Do Not Dull Your Defenses
There is a certain kind of person, across political spectrums, who believes that women's natural suspicion of strange men is unkind, unwarranted, or the result of some prejudice or artificial social ill.
The argument you hear from radfems advocating the abolishment of marriage and the family is that women are most likely to be assaulted, murdered, or raped by the men closes to her-- her father, brother, husband, etc.. - The only reason a woman would want to influence policy to make street harassment punishable or untenable is because she is diluted about where the real dangers lay.
That is not true. The correct way to state this is: when a woman is assaulted, murdered, or raped, it is most likely to be perpetrated by a man she knew or loved.
Most women are never abused, murdered, or raped, thank God.
But virtually all women have been harassed by, leered at, masturbated to, or made uncomfortable or afraid by a man she only ever saw once.
I live in a city with what is regarded as one of the safest public transport systems in the country, and yet, not a month, at least, goes by where I do not have to scream at a man, scurry off my train 10 stops early, take a train to a place I didn't intend (just to get away), or some other such frightening indignity.
This summer, I was burglarized, and what I awoke to during it was a strange man staring at me in my bed as I slept. Who knows what he would've done if I didn't wake up just then.
When I walk on the street just a block from my university, I carry my water bottle upside down, in case I need to hit a man over the head with it.
It is always strange men making my day scarier and less convenient. Maybe a man I love, sometime in the future, will murder me, beat me, or rape me. Maybe. It could happen. But I know for certain that today, yesterday, and tomorrow, my blood pressure will be raised by a strange man.
I say a "strange man" but in reality, it might as well be all the same man. It is always the same man. We know what he looks like, we know how he acts, how he dresses, how he mumbles, and anyone telling you to ignore these instincts does not have your best interests at heart-- they want to dull your defenses. They want to make you more vulnerable to these men. They want to see either your blood or your dignity spilled on the very pavement you walk.
When that hideous, creepy, creature of a man broke into my room, I should have screamed! I should have alerted the police then and there. But I was told, and I felt inside, that it would be "unkind" to do so.
What is unkind is risking that kind of terror on another woman. What is unkind is risking that on the rest of the world.
You are not being mean, prejudiced, or any other such pejorative when you notice what is a threat to you. Stay vigilant and stay safe. Stay armed with your prayer rope and a litigious disposition. And a heavy object.