuries past, then you either need to take the blinders off or put the glasses on because you’re missing quite a show. 

But I, personally, cannot wait until we see the final credits rolling.