Men are Afraid Women Will Laugh At Them. Women are Afraid Men Will Kill Them.

I’ve been psyching myself up to write this because I wanted to make sure I had a few days to sit on it before reliving what happened.

Nate and I went to New Orleans for a wedding. The night before the wedding, we went out to a nice restraint where we had become friends with a few of the bartenders. We stayed for a few hours, had some appetizers and drinks and chatted with people around the bar.

After we left to go get dinner, we were walking down the sidewalk. It was sort of crowded but not unusually so. Nate and I were walking hand in hand talking about nothing in particular.

Because I am always alert and on guard no matter who I am with, I noticed this very large man walking down the sidewalk towards me. I knew before he even came within 10 yards of me that I was going to have to awkwardly contort to avoid running into him.

So I moved over to the side as he came closer and he proceeded to walk closer to me and then when he passed me he deliberately ran his hand up my thigh literally all the way to the inside of my hip. Yeah…it’s exactly what you are thinking.

I immediately turned around and yelled “HEY! You aren’t allowed to touch me like that!” He turned towards me and started making up some dumb excuse all while having a shit-eating grin on his face and I repeated my statement and walked away.

Nate didn’t even know it had happened until I turned around and yelled. I was so angry and felt so disgusting and dirty. It basically ruined my night. It made me feel so utterly violated.

I wasn’t doing anything except walking hand in hand with my husband going to dinner. I was wearing jeans, a black tank top, pink blazer and tennis shoes. And he STILL did it.

The next day I after Nate and I went to the wedding, we decided to go to this little wine tasting place we discovered on our first trip to New Orleans. We were having a lovely time and as I was getting another sample of wine while Nate was on the other side of the room, a man was walking behind me to leave. On the way he rubbed my ass with his finger. On high alert and still royally pissed off because of what happened the day before. I spun around and said, “Hey! Did you just rub my ass?” He kept walking and went out the door so I followed and called louder from the door, “Hey! Did you just rub my ass?”

He never turned around.

You want to guess who the first person to react to my statement was? Another woman.

She was there with her husband and immediately said “What the hell? Who did that? It wasn’t my husband was it?” After assuring her that it wasn’t, Nate came over and asked me if I was okay. Then the male staff member asked the same and then he asked me if I was sure that he did it because “it just wasn’t in his character.”

After saying, yes. His female coworker was like “I’m so sorry,” and then turning to her male coworker said “why the hell would a woman lie about something like that?”

That got to the root of it all.

I have to admit, when I was yelling at these guys, I didn’t feel brave. I was shaking, I was so scared, even though Nate was with me. I was the same when I flipped off guys who catcalled me from a car when I was walking on a sidewalk with Nate and my mother in law. They proceeded to say “Fuck you bitch” to me.

Ever heard that quote from Margaret Atwood? “Men are afraid women will laugh at them. Women are afraid men will kill them.”

Before this happened, I never really understood the rage I saw from women who were groped and catcalled. Maybe because it hadn’t happened to me like it has recently, but now I get it.

Women are accused of being bitchy and cold. Of being “ungrateful” of not being able to take a compliment. Maybe we don’t like it? Maybe we don’t want it? Maybe we don’t see it as a compliment?

Maybe it’s just gross, disrespectful, and threatening.

When I told all those guys off, my main fear was them coming after me with physical violence for rejecting them. Because that happens all too frequently. I was worried I was going to get hurt or killed.

That’s why I use headphones in the gym. Why I don’t wear headphones when I am walking alone. Why I generally speaking keep a perpetual resting bitch face on when I’m alone in public. I don’t want the attention. I just want you to mind your own damn business and treat me like a human.

Ladies, we DO NOT have to accept or allow this behavior. We need to call men on their behavior. We need to explicitly say it is wrong and unwelcome. Maybe if enough of us start doing it now, we can save our daughters from dealing with this shit in the future.