Friday 31 October 2014

Men in-control? Not.

It was recently on the news that a woman walked for 10 hours through Manhattan - New York, in a plain black t-shirt and jeans on and had over 100 men verbally and physically harassing her. 

"Somebody is acknowledging you for being beautiful - you should say thank you." 
"Damn"
"Hey baby"
"God bless you mami."
One man even walked close by her for 5 whole minutes.


I heard about this on BBC Newsbeat, a 15 minute news update that comes on Radio 1xtra throughout the day. On the radio there was a news reporter asking other males in the UK whether they found this behaviour from fellow males to be normal. One of the men asked the reporter, how the woman was presenting herself, the reporter told him what she was wearing and whether that mattered, "it can draw attention, can't it" he said.
Another builder stated "you know what men are like" and when told to elaborate, he put it down to "bad manners"


I find this disgusting. I find the whole on-going situation disgusting.


I am an 18 year old female, living in London. And I get approached by men mainly in the evening however, they don't physically harass me, but they will approach me. They try to find out why I'm in London, the University I attend, my age just personal information about me. Luckily, it's easy to lie, and I'm able to handle myself. That doesn't mean every female can. And females shouldn't have to deal with those situations when all they're trying to do is mind their own business.


I don't like the fact that some men feel that they have authority over females. This can be down to a lot of things; up bringing, culture or simply taking after someone. Not that any of these reasons make this behaviour right, in the slightest. I personally believe that when males are brought up a certain manner whether it be by a man or a woman, they're brought up to believe that they're higher than women - authority wise, this will then lead them to always believe that they have power over females. This is wrong. I'm sure I'm not the only person who thinks that everyone should be treated equally, atleast to an extent. This links in with culture, for example, I'm a Hindu, and in my culture women are often presented inferior to men. "A girl is governed by her father, a married woman by her husband, a widow by her sons." I agree with this statement to an extent. I agree that women are suppose to be looked after by their father, husband and sons, not because she needs to be looked after by them, but it's a nice sense of security. I don't agree with this statement if it was meant to mean that women are suppose to tend to the needs of their fathers, husbands and sons. Of course, when both of your parents are of an old age, you look after them, and if your husband and/or sons weren't well then you'd tend to their needs as much as you can. 

All of the above is easily changed. And is all dependant on what your personal morals are. Some women do believe they are there to tend for the men in their life, and if they're happy with this then that's fine, that's up to them. What I think is wrong, is when men think that they should be seen to by the women in their life.

Back to the 10 hour walk through New York by the woman and the responses the BBC reporter received. I understand sometimes when someone wears something eye catching, you're going to stare, I do it too. But I don't think it should be interpreted as an invitation to be approached. I believe you should be allowed to dress however you want to dress, people use the way they dress to express themselves, and I think they should be allowed to do this without unwanted verbal and physical attention. I can't seem to understand why people pass verbal judgement to others when it has nothing to do with them. It's just unnecessary and rude.

Another matter I recently read up on was the "Melton dad who repeatedly raped his five-year-old daughter". Reading this made my stomach churn. You know those moments when you're reading or watching something and it has you shouting at your screen out of frustration? That's what I was doing. In the report I read on the Leicester Mercury website, "the paedophile callously blamed his wife for his offending – claiming her disregard for his needs made him commit atrocities with his little daughter" It makes me physically sick that he ended up blaming his wife for not tending to his needs, again, women/wives are not there to solely tend to the needs of their husbands/partners. But the fact that he thought the conclusion to his problem was to sexually abuse his daughter, is baffling. I can't seem to wrap my head around how he could even go through with doing this to a little girl, despite it being his own child. Horrible.


I could go on and on ranting about how much I despise men like this, but I physically cannot type anymore, I'm feeling too angry. 


Links below if you want to read up on situations discussed above. Thanks for reading.


NKB


Sources:
http://www.leicestermercury.co.uk/Melton-dad-repeatedly-raped-year-old-daughter/story-23102167-detail/story.html
http://www.patheos.com/Library/Hinduism/Ethics-Morality-Community/Gender-and-Sexuality.html
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b04lpsk9
http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2014/oct/29/woman-records-10-hours-of-harassment-walking-through-new-york

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