Fear

September 6, 2012 · by amy~* · in ,

So, school started this week. I’m officially back in class, and it feels sooo good! Already I adore my professors, my fellow students, what I’m going to be learning. I’m reading to crack the knuckles and dive in to reading and expanding my brain. It was feeling a little atrophied over the summer. It’s good to remember why I am so passionate about this program, and about teaching pole dance, and taking class renews my vigor and curiosity and interest in what I’m learning as an instructor, and vice versa. It’s pretty awesome.

Before we get to today’s blog, a couple things (I mean, I’m blogging once a week now, so I have a lot of stuff to squeeze into one post!):

I’ll be in Dallas this weekend teaching at The Girl’s Room and also Zensual Dance. I hope to see some of you guys there! If you haven’t signed up already, here’s the link to my schedule. I’ll be in Toronto next weekend, and Memphis the weekend after that! EEEE I am so excitedddd!

If you are looking for new pole dance tunes, and have been absolutely bereft without weekly Tunes, have no fear– a temporary fix is here! Ten new tunes that I’ve been jamming out to. A little extra blog entry giftie. The full list:

…and as usual, Spotify here and iTunes here. I hope that you get to rockin with these! One– an oldie but AWESOME SONG– is the Janet classic, “Would you Mind”… if you don’t know this song, and you want to get busy with yourself, or want to get turned on and get busy with someone else, play it. Seriously. It’s like R&B sex. But yeah. There’s a whole section at the end… oh boy. Just listen to it.

So this week’s entry is a pretty serious one. And I’m going to talk about the world outside the safe, cozy, dimly-lit clean sparkly pole studios that we all know and love.

I live in Manhattan, and I’ve complained about this in the past, but in the summertime it is generally the beginning of the verbal harassment on the street. If you have two hands, two feet, a face, and boobs and a butt, you will get catcalled. Sometimes it’s harmless, sometimes it’s a little bit more frightening. Sometimes the guy says things to you when you walk by, sometimes they try to follow you. Sometimes it’s on a street corner in daylight, sometimes it’s on a dark street. Sometimes you walk away confidently knowing nothing bad will happen, and sometimes… sometimes there’s a seed of doubt, a seed of fear, and you’re glad there are mor people around. Because sometimes what they say… is a little bit over the line.

I have had some experiences with men in bars and outside of the street setting, too. I’ve been out and gotten unwanted attention… and it’s always a tossup whether I’ll simply ignore the guy who’s in my face, or being a little too aggressive, or if I get back in his face and make him back down. I work with nearly all men, and I’m pretty good at navigating through that, but when a man has no connection to you, has never met you, doesn’t have to deal with you in a professional setting, it’s sort of all bets are off. You don’t know what will touch a nerve or piss a guy off. Once I got in a shouting match on the train with someone who actually started to come after me with his hands raised. I’ve had crazy emails and texts sent to me. I’ve had threatening remarks made to me by a stranger.

As women, we navigate a world that can be frightening at times. I may have bravado– I may be strong– but violence against women is something that can happen to anyone. I read an article recently that struck a chord of recognition and fear in me– her story didn’t sound so different from something that could have happened to me. I don’t share this to offend, or vilify men. But there’s still a culture, in our society, of thinking that there are legitimate and “bad” forms of assault– sexual, violent– and others, which are far more insidious, that can be damaging all the same. What do you think? Do you react strongly every time something inappropriate is said to you? How do you react to catcalls, and how would you react if something like this happened to you? I thought that as a NYer, I had pretty good judgement, could tell when I needed to keep away from someone… I read this, and it has stuck with me and made me think carefully about how I might handle a situation like this in the future. I hope you read it, and think about it as well.

This is copy and pasted; I do not take any credit for this writing. The original post is from here.

And then I debated whether or not to put it on Tumblr…but I decided it was important.  Because in my own way, I can (unfortunately) point out exactly what is wrong with men when they don’t realize how hard it is to be a woman.  How we do not have equal opportunities and freedoms in everyday life.  How most men, even good caring men, have no clue what we go through on a daily basis just trying to live our lives.

So here goes.

I often ride the Metro when I commute from North Hollywood to Long Beach in order to save money.  I bring a book, pointedly wear a ring on my ring finger to imply I’m married (I’m not) and keep to myself.

Without fail, I am aggressively approached by men on at least half of these commutes.  The most common approach is to walk up to where I am sitting with body language that practically screams LEAVE ME ALONE and sit down next to me or as close to me as possible, when the train is not crowded and there are many empty rows.  Sometimes an overly friendly arm is draped over the railing behind me, or they attempt to lean in close to talk to me as if we are old friends.  Without fail, the man or boy in question will lean to close and ask me

What are you reading?

Is that a good book?

What’s that book about?


This serves the double purpose of getting my attention and trapping me in a conversation.  If I stop reading the book I enjoy to talk to you, random stranger, you hit on me or just stay way too close to me.  If I tell you to leave me alone, you get mad at me.  Because I somehow, as a woman, owe you conversation.

Tonight when I boarded the train in Long Beach at 10:30pm, it started up right away.  I was not on the train more than three minutes before three boys who looked eighteen sat in the row behind me and leaned over the seats into my personal space, close enough to breathe on me.  The one with his arm draped over onto the back of my seat asked me—surprise— “what are you reading?”  I went through my usual routine.  I told them loudly and firmly that I wanted to be left alone to read my book.  They got angry.  I was told “Why are you going to be like that?  I just wanted to talk!”  His friends start laughing at me and they don’t move, telling me come on! and why are you gonna be like that? until I tell them to leave me the fuck alone, stand up, and move to the front of the car near the three other people on the train, a couple and a business man in a suit.  They spend the next two stops shouting at me from the back of the car, alternating between trying to sound flirtatious and making fun of me, shouting “I bet she’s reading Stephanie Meyer!  I bet she’s reading Twilight or some shit!  You reading Twilight or some shit?”

They exit the train at the next stop, and I’m relieved.  The train is going out of service at the next station, so we all exit to board a new train to Los Angeles.  As we board, the business man steps aside to let me go through the door first and asks me if those guys were bothering me.  I say yes, that it happens all the time, and he tells he’ll beat them up for me if they come back.  He is a nice person who talks to me like I’m a human being instead of a walking pair of tits, and I make a mental note:  This is how a real man talks to a woman on a train.

The business man and the couple exit our new Blue Line train an exit or so later, and I think my night is ending on a good note.  A seemingly normal man enters the train with his bicycle.  At this point I am three rows from the front of the car, another man was sitting near the back of the car, and the rest of the car is empty.  Bicycle Man walks halfway down the row, and settles into the seat directly opposite me.  Perfect, I think.  Twice in one night.

It’s not the first time I’ve been bothered multiple times.  As such, I’m still amped from the teenagers on the first train.  So when this man leans across the aisle into my personal space and asks me, yes, what are you reading, I assertively but calmly tell him to please leave me alone, I am reading.  The man stands up, moving to the front and muttering angrily over his shoulder that it isn’t his fault I’m pretty.

Yes.  Exactly that.  I am the bad person in this situation because somehow this is all my fault.  I started this by being attractive.  I am making a mental note to bitch about this to my friends later.  I go so far as to write it down so I know I’m remembering it properly.

It is at this exact moment I realize Bicycle Man is not taking it well.  The seemingly annoying but normal man a moment before is now talking to himself, becoming agitated.  In my years of being bothered by total strangers, I have learned how to hold a book and seem to be reading while taking in everything around me.  He is glaring at me, and says out loud in an angry baby talk voice “PLEASELEAVEMEALONEI’MREADING.  PLEASE LEAVE ME ALOOOONE.”

Then he’s up out of his seat and things go from bad to worse.  He begins pacing back and forth in front of his bike, alternating between screaming something about his mother being dead and calling me a slut, a hoe, a bitch.  I am frozen in place.  There is one other person in the car, and I’m not sure if trying to change seats will draw more attention to me or less. I trust my instincts and show no fear, doing my best to appear to be calmly reading my book, never once looking up to acknowledge the abuse he’s hurling at me.  There are four stops left until we reach the main downtown station where there are lights and security officers.  Those four stops are virtually abandoned, and I have no guarantee that leaving to wait for another train won’t motivate him to leave the train as well, leaving us potentially alone at a metro station platform just outside of Compton.  I’m frozen in place, trying to plan what I’m going to do if he decides to take all this rage directly to me.  I’m ready to kick him, scream, make enough noise that he panics and flees.

At this point he’s punching the walls and doors of the train, screaming at me.  He stares me full in the face and screams

SUCK MY DICK, BITCH

YOU BITCH

YOU STUPID BITCH

YOU GODDAMN HO

IF I HAD A GUN I’D SHOOT YOU

I WOULD FUCKING KILL YOU BITCH

This went on for two stops.  No one came to see what was happening.  The man in the last row was as frozen as I was.  I’m not angry he didn’t come to my defense.  He was smaller, older, and frailer-looking than I was.  Again, I was worried if I got up, I would be turning my back on him to walk down the aisle.  In the state he was in, I had no guarantee it wouldn’t get physical, and I had more physical strength with my back to the window and feet in kicking position where I was.  If he had chosen to assault me, I would only be making it easier for him by standing up and putting myself directly in his path.  On and on, over and over, he screamed at me, screamed at his dead mother, screamed at me again.

The moment we reached the downtown station, I was out the door and down the stairs.  I still had to catch a connecting train to North Hollywood, and made sure there was no sign of Bicycle Man before I entered the car.  That’s when I finally starting shaking, and almost threw up.  By the time I exited the Red Line and reached my car I could barely breathe and my heart was pounding out of my chest.  Even now, in my own home, my hands are still shaking and for some reason the stress has made my back muscles feel cold and numb.  From all the tension, I can only assume.  I can’t eat anything, I still feel like I’m going to vomit, and I’d be lying if I said I hadn’t cried so much, so hard I still have the headache.

So when people (men) want to talk about “legitimate” forms of assault, tell girls they should be nice to strangers and give men the benefit of a doubt, tell them to consider it a compliment, tell them to ignore the bad behavior of men, I want them to be forced to feel, for even one minute, what it feels like to have so much verbal hatred and physical intimidation thrown at them for nothing more than being female and not wanting to share.

I just wanted to read my book.

It’s not my fault I’m pretty.