From: banksie@khantazi.welly.gen.nz
Subject: Re: men crossing the street at night to avoid frightening women
Newsgroups: soc.feminism
Reply-To: banks_p@kosmos.wcc.govt.nz
Organization: My Arc.
Date: 6 Jan 93 19:51:19 GMT
            <9212292355.AA02165@york.cs.ucla.edu>
            <3eh+L-j027n@khantazi.welly.gen.nz>
            <9301021731.AA07290@york.cs.ucla.edu>

gds@ficus.cs.ucla.EDU (Greg Skinner) writes:

> Well, if someone is going to hurt me for walking by them at night,
> maybe *they* ought to move to the other side of the street.

   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.

   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.

> *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.

> I am not so sure here what you mean by crowded personal space.  For
> one thing, if we are just talking about walking past someone for a
> brief second, standing at a bus stop, or something like that, (1) it
> should not be perceived as crowded, because the person is not
> breathing down their neck, and (2) these are public spaces, not
> personal spaces, and as such, law-abiding people have the right to
> use them in lawful ways.

   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. 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.

    Philip

--
Philip R. Banks  Syntax: mail < banks_p@kosmos.wcc.govt.nz >            @@@@@/|
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Fate protects fools, little children and ships named Enterprise.        @@/---|
 ---Commander Riker, ST:TNG 'Contagion'                                 @/    |

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