Oh man
To all my guy friends who are respectful, loving, and secure enough in their masculinity to not have to prove it all the time in disgusting ways:
Thank you, and this post is not about you. Please rest assured that I do not judge your gender by the actions of a few. I love you guys.
That said: Sometimes I really frigging hate men. If any of you think sexism is not alive and well in this country, try being a "chick" someday and tell me what you think.
I keep encountering men who either think they have a RIGHT or a DUTY (or sometimes both) to make advances toward me without even knowing me, or just to pass by and make some comment or gesture that reminds me that I am a sex object and should appreciate being one. It's not very fun. It wouldn't be fun for me even if I WAS interested in sex. Without being interested in sex, it's doubly un-fun.
I took a Greyhound trip this weekend. On my way home, two men approached me during the Orlando layover just to do something shitty. One of them passed really close by me and made a leering kissy face at me before going into the bathroom. The other one commented "Hey there, BABY," ogling me before swaggering on his way.
On the way home, I shared a taxi with an 82-year-old man and the cab driver said we'd split the fare. Cool. My fare was probably supposed to be astronomical. But on the way home, after the man got out, the driver started talking to me, making regular conversation . . . and then he started pressing to know WHERE I like to sing karaoke when it came up, wanting to know if I want him to take me sometime, he won't charge me, blah blah blah. When we got to my place he's like "I going to give you my phone number. I like to hear you sing, you nice girl. You call me!" No, dude. I told him I wasn't going to do that. He didn't seem to care--seemed to think he was doing something appropriate when he offered a business card with his personal number scrawled on the back.
He charged me only $15. The cab ride was like half an hour long.
I almost insisted that he should charge me what I REALLY owe, so he doesn't go thinking he gave me a break because I'm a cute girl. And then I figured I should at least get something for my frigging trouble. In the words of Ani DiFranco:
I want you to pay me for my beauty
I think it's only right
'Cause I have been paying for it
All of my life
Screw that, man.
I came back from early voting yesterday (yay!) and some campaign volunteer stopped me on my way back to my bike and asked if I wanted a sticker. (Not the "I Voted" sticker, some other kinda campaign sticker.) I took it and he started asking if I wanted to volunteer and help with phone calls or something, but I told him I probably couldn't. He said, "Yeah, well, you underage." Huh? I'm not underage for much anymore except running for President. When he asked my age and I told him, he denied it loudly, then started asking me where I work and saying he wants my help in his business trying to help him sell houses. What? I shook his hand when I left and he kept holding on. Like it was a joke. Let go of my frigging hand.
Last week before any of this stuff I had a dream that I stopped a rape. The dream scared me but not for the reason you might be thinking.
I think it was based on an e-mail I got. Some dude on OKCupid has been sending me unwanted messages and is apparently oblivious that I don't like him. After expressing to him in concise (I know, right? ME, concise??) e-mails that I was not interested in his kind of fun, he responded to me with stuff like "baby i like how u talk, i kno u wud like me, heres my #" and urging me to call him. I kept thinking about how pissed off I was that this guy thought he could talk to me like that just because he likes my pictures.
So in my dream, some guy was coming into my apartment to fix something in the place--he was the hired maintenance guy.
He fixed whatever it was and then started talking suggestively to me, saying we should go into a nearby apartment and get to know each other. I refused, obviously.
Then he put his hand on my shoulder and said some more stuff--can't remember the words--telling me in a rather no-nonsense way that we were GOING to get to know each other. I wasn't scared at all. I told him to get his hand off my back.
He responded by putting his other hand--rather gently, all things considered--on my neck. Obviously he meant business.
Too bad he didn't know I had kick-ass telekinetic powers. He ended up at the end of the hallway bleeding.
Time skipped somehow in the dream and I had a knock at my door. It was the woman who ran my apartment complex. Apparently I had put in some kind of report on the guy and she was acting totally appalled, saying he'd already been fired and all this butt-licking apologizing to me. I asked for the guy's name--I guess I wanted to put it in my police report? She started hemming and hawing, and haltingly told me she thought (huh?) his name was "Avadi." How can you "think" you know someone's name if they work for you and you fired them?
The part I mentioned as being scary was that I later eavesdropped by someone's door and it was the apartment manager's apartment--she lived on site. "Avadi" was in there with her. They were discussing the incident, referring to me as "that bitch" and fretting over whether people were going to find out because of me and if they'd have to leave the state together. They were boyfriend and girlfriend. The manager was trying to protect him and blaming me for reporting it, but trying to save her own skin by faking her horrified reaction to the attempted rape.
What scares the shit out of me is that much of society DOES perceive that these things happen because it is the woman's fault.
Thank you, and this post is not about you. Please rest assured that I do not judge your gender by the actions of a few. I love you guys.
That said: Sometimes I really frigging hate men. If any of you think sexism is not alive and well in this country, try being a "chick" someday and tell me what you think.
I keep encountering men who either think they have a RIGHT or a DUTY (or sometimes both) to make advances toward me without even knowing me, or just to pass by and make some comment or gesture that reminds me that I am a sex object and should appreciate being one. It's not very fun. It wouldn't be fun for me even if I WAS interested in sex. Without being interested in sex, it's doubly un-fun.
I took a Greyhound trip this weekend. On my way home, two men approached me during the Orlando layover just to do something shitty. One of them passed really close by me and made a leering kissy face at me before going into the bathroom. The other one commented "Hey there, BABY," ogling me before swaggering on his way.
On the way home, I shared a taxi with an 82-year-old man and the cab driver said we'd split the fare. Cool. My fare was probably supposed to be astronomical. But on the way home, after the man got out, the driver started talking to me, making regular conversation . . . and then he started pressing to know WHERE I like to sing karaoke when it came up, wanting to know if I want him to take me sometime, he won't charge me, blah blah blah. When we got to my place he's like "I going to give you my phone number. I like to hear you sing, you nice girl. You call me!" No, dude. I told him I wasn't going to do that. He didn't seem to care--seemed to think he was doing something appropriate when he offered a business card with his personal number scrawled on the back.
He charged me only $15. The cab ride was like half an hour long.
I almost insisted that he should charge me what I REALLY owe, so he doesn't go thinking he gave me a break because I'm a cute girl. And then I figured I should at least get something for my frigging trouble. In the words of Ani DiFranco:
I want you to pay me for my beauty
I think it's only right
'Cause I have been paying for it
All of my life
Screw that, man.
I came back from early voting yesterday (yay!) and some campaign volunteer stopped me on my way back to my bike and asked if I wanted a sticker. (Not the "I Voted" sticker, some other kinda campaign sticker.) I took it and he started asking if I wanted to volunteer and help with phone calls or something, but I told him I probably couldn't. He said, "Yeah, well, you underage." Huh? I'm not underage for much anymore except running for President. When he asked my age and I told him, he denied it loudly, then started asking me where I work and saying he wants my help in his business trying to help him sell houses. What? I shook his hand when I left and he kept holding on. Like it was a joke. Let go of my frigging hand.
Last week before any of this stuff I had a dream that I stopped a rape. The dream scared me but not for the reason you might be thinking.
I think it was based on an e-mail I got. Some dude on OKCupid has been sending me unwanted messages and is apparently oblivious that I don't like him. After expressing to him in concise (I know, right? ME, concise??) e-mails that I was not interested in his kind of fun, he responded to me with stuff like "baby i like how u talk, i kno u wud like me, heres my #" and urging me to call him. I kept thinking about how pissed off I was that this guy thought he could talk to me like that just because he likes my pictures.
So in my dream, some guy was coming into my apartment to fix something in the place--he was the hired maintenance guy.
He fixed whatever it was and then started talking suggestively to me, saying we should go into a nearby apartment and get to know each other. I refused, obviously.
Then he put his hand on my shoulder and said some more stuff--can't remember the words--telling me in a rather no-nonsense way that we were GOING to get to know each other. I wasn't scared at all. I told him to get his hand off my back.
He responded by putting his other hand--rather gently, all things considered--on my neck. Obviously he meant business.
Too bad he didn't know I had kick-ass telekinetic powers. He ended up at the end of the hallway bleeding.
Time skipped somehow in the dream and I had a knock at my door. It was the woman who ran my apartment complex. Apparently I had put in some kind of report on the guy and she was acting totally appalled, saying he'd already been fired and all this butt-licking apologizing to me. I asked for the guy's name--I guess I wanted to put it in my police report? She started hemming and hawing, and haltingly told me she thought (huh?) his name was "Avadi." How can you "think" you know someone's name if they work for you and you fired them?
The part I mentioned as being scary was that I later eavesdropped by someone's door and it was the apartment manager's apartment--she lived on site. "Avadi" was in there with her. They were discussing the incident, referring to me as "that bitch" and fretting over whether people were going to find out because of me and if they'd have to leave the state together. They were boyfriend and girlfriend. The manager was trying to protect him and blaming me for reporting it, but trying to save her own skin by faking her horrified reaction to the attempted rape.
What scares the shit out of me is that much of society DOES perceive that these things happen because it is the woman's fault.