From: gds@ficus.cs.ucla.EDU (Greg Skinner)
Subject: Re: men crossing the street at night to avoid frightening women
Newsgroups: soc.feminism
Organization: in your face!
Date: 12 Jan 93 21:29:53 GMT

In article <3fACBIj027n@khantazi.welly.gen.nz> banks_p@kosmos.wcc.govt.ns writes:
>   Personally I would argue they shouldn't be on the street at all if
>they are going to hurt people. But you have ignored my qualifier,
>namely that of being attacked for being misinterpreted in my actions.
>Say I was wandering down a road with a realistic looking water pistol
>and got shot by the police for this. Would you argue the police
>should be locked up for shooting me if I had made threatening motions
>with it? This is effectively what you are saying.

You have touched on what I believe are the central points to this
issue:

* There are people who do harm to others.
* There is no way to reliably distinguish someone who is harmful from
  someone who isn't.
* Some of us don't want to be "marked" as harmful, or be asked to obey
  some code that would identify us as being non-harmful (because to do
  otherwise might imply that we are harmful, based on preconceived
  notions about us).

There is a fair chance (around LA at least) that if you did wave
around a water pistol in the vicinity of some cops, you might very
well get shot.  (I believe this has already happened, perhaps not in
LA.)  You are within your legal rights to wave around a water pistol
so long as you aren't doing something illegal with it.  Yet it is not
advised that you wave it around cops, because cops are jumpy.

Whether waving a water pistol around is an inherently threatening act
is a debatable topic, as is whether walking past a woman late at night
(instead of crossing the street, or maintaining some "safe" distance)
is inherently threatening (otherwise we wouldn't be debating it).
Common sense would suggest that you not wave a water pistol around
cops.  From yours (and others') arguments, it seems that common sense
would suggest that men keep some "safe" distance from women late at
night, and a reasonable measure of "safe" seems to be across the
street, judging from past comments.  I might suggest that it is equal
common sense for women who are afraid of men approaching them at night
to move to what they consider to be a safer place (like across the
street).

In another article I wrote about how some guy ran directly towards and
past me during the time there were riots here in LA.  You are
suggesting that he ought to stay away from me because of what I, the
scared party, might do to him.  In effect, you're saying he ought to
give up his lawful right to run down the street because I'm scared of
him.

>My point is that by simply keeping my distance I can avoid having
>my actions misinterpreted. Also this has the nice side effect of
>keeping someone else at ease and allowing them to enjoy using the
>public place as much as I do.

This is certainly true.  It is equally true if the woman keeps her
distance from you, too.

I wrote:
>>*Everyone* needs to learn to defend themselves against all possible
>>attackers.
>   I disagree, nobody should *have* to learn. It should be by choice,
>ideally we should live in a society so peaceful that violence between
>members never occurs. Unfortunately we don't and sometimes people do.
>I haven't yet mostly because my large size deters people from
>attacking me.  Thus even in todays society your absolute claim does
>not hold.

All right, everyone does not need to learn how to defend themself.
(Note: I am including "avoid potentially dangerous areas/people" in
self-defense.)  If they want to walk near potentially dangerous
areas/people, I don't see why I (a law-abiding citizen) should avoid
THEM (since I will cross the street to avoid what I consider to be
potentially dangerous areas/people).  IMO, it's as if they are saying,
because I'm scared, YOU should do something about it.  Who are they to
demand of me that I change my behavior, if I'm not doing anything
wrong?

>   Perhaps, you have to remember I live in a country where the
>population density is quite possibly much lower than yours.
>Accordingly I am used to having a much wider 'personal space' area
>than maybe you are. This makes me somewhat more aware of people around
>me. I can thus empathise to certain extent with how worrying/annoying
>having someone too close to you is. Maybe to you walking within a
>metre of someone else late at night is okay. However to me and quite
>possibly alot of other people this activity is decidely worrying and
>would be unsettling.

Perhaps it is.  It's their job to move to a less threatening distance
between me and them, if they're uncomfortable.

>Now when simply slowing down a bit and acting non-intrusively where
>you can avoids this why not do it? In no way is it encroaching upon
>your ability to use the public place, it is merely showing a little
>concern for your fellow citizen.

It would be different if all people were asked to maintain safe
distances from each other based on some universally understood notion
of personal space, but no one (yet) has proposed this.  Instead,
people are proposing that because some men do harm to women, other men
ought to keep a safe distance from women.  This is encroaching upon my
ability to lawfully use the public places that I and other women
simultaneously occupy.

As a black man I personally feel I have been stripped of enough of my
rights in this society, and I will not voluntarily strip myself of
rights that are granted me by law.

--
Post articles to soc.feminism, or send email to feminism@ncar.ucar.edu.
Questions and comments should be sent to feminism-request@ncar.ucar.edu.  This
news group is moderated by several people, so please use the mail aliases. Your
article should be posted within several days.  Rejections notified by email.