Toxic Masculinity Is the Real Problem Behind Women's Harassment

These ideas all apply to men as well as women. In the middle of an interval workout on a rest period, if a fit guy with a gun comes up to me, I am as screwed as a woman.

The three basic ideas are 1) avoid dangerous situations. 2) Do not escalate with an aggressor (threatening, trying to fight for or hide your wallet,...) 3) Have an escape strategy, typically with a range weapon like pepper spray (or a gun if you are really into that, though I am not sure you can take a gun everywhere people run normally).

Self-defence fighting techniques almost never apply. No one attacks you without premeditating advantages like groups, weapons, ... which make your 110lb karate moves irrelevant.

Staying in places where you can call the authorities and use a weapon to disable your opponent(s) is the optimal self-defence strategy virtually always.

Alpha male 20 wrote:

Are you the 95% of dudes who don't harass women or do other obnoxious sh** to compensate for your inadequacy? Or are you the 5% of toxic-males who do because you feel the need to prove to yourself you're a tough guy?

This is directed at the f***s that give dudes a bad rap. Recognize the problem and be part of the solution. Quit b*tching and whining and thinking of only yourself.

I'm not reading this whole thread to find out if anyone has corrected you already, but there is no chance that 5% of males harass women. It's more like 0.1% at the absolute highest.

No, it's definitely at least 5% if you're including catcalling or pestering. If you are male and think you've walked with a girl or woman and not found that to be your experience, it's because you were there.

As a completely average, run of the mill runner who only really scans through letsrun when a big news story has happened, I'm always shocked to see the traction and contention that think pieces like this one get on the site.

I understand that the majority of commenters seem to be male. That they're American. That they're probably leaning towards conservatism and away from . But the overwhelmingly negative, flippant response to articles like this is frankly a little bit infuriating.

So what if only 5% of men actively leer at women who go for runs - as a society, we live in a culture where women are conditioned to be afraid of the night. Yes, I'm almost certainly not going to be killed, raped or even harassed while I'm running. But that doesn't matter. What matters is that at least 50% of the population is actively taught to be afraid of something that is only a problem because of the behaviour of a few.

I don't understand how women can be accused as being winging raging liberals just for commenting a fact. Running in the dark, or even just on a secluded street, can be terrifying - and there is nothing that we, as a society, are doing to try and even the root cause of this reality.

Incessant callous statements, regarding the ethnicity, diet, social class and gender that people just so happen to be or have seems to be the defining characteristic of letsrun. Honestly, with the frequency that these subjects are brought up as reasoning for deficiencies of others, I am at a loss as to how I'm the one obsessed with .

Whoops this is the first time I've commented - and it doesn't like the way I format my writing... now corrected.

As a completely average, run of the mill runner who only really scans through letsrun when a big news story has happened, I'm always shocked to see the traction and contention that think pieces like this one get on the site.

I understand that the majority of commenters seem to be male. That they're American. That they're probably leaning towards conservatism and away from "identity politics". But the overwhelmingly negative, flippant response to articles like this is frankly a little bit infuriating.

So what if only 5% of men actively leer at women who go for runs - as a society, we live in a culture where women are conditioned to be afraid of the night. Yes, I'm almost certainly not going to be killed, raped or even harassed while I'm running. But that doesn't matter. What matters is that at least 50% of the population is actively taught to be afraid of something that is only a problem because of the behaviour of a few.

I don't understand how women can be accused as being winging raging liberals just for commenting a fact. Running in the dark, or even just on a secluded street, can be terrifying - and there is nothing that we, as a society, are doing to try and even the root cause of this reality.

Incessant callous statements, regarding the ethnicity, diet, social class and gender that people just so happen to be or have seems to be the defining characteristic of letsrun. Honestly, with the frequency that these subjects are brought up as reasoning for deficiencies of others, I am at a loss as to how I'm the one obsessed with "identity".

Well said. Thank you. patti

You make good points and - as a man - I don't think I disagree with any of them. I believe the reason these articles tend to get such a strong response is because they almost always disregard the obvious and somehow manage to imply that it is the fault of the great patriarchy led by rich white males. We all know that is not the case, but they would not sell magazines that wrote about the dangers of running in lower income neighborhoods or near mentally ill homeless people living under overpasses. You know that is true. It is the great unsaid. Plus, to complain that it is unfair that you cannot put yourself in a dangerous situation is like complaining that the sky is blue. No matter what we do as a society, there will always be predators and prey. It is the way of the world.

I think I speak for 99.999% of the men on this site - even the trolls - when I say that if we saw a woman in a perilous situation while on a run, we would risk our life to help her out. Maybe that bothers you. I don't know... but it goes for men as well. I would help a fellow human if they needed help. We need to build each other up, not whine and moan about what is simply unavoidable (danger). There will always be danger, and while it is trendy to ignore the root of that danger and blame it on the blameless, it does no one any good. Boston College hottie in the article is not the cause of her problems...

As a white woman living in a white neighborhood in a majority white country, I gain many of the benefits that come along with a patriarchal societal structure - and yet I absolutely consider it to be these structures that permit harassment, not just on the streets, but everywhere. When one group of people are perceived by the broader society as having an oversized influence on the very functioning of that society, they are at a fundamental advantage. Yeah, running magazines certainly appeal to a certain audience when writing articles such as these, but nothing that they say in them is outright wrong (If anything, they have a tendency to be a bit bland).

I don't think that Keefe blames "Boston College Hottie" for her inability to run comfortably at night. Quite the opposite in fact. The ability to do as you please, when you please is desired by everyone - the "hottie" has certain freedoms that Keefe believes are unavailable to her - if anything, she is jealous.

Danger is, as you said, unavoidable and a fact of life. However, the assertion that as everyone is exposed to some level of danger while running, that the only thing we can do is aid others when we see them in actual trouble is dangerous in itself. There will always be nutters, who desire nothing more than to embarrass, belittle and hurt others, but one of the major reasons harassment is so prevalent is that of the 99.999% of men who would be willing to aid a fellow person while out on a run, significantly fewer are willing to admit to the societal structures that allow, and sometimes even encourage, negative behaviour.

And please... the media demonizes the poor and mentally ill enough as is - we don't need to assert that they're the reason people freak out while running.

Even though I disagree with the bulk of your arguments I was willing to give them consideration and acknowledge some validity.

And then you had to go ahead and type out that last sentence.

Is it possible to make a statement of your own without the currently-in-vogue SJW preambles? Please learn to think for yourself and stop it with the references to 'patriarchy' , 'privilege' and such. All of the academic SJW double speak is divisive and poisonous. Remember, all garbage multicultural theory falls on its face when applied to the individual, and it paints all of us into nasty little tribes being screwed by other little tribes, all in conflict with one another.

Tell the poor white trash infantryman, under fire and about to die, that he is privileged. Tell anyone in Somolia that you feel unsafe while running in the US. Any one of us can readily identify individuals who in no way fit the current narratives of 'oppression' or 'privilege', which in my book makes them useless in their application. They sound great when professor X is rambling on in multicult, but they fail in the real world.

While I'm at it, you really want your boys (and girls too) to lose their aggression? Will you still feel that way when you need to ship off a fighting force during a future Great War? Aggression and antagonism are baked into our very DNA as human beings, and if we lose the ability and want for the fight others will dominate us. That sucks but it is the way of the world, whether any of us likes it or not.

The world is dangerous and there are terrible people in it, along with beauty and wonder and wonderful people. Live your life and hope for the best while understanding the worst can happen. It doesn't have to be any more complicated than that.

Don’t worry. Guns aren’t for you. Leave that to the men. You can ask your boyfriend to hit the vandal with his purse.

duuuuuude - come on! I had to google what SJW even meant. Whoopidy do dah some people are liberal - what! a! shock! I'm pretty sure that your politics may have an influence on how you see the world as well...

Your post is truly moronic, childish, ignorant and naive beyond comprehension.

Root out the cause of ......crime? Are you a baby?

The idea that you and others are somehow trying to position one of the most fundamental issue of humanity into some kind of new and decisive social justice /identify politics cause.... in a running context is just astonishingly ignorant. To be honest, I’m less worried by everyday criminals than the utter stupidity of people like you. No joke.

If you aren't abreast enough of the cultural zeitgeist that drove the creation of the thread itself, why are you commenting?

calmthefarm wrote:

duuuuuude - come on! I had to google what SJW even meant. Whoopidy do dah some people are liberal - what! a! shock! I'm pretty sure that your politics may have an influence on how you see the world as well...

"I don't want the patriarchy to be like it is I want to tell it what to do"

women, be better

message board troll you don't have to think wrote:

"I don't want the patriarchy to be like it is I want to tell it what to do"

women, be better

Now that everyone is good and riled up I think I should point out the articles that followed the whole group of harassment articles. We have a recommendation of what marathon you should chose to do next led by an expert panel including none other that Dean Karnazes. Then we had an article about a guy who runs with Donkey's. Of course this was all sandwhiched between 40 pages of gear reviews and advertising. This is why I continue to shill out $5 a year for this magazine. It gives me the joy of meaningless outrage over it's horrible journalism.

Runners world please stick to articles about running with Donkeys. Because with your journalistic incompetence you really bumble any topic that requires intelligent thought.

Women will always be unsafe, because women will always vote for radical immigration and integration policies.

Women will walk down the street and get harassed by 100 black and latino men, and women will say that race has nothing to do with it.

Women will even go so far as to say that white supremacy made Jamal and Jose sexually harass them.

https://old.reddit.com/r/PublicFreakout/comments/dud95o/sucks_to_be_him/

https://old.reddit.com/r/PublicFreakout/comments/dud95o/sucks_to_be_him/