read the link first
http://drugmonkey.blogspot.com/2009/06/i-noticed-it-again-last-friday.html
i want to be that open-minded in real life, i swear. and i do see lots of little families with adorable children, whose mothers and fathers are hispanic or black or whatever it is that my parents object to. my parents look at these people, and at first glance, they see the worst of the 80s in nyc. then they see the children, which usually helps, as does any evidence of upward mobility. but just as people of more "acceptable" ethnicity aren't judged if they don't have a wife, 2.5 kids, car, dog, white picket fence, huge-ass mortgage, etc., i should be just as comfortable with the single young men of certain backgrounds swaggering about new brunswick. but i'm not. mostly because i've gotten chased down the street or leered at one too many times. and i'm nowhere near the level of attractiveness where too much male attention should be an issue.
besides, that kind of attention is kind of like rape- at the root of it, it really has nothing to do with sexual attraction or attractiveness. you are not "asking for it" if you're dressed attractively or walk a certain way or dare to go somewhere alone. and by the way, i care about how i dress, but i very rarely wear anything a mormon would object to, so don't shoot me a flame denouncing me as a whore. also, even if i did wear revealing clothes, again, that has nothing to do with it and does not reflect my worth as a human being or my profession (because whoring is a profession and you're only a whore if you take money for sexual acts, as an agreed upon transaction). anyhow, i think the closest i could place the issue is gender politics.
for some reason, some (not even a small minority) of these otherwise nice people (i'm assuming they're nice to their grandmothers and whatnot, because i don't know them and therefore should not arbitrarily decide that they must be evil scumbags) think that it is ok to leer, that it is ok to make advances to random people on the street and continue making those advances even after it becomes apparent that they are not quite comfortable. granted, the words they use when they're not leering are more or less polite- no cursing or open references to various body parts. so i must still be considered a "lady". but why in the world would you stop a stranger to tell her she's very very pretty and would she like your phone number and is she sure for the 42nd time that she doesn't want it? no matter what you look like, that's just creepy to me.
i don't care if it works in movies. i don't care if persistence is generally considered a good thing. there are so many other people out there- go talk to them. i only deal with strangers at work and at parties, in case of emergency situations, or if i choose to make an exception (such as people who are obviously students and aren't hitting on me who are going to be in rather close proximity to me for an extended period of time- ie. in transit.) if i'm off the clock and not at a social event where the point is to meet people, i will not talk to you unless you know someone who knows me. and commenting on my perceived physical attractiveness or other forward behaviors is not a good way to encourage me to make an exception for you.
ok, back to the open-minded-ness issue. it's probably close-minded, bigoted, and class-ist or however you refer to discriminiation based on socioeconomic status for me to be extra cautious and a little bit stand-off-ish when i'm aware that a black or hispanic male is paying attention to me. i don't want to be close-minded, but at the same time, i don't want to be approached in that way. i fully recognize that the vast majority of human beings, especially human beings in this country, are nice people that want a nice life and we're all quite similar. their parents are probably quite simiar to my parents in personality and prior experience. and i very firmly believe that american people should not be throwing rocks out of their glass houses built by their own immigrant ancestors, especially when the doors of these houses are supposed to be freely opened. ("give me your tired, your poor")
but how do i practice what i preach without unnecessarily forcing myself to speak to people when i am not comfortable or interested? i thought that my natural tendency towards being equally cold to just about anyone i haven't been introduced to would do the trick, except that people are not mind-readers and will assume what they want to assume. they will think it's because they're ghetto, or because of their looks, or because of all the stereotypical reasons a college girl would not want to speak to an actual new brunswick resident. should i wear a sign saying, "please leave me alone, i'm a frigid bitch and it's not your fault"? should i slouch around in baggy clothes and sneakers? should i refuse to leave my house without a posse? should i just blindly trust every stranger that talks to me, since most people are not murderers, thieves, and/or rapists?
nobody's going to read this, so the ending line that popped into my head ("let the flaming begin") is probably not relevant. however, if you have managed to stumble upon this blurb- even if you don't comment, read the whole thing, and/or generally care about what i think- please at least think about your own inner bigot for a little bit.
i want to be that open-minded in real life, i swear. and i do see lots of little families with adorable children, whose mothers and fathers are hispanic or black or whatever it is that my parents object to. my parents look at these people, and at first glance, they see the worst of the 80s in nyc. then they see the children, which usually helps, as does any evidence of upward mobility. but just as people of more "acceptable" ethnicity aren't judged if they don't have a wife, 2.5 kids, car, dog, white picket fence, huge-ass mortgage, etc., i should be just as comfortable with the single young men of certain backgrounds swaggering about new brunswick. but i'm not. mostly because i've gotten chased down the street or leered at one too many times. and i'm nowhere near the level of attractiveness where too much male attention should be an issue.
besides, that kind of attention is kind of like rape- at the root of it, it really has nothing to do with sexual attraction or attractiveness. you are not "asking for it" if you're dressed attractively or walk a certain way or dare to go somewhere alone. and by the way, i care about how i dress, but i very rarely wear anything a mormon would object to, so don't shoot me a flame denouncing me as a whore. also, even if i did wear revealing clothes, again, that has nothing to do with it and does not reflect my worth as a human being or my profession (because whoring is a profession and you're only a whore if you take money for sexual acts, as an agreed upon transaction). anyhow, i think the closest i could place the issue is gender politics.
for some reason, some (not even a small minority) of these otherwise nice people (i'm assuming they're nice to their grandmothers and whatnot, because i don't know them and therefore should not arbitrarily decide that they must be evil scumbags) think that it is ok to leer, that it is ok to make advances to random people on the street and continue making those advances even after it becomes apparent that they are not quite comfortable. granted, the words they use when they're not leering are more or less polite- no cursing or open references to various body parts. so i must still be considered a "lady". but why in the world would you stop a stranger to tell her she's very very pretty and would she like your phone number and is she sure for the 42nd time that she doesn't want it? no matter what you look like, that's just creepy to me.
i don't care if it works in movies. i don't care if persistence is generally considered a good thing. there are so many other people out there- go talk to them. i only deal with strangers at work and at parties, in case of emergency situations, or if i choose to make an exception (such as people who are obviously students and aren't hitting on me who are going to be in rather close proximity to me for an extended period of time- ie. in transit.) if i'm off the clock and not at a social event where the point is to meet people, i will not talk to you unless you know someone who knows me. and commenting on my perceived physical attractiveness or other forward behaviors is not a good way to encourage me to make an exception for you.
ok, back to the open-minded-ness issue. it's probably close-minded, bigoted, and class-ist or however you refer to discriminiation based on socioeconomic status for me to be extra cautious and a little bit stand-off-ish when i'm aware that a black or hispanic male is paying attention to me. i don't want to be close-minded, but at the same time, i don't want to be approached in that way. i fully recognize that the vast majority of human beings, especially human beings in this country, are nice people that want a nice life and we're all quite similar. their parents are probably quite simiar to my parents in personality and prior experience. and i very firmly believe that american people should not be throwing rocks out of their glass houses built by their own immigrant ancestors, especially when the doors of these houses are supposed to be freely opened. ("give me your tired, your poor")
but how do i practice what i preach without unnecessarily forcing myself to speak to people when i am not comfortable or interested? i thought that my natural tendency towards being equally cold to just about anyone i haven't been introduced to would do the trick, except that people are not mind-readers and will assume what they want to assume. they will think it's because they're ghetto, or because of their looks, or because of all the stereotypical reasons a college girl would not want to speak to an actual new brunswick resident. should i wear a sign saying, "please leave me alone, i'm a frigid bitch and it's not your fault"? should i slouch around in baggy clothes and sneakers? should i refuse to leave my house without a posse? should i just blindly trust every stranger that talks to me, since most people are not murderers, thieves, and/or rapists?
nobody's going to read this, so the ending line that popped into my head ("let the flaming begin") is probably not relevant. however, if you have managed to stumble upon this blurb- even if you don't comment, read the whole thing, and/or generally care about what i think- please at least think about your own inner bigot for a little bit.