Day 7 - An Unpopular Opinion

Yesterday, I posted an opinion on Instagram that made me very unpopular. I felt a bit stressed a while later, seeing how many women were hitting back at me so negatively. I wondered if I should delete it, for my mental health and safety. I decided not to. Instead, I felt the sting of hurt, then the spike of annoyance that nobody was even trying to hear what I had to say. 

My world often feels lonely. Not intentionally, but typically, I have a different opinion to what might be called "popular," with respect to certain topics. I question everything. I look behind everything for an underlying cause or motivation. I'm acutely alert to societally conditioned thinking, and tend to try to break through it. 

This can make me seem disagreeable, difficult even. There aren't many people I can sit and have a fully expressive conversation with. Sometimes, I just stay quiet because it's easier than having to defend my views or see the looks on people's faces when I share my thoughts.

Sometimes, however, it feels criminal not to share, even if it means being disliked. It's taken years to get comfortable with this. I've been quite an agreeable person most of my life, fun, easygoing. I never held my opinion back, but I also hated feeling misunderstood. I'd often be very careful about not rocking the boat too much, not being too controversial. 

Integrity 

Whatever I do share an opinion on, I have experience of, and usually have done some research on the topic before commenting. I don't just spout facts and thoughts at people without having backed them up. That's part of my conditioning. I don't like to get things wrong. Of course, I get things wrong all the time, but I try to be as informed as possible before commenting. If I can't speak from knowledge or experience about something, I don't discuss it.

But only I know that's the case. When I say something, people often think I'm just making a flyaway comment and hit back at me on the defensive. They don't know I've researched or lived it. I have to decide between not expressing myself and sharing what may be an unpopular opinion. 

Do You Take This Opinion.... 

...to be your moralistic view of life? 

Yesterday, I commented on a video telling men they should cross the road at night if a woman is on the same side of the road as them. This is to make the woman feel safe. It's being popularised as "positive, empathetic behaviour" by men, respecting and looking after women, making them feel safer if out walking at night. 

You might be thinking now, "yes, that's the right thing for them to do. Women should be able to feel safe walking down the street." I can understand why it might seem like a good thing. However, I don't agree. And this is where my opinion gets unpopular. 

Fearmongering

A female street-walker named Molly Malone is probably the most famous "monger" in the world. A "monger" is a dealer or trader. One legend has it that Molly was a fishmonger by day and part-time prostitute by night. She's been called the "tart with the cart" by many. Two days ago, June 13th, was "Molly Malone Day," something I did not know existed until putting this post together. Were Molly real, she would have "wheeled her wheelbarrow through the streets broad and narrow," walking alone through Dublin's streets in the 1600s. 

She was a fishmonger. Nowadays, what we see all around us is fearmongering, particularly in the media. Women feel fear when walking alone at night. It's understandable. Our brains are wired to move away from threat. Being in darkness reduces visibility and the ability to react fast. Noises coming from somewhere we can't see trigger the now well known "fight or flight" response. The amygdala, our brain's alarm bell, signals when something is unsafe and primes us to get to safety. 

But what is safe and what is a threat? Are all men out walking at night dangerous? How likely are you, as a woman walking alone, to get attacked by an unknown male in the street? 

A different part of our brain helps us make analytical decisions. In other words, it helps us discern what's a threat and what isn't. Past experience influences our perception of threat and reward. If you have previously been harassed, abused or attacked by a strange male, your brain's learning mechanism will have stored that experience, heightening your sensitivity to the potential threat. 

Fearmongering in the media, headlines and videos like the one I commented under yesterday, are teaching women to stay afraid, teaching men scared women need protection, and teaching both that all men are potential attackers who should cross to the other side of the street to avoid being judged incorrectly as an attacker. 

Perception vs Reality

Women's fear of being attacked by a stranger is almost twice that of men, according to a study done in 2022 in Ireland. In keeping with what I mentioned above, previous victims of crime reported higher levels of fear. There is no denying that women are subject to high rates of harassment, abuse and attack. Almost one in three women have been subjected to some form of violence in their lives. It is also still very difficult, sometimes impossible, to get the support needed when reporting abuse. 

Statistics like this teach us to think that women are more susceptible to attack. They breed fear. Clickbait content that feeds on fears for engagement, teaching women to stay afraid and that men should cross the road to help them feel safe, compounds the problem, and avoids finding a solution. Women are being trained to perceive danger if they come upon a stranger. Perception and reality are different, however. 

Fact Check

Statistics show that the majority of victims of serious crimes knew their attacker. In Ireland, the figure stood at 67% in 2022 for attempted murder, assault or harassment. Strangers are less likely to attack us than people we know. Males are also more likely to be assaulted than women, though women are more often victims of harassment and other related offences. 

The reality is that the chances of being attacked and raped by a stranger are very low. What's high is the fear of being attacked. That is what we need to change, and asking men to cross the street is not going to cut it. Sticking with this idea means the threat response is activated anyway. Women will still walk afraid, they'll see a male, and feel the spike of fear. Next, the man will notice the woman. He'll feel a spike of fear that he'll be perceived as a potential attacker, maybe even fear that a woman may go on the defensive before he has a chance to do anything. Then, he'll make himself slow down (impacting his freedom to roam), and cross the road. Now, we have two people, both having experienced a fear response and resulting adrenaline rush, separating themselves from each other, furthering the divide between the sexes. 

The Truth is More Frightening

Based on research carried out in the US and UK, a frightening reality is revealed. It seems that, "for women and girls, the streets may be safer places than their domestic environments." 

Flip the Focus

My thoughts on this may not be popular, but they are not random either. Women have been trained and conditioned to fear. We fear being wrong. We fear being perceived as not loving, kind, and caring enough. We're called abrasive when we're direct. We're called bossy when we're ambitious. Everything about this world for women is designed to keep us in that sweet spot of fear. May the male be the protector of the little woman who can't look after herself completely. 

That's the narrative we need to change. We change that by teaching women to stand confidently and look a man back square in the eye when he's staring her down. They don't tend to keep looking for very long when we do that. (This is culturally relative, of course. In some cultures, eye contact is a sexual marker). We change it by creating cultural inclusivity, putting a stop to the cultural enclaving that happens when high numbers of people from new cultures move into a new one. We create educational programmes and training courses that teach immigrants the cultural norms and behaviours in countries. And we teach women the reality - and how to better discern the difference between real threat and perceived threat. 

Women have been made to feel afraid for long enough. The patriarchy made women feel afraid because they were afraid of us. Women staying silent, afraid to speak, to walk, and to disagree is part of the reason why we are so underrepresented. The more of us that stand up and say, "I refuse to be afraid to walk alone," "that behaviour is unacceptable," and "my voice is worthy of being heard," the stronger we become, the more quickly men learn how to behave respectfully towards us.

When I was in Morocco in 2023, completely alone, men helped me find places when I asked for help. At no point in time did I feel vulnerable. We can work together to make the world feel a safer place for us all. It starts with the stories we tell ourselves and the reality we allow those stories to create within.