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Womens Fears
Posted by Anonymous on 23/09/2006 at 6:27 amThis blog just appeared on SMH web page but did set me to wondering. How safe do you feel when you are with strangers…and how do women normally feel. This article is obviously a bit of fun but does set you thinking.
The writer intends to spend nect weekend as a woman.
http://blogs.smh.com.au/allmenareliars/archives/2006/09/_a_lot_of_you.htmlAnonymous replied 18 years, 4 months ago 0 Member · 2 Replies -
2 Replies
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Anonymous
Guest23/09/2006 at 6:29 amThought I had better include the article in case it disappers from the SMH page.
A lot of you may zip out a comment on this blog, send it off into cyberspace and think that I and the other readers never actually reflect on your opinions. With a lot of the dross, that’s true. However, some of your more thoughtful posts and emails stay with me for days, sometimes weeks. One comment in particular, from a woman who freely admits she loathes this blog, has been like spun glass in my eye for weeks now. She was quoting Naomi Wolf’s Beauty Myth when she said, and I’m paraphrasing here: “A survey was conducted of men and women asking them what was their biggest fear about the opposite sex. Men said they were scared of being laughed at by females. The women’s greatest fear about men? ‘That they will kill us’.” Whether this is true for the majority of females, I don’t know, but I haven’t been able to get it out of my head for weeks …
I’ve been thinking a lot about my “ignorant male perspective”, as it’s been deemed by some commenters, and it’s made me question some of my larger assumptions about sexual dynamics.
A couple of weeks ago, I was sitting on a train with a boofy bloke (a stranger), who was doing a 150 degree leg spread for the carriage, his package on show for this geeky-looking honey sitting opposite.
The girl was ignoring us, reading, but she knew we were both having the odd suss. Then, a third guy entered the carriage and sat next to her. Now there were three larger, stronger beings within two metres of this girl.
For some reason I thought of the above-mentioned quote and said to myself: “All right, what would it be like to be her at this moment? Put yourself in her shoes.”
And I thought about what it would be like to be in a situation where three strangers, if they wanted, could do anything to me. Because they were stronger, they could control me, insult or hit me, force sex on me, or any other number of degradations.
And yeah, if they really wanted to do it, they could probably kill me.
Sure it was a worst-case scenario, we weren’t in a bad part of town, just going home on the train. But it was sobering.
It’s not often a bloke is in that sort of situation, but it must happen all the time as a woman. It was a major revelation for me.
Anyway, I wanted to take this “walking in someone else’s shoes” experiment a little further, so last week I decided I was going to spend next weekend (Sept 30 – Oct 1) as a woman.
That’s right – grand final weekend in both Melbourne and Sydney, the blokiest weekend of the year – and I’m gonna wear women’s clothes for 48 hours.
I’ve already done a run-through, bought my clothes, my wig, my bra. I intend to go to dinner, to the pub, exercise in the park and take public transport at night, all dressed as a chick.
If Fairfax come to the party and pay my expenses, I’ll get a Brazilian, wax my legs and undergo any other torturous beauty treaments you can think up. We may even tape the weekend for the first All Men Are Liars video if the bosses get themselves sorted and approve it.
And yes, it’s fair to say I make a very, very ugly woman but these pics were just bashed off by my “stylist”, the very, very sexy Zorro (female) and I hadn’t shaved, plucked or done my make-up or hair properly.
I know I’m not going to pass as a women most of the time, so what I’ll actually be experiencing on that weekend is life as a trans-gender person. However it’s a lot closer to the feminine experience than I’ve ever been and I’ve already had a number of powerful revelations.
What I want to know from you is, what else should I do on my weekend?
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Anonymous
Guest24/09/2006 at 6:30 amMany years ago I was at a pub watching a group called The Mojos, (all girl, blues band). I went over and chatted to the lead singer, I was with my ex wife at the time and was asking about the guitar she was playing, (the singer not my ex!).
All the rest of the girls came over to see if I was putting the hard word on her, she was cool and they all joined us at our table, happy, I thought that they could relax in male compane, so long as there was a female chaperone I suppose.
Later one of the girls, the harmonica player, very petite, was crossing the floor and nearly got tromped on by a huge hairy type. She jumped through the group looking like a scared rabbit. This made me wonder as has been mentioned here, do all women go through this all their lives? Do they feel they have to be careful when in male company all the time.
I have always been careful to allow any woman her space, whether at a party, a pub or walking down a street at night, I’ll cross the road so she will feel safe. It really must be pretty scarey sometimes.