I'm Your Venus, I'm Your Fire...

So the night before I went out with internet boy last week, I established some ground rules.

1. No I won't be having sex with you.
2. Ok, maybe I'll kiss you goodnight.
3. No I won't be picking you up at your place.
4. No I won't be driving you home.

He was confused by #3, and completely offended by #4.

I mentioned this to D2 while we were roadtripping last weekend. He didn't get it either.

Then I mentioned this to a couple of girlfriends. They all said "well duh." They got it immediately.

I find it both amusing (on a small scale) and sad (on a big scale) that men and women have such differing attitudes in something like this.

Men simply don't know that kind of fear. For the few women out there who go around boiling people's bunnies, there are hundreds of men who stalk and kill innocent women. Men can't know the potential apprehension we can feel when simply passing a stranger on the street. What if that guy looks twice at you? What if you suddenly become his object? What if he won't take no for an answer? What if...

Girls are taught from a very young age about defending themselves, and how most sexual assaults are committed by someone the victim knows. Our parents give us much more intense speeches about not walking alone at night, and checking in so they know we're safe. It's not that they love their daughters more than their sons, it's simply a fact that men are victimized only a fraction as often as women are.

I know men who have had women harass them. And I know of situations where it's ended quite badly. But that's the worst of it. I know women who have been harassed, stalked, assaulted and abused. And there's simply no comparison in the severity of the situations.

So as lovely as D2 and internet boy are, I find it silly that they couldn't figure out why I wouldn't get into a car with a stranger. Of course I understand that they are good guys, and they would most likely never hurt anyone. But the thing is, I think that men are capable of feeling rage to a degree that most women aren't even capable of producing.** Maybe it's a testosterone thing. Maybe it's a society thing. Maybe it's DNA. I don't know. But as women we have to be cautious.

Now I can appreciate the fact that the men reading this (I think I have 3 or 4 male readers) might possibly think that I/we are being paranoid. That we shouldn't dwell on the "what ifs" so much. But how can we not? Rape, and assault and abuse aren't new. They've gone on since the Neanderthals were clubbing women and dragging them back to their cave by their hair.

Oh Good Lord, this sounds like a bloody public service announcement. The point of this post, before I started going off on a tangent, is that it struck me as amazing that the women I spoke to about the driving home thing totally got it, and the men didn't. I'm not a big advocate of the Mars & Venus thing - but in this case it seems to be true.

xo

UPDATE: ** OK maybe this is an inaccurate statement. It's been pointed out that women are just as rage-y as men, which is probably true.