the cultural milieu is over for it but you really did have a lot of feelings about that "man or bear" conversation. you think often of how this stupid and barely-feminist take got, like, thousands of men violently angry. and it's that anger that's so hard to explain to someone else, isn't it, it's that anger that is what makes you "choose the bear" or say "all men should die".
because in your private life you actually love men. a lot of men are close to you, are your family or your dearest friends or your partner; are symbols of the good ones. and you've met so many good men, really, have so many good memories with them. and if you were genuinely pressed about it, you'd say that all genders have the same capacity for evil, it's just shaped differently depending on societal expectations. after all, your high school bullies were other girls.
but how can you tell other people about the anger. because it isn't the first-burn anger, it isn't the obvious knife-in-the-dark. it is the second anger that does it for you. that when you say i'm scared, the response is not curiosity and gentleness, but instead a desire to reform. that they resent you for being scared, for being unwilling. that you had the gall to say no. that you had the temerity to dare to say - i'm not comfortable with that behavior in my home.
because, yes, isn't the assumption of your guilt? you should have given him a chance or been better-natured or sweeter or less like a nagging bitch. there's always something the woman could have done, and then of course the man wouldn't have attacked her - men are protectors, right, so something you did must have made him broken. (you googled it once. to your knowledge, there is no study that proves that men are instinctually more "protective" than women - in fact, most studies you found suggest that there's no gendered difference there whatsoever).
and that anger is different, and it smells different, and you know it is different, because it tastes like iron. if it had been a bear, for example, and you'd said - there's been a bear sighting on the path, i'm bringing bear spray while i go running - no one would blink an eye. yes, bring the spray! wear a bell! in fact, everyone would call you stupid if you died without doing those things. you know this.
but if you say - i don't walk in that part of town anymore, i got followed once and it scared me - the anger, then. as if you are taking something from someone, rather than deleting freedom from your own life. you have to make sure your friends have your location before a date. you can't just get in the uber, you need to send info about the ride. you can't ride the train in that outfit, you need a specific "between outfit" you throw over everything. you can't lose your phone or your wallet or your keys, what if something happens. you can't leave your drink unattended. you can't even really turn someone down, have mastered the art of doing it delicately.
you have all the tricks and then some. how many times have you (with no boyfriend to speak of) said - i have a boyfriend. or invented a cop dad. or made up some - good!! - man in your life, to sit as a bulwark between you and another man. and be good when you do it. they get angry if it's too obvious that you find this interaction spooky.
and still that anger. how quickly it floods into each of these interactions. in the comments or in the mouths of people who you thought were your friends. and, like, you're aware of the statistics - it wouldn't be a stranger or whatever. you're not that worried about a bear, either. but then the anger comes out, after - and you see it on the lips and tongues of so fucking many. the anger that you even dared to say "i would chose the bear and die happy."
and it's not just this specific moment, because it happens fucking all the time, but it's the amount of hand-holding and gentle explanations and all of it, the placating. while in this silly, milquetoast critique, all you have effectively said is: "i am very scared, and this world feels like it punishes me for having this body." and yet the response was immediately: i hope you die about that. like you, being scared - it's incredibly aggravating. like they find your discomfort - even metaphorical - to be stealing from them. like if they could just force you into understanding, surely you'd find their point of view, underneath.
"protectors" indeed. instead of comforting you, they all show their teeth.
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