Rou

I'm male. Growing up, my parents instilled a number of attitudes in me that are inherently sexist. But they're also considered gentlemanly. Open doors, walk on the road side of the lady, and carry items for her. Standard fare, but not as wide spread anymore. One of these "sexist" attitudes is a built in sense of worry and protectionism for females. And that brings me to my point.

Shortly after 1AM tonight, the bars all closed, the college kids all started stumbling back to their dorms, and I headed out to grab dinner. On my way from the parking lot to the takeout joint, I saw a girl walking down a dark street, alone, clearly drunk, and clearly not paying attention to her surroundings.

I was really annoyed at her. In fact, I fumed about it for most of my journey. I mean, it drives me up a wall that someone can be that fucking stupid. She did so many things wrong at the same time, it literally annoyed me.

1) Alone: Fucking wrong. No walking alone late at night.
2) Drunk: Fucking wrong. By itself not bad, but when combined with the rest of this list, it's very bad.
3) Dark street: Wrong. Unless you live on that particular street, there are alternative routes that are faster and better lit.
4) Oblivious: Wrong. Pay attention damn it. Thieves, rapists and vicious drunks are easier to spot if you're not staring at your shoes.

Now, I don't want to give the impression that my little town is a hotbed of crime. It's not. I went to that school. Nearly 20K students. And a half dozen times a year, the paper would have a story about a girl like this getting yanked into the bushes, and raped. It's idiotic to ignore the risk so blindly. On top of that, there are a number of programs that offer either a campus cop or a volunteer to walk you home safely. Or hell, ASK A FRIEND. There have to be others like me there. I told every female friend I had that anytime they needed, even middle of the night, they could call me, and I would walk them home. Most of my buddies did the same.

Halfway through this thought about her, I realized something. It's sorta sexist. I know it's gentlemanly and all, but in some ways, it's sexist. It assumes that a woman needs someone to protect them just because they have a uterus. That they're somehow so weak they need help to walk home.

I dunno how to deal with that dichotomy. On one had, I don't feel like it's right to let her walk alone. On the other, it's wrong to assume something about her because she's female. I clearly wouldn't behave the same if she was male.

Fuck it. She'll get over it. I walked a few dozen feet behind her until she turned into her house. She probably never knew I was there. And it wasn't that much out of my way. Sexism be damned. I'll live with it.

And so will she.