Let me explain to you why I run on main roads in the middle of the day.
My dad and l stopped in a little town off the interstate to eat dinner at a picnic shelter while on a road trip. It immediately felt off to me. Cars were slowly driving in circles around around the park, watching us, revving engines, parking nearby. After the same car drove past us for the third time, my dad remarked “slow Saturday night huh?” I realized he wasn’t scared at all. The contrast in our demeanors was almost laughable: I was shaking with fight or flight endorphins and my dad was talking about fishing while flipping burgers on a camp stove.
The situation made me realize how many things women do and notice on a daily basis that a lot of men don’t have to consider. Any one of the things that felt off while we were eating would have made me immediately look for alternative options if I were alone. Here we were, with multiple “red flags” waving, and my dad didn’t feel the least bit uneasy. Perhaps he is naive, or perhaps at 6’5” 210 pounds and with nearly 6 decades of life experience, truly not many things do scare him. But I think it is most likely that he didn’t feel scared because most men do not experience this kind of danger with the same frequency and intensity as women do every day.
Hear me out. I do not say this lightly, and I don’t like playing the gender card. I don’t like being scared. But I am. “Why?” “That’s an overreaction.” “Just pay attention to your surroundings.”
Here’s why. The number of times I have been chased, grabbed, yelled at, followed, and filmed while I’m on a run is above the threshold below which I can chalk the occurrences up to bad luck. Most recently, I was followed and filmed by a car of guys while I was running on a busy road in the middle of the day. This isn’t scary. This is infuriating. I know I’m not in danger here (this is why I run when and where I do), but it’s the lack of respect behind the action that scares me. I run for my own enjoyment, not yours. How would you feel if it were your sister, daughter, or girlfriend being harassed? I am someone’s sister, daughter, and girlfriend. What makes me less of a person than her? Further, I am someone. I am a living, breathing person just like you. What gives you the right to take away my comfort and security? I’ve been grabbed for refusing a drink at a bar, I’ve been chased by two men on foot while running downtown in the middle of the day. Every female I know has innumerable similar stories. Tonight, my dad was right. Our dinner was unsettling and suspicious but harmless. He told me multiple times that everything would be ok. I told him that he’s probably right. But I can’t ignore the number of times something almost happened in the past. If something almost happens enough times, you start asking yourself not if, but when.
Overreaction? Maybe. Probably. But I don’t get to be wrong. 95% of the time I feel like something is off, it’s probably fine. But the 5% is worth the 95%. I’ll never know if I was right to react a certain way, to avoid a street or car or group of people. But I will definitely know if I was wrong.
It doesn’t matter how much I pay attention, how attuned to every detail I am. The issue isn’t that I’m startled or caught off guard, it’s that there is nothing I can do. It’s helplessness. I can know every license plate number near where I’m parked, the position of every person in a store, the number of times a car drives past me when I’m running. I can mitigate every foreseeable risk, but the unfortunate fact is that if push comes to shove, there’s really not a lot I can do about it.
Don’t you dare make this about what I’m wearing. Don’t you dare make this about me. “Dress more modestly”, “don’t draw attention to yourself”, as if this is my fault for existing, for exercising, for pumping gas. If you can’t handle being in public without harassing someone, stay inside. I wear what I am comfortable in. If it is 90° out, maybe that’s a sports bra. If men can run down the street shirtless with no fear for their safety, why am I not afforded the same right? This is my home too. These are my roads too. This isn’t about me, it’s about a culture that perpetuates that girls are worth less if they wear less, that they exist for entertainment and thrive on male attention. No. I won’t live in fear or make myself smaller or less comfortable for your sake.
My point is this: being a girl is scary. We are forced to notice and pay attention to every tiny detail, gut feeling, sixth sense. Bad things happen and you hear about it on the news, read about it on social media, feel sorry for the poor girl and her family, and shudder to yourself. But bad things ALMOST happen and nobody talks about them because “everything turned out fine” “I overreacted” “it was no big deal”. But it could have been. You never know. The goosebumps on your neck that made you pick a different gas station could have saved your life. While this is true for both men and women, women generally have a much smaller margin for error than men do. Unsettling, suspicious things happen all the time and while they don’t result in direct harm, they are sobering reminders that bad things can and do happen.
I’m not saying this because I want sympathy. I don’t want you to tell me to “be careful” or treat me like I’m unable to take care of myself. I want you to pay attention. As a guy, look at situations through the eyes of your female friends. I’m not saying you’re never faced with danger, I’m just asking you to please think before you dismiss your friends’ concerns as superfluous. Chances are, the world looks a lot different to them. If they tell you something feels off, believe them. Don’t coddle them. Don’t act like they’re helpless. Understand that danger likely looks a lot different to them than it does to you, and likely for good reason.
- Anonymous
