For my Mum and my Dad, I am their daughter and I always will be.
So should I be scared?
After 21 years it seems like I should be. Daughters everywhere are constantly reminded, throughout their whole lives, about how dangerous and unsavoury the world is.
"Don't go out at night on your own" - this is a classic parent to daughter warning. Don't go out on your own child, there are nasty men out there who will want to hurt you if you're on your own.
"Don't wear that short skirt, it gives off the wrong message". This is another classic, because everything that a girl wears gives off a "message". It isn't the interpretation of the message that is important people, it's the implied message.
"If you go out drinking, don't get separated from the group, it's dangerous if you're drunk!" Again, another snippet of advice given to daughters that further pushes them into a deep realm of fear.
Why is the world out to get women everywhere?
Well, for starters, blame is (for the majority of the time) placed upon women and their actions. Why are parents not telling these things to their sons? It is overwhelmingly true that daughters are treated a hell of a lot differently than sons.
Instead of telling men and boys everywhere that when a woman is too drunk to say yes she is saying no, women are told not to go home with strange men if they've been drinking.
Young men are not told that because a woman is wearing a short skirt she is not making unspoken sexual advancements upon them. Instead, women are told to fit their clothes and their dress sense around the presumptions of the oppressive society that controls them.
It is hard being a girl because the world is presented as dangerous. The thing is, when I went to Cape Town in South Africa (and it's quite dangerous there for everybody) I went out on my own a couple of times and instead of feeling fear all around me I instead forced myself to be confident. Nothing happened to me, I was never attacked or harassed and it is then that I realised something: women's own inferiority is ingrained into them in the way that they are told to live their lives, in fear of men/people.
Now I'm not saying that attacks on women don't happen at night or whatever, because that would just be ridiculous. What I am saying is that if I ever have a son I will be teaching him about how to treat women in the right way and if I ever have a daughter I will be telling her that what people try to drill into her about her inferiority is bullshit. I will tell her and any of her friends (male or female) about why telling a girl that her skirt is too short and attention seeking is halting to social progress that I am so desperately reaching for.
You make a very generalistic statement about what boys and men are told when they are growing up, yes some are assholes, but in all populations there will be assholes. Many guys are taught to look after ladies when drunk, and it is often a middle class thing to worry. But the worrying factor is universal, As conventional sex physically can only requires the man to be excited, and as it is such a penetrative action, male power is always going to occur, unless we completely change our whole group social behaviour journal which I doubt will occur since we have no need to change it as it will not increase our fitness.
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