As I walked by the group of young men I felt myself tense up and walk a bit faster, discretely I turned my music off so I could hear if they said something of started walking after me. Exaggerated? Maybe, but why would I, a soon to be 27 year old woman be scared of a group of young men, what have they done to me? Nothing! Nothing at all, isn't it crazy how society is? I mean, today's society is built in a way where we women are scared of walking out alone, we fear being raped, followed and sexually harassed. It shouldn't be that way, never.
Now people, probably mostly men, will say "not ALL men are like that". I know that! I know plenty of nice and kind men. But WHY, why in the whole wide world do we women, no matter age, have to be scared when we are out alone. This summer I have read about countless of sexually harassed young women at festivals and such as, where men have taken the freedom to touch and in some occasions they tried to rape the woman. I feel sick hearing that, I do wonder what their mother would say if she knew what her son just did. That mother who birthed him, raised him - he should be respecting the woman... Or? Are there so many boys growing up learning that women are objects and deserve being treated as such? I really can't wrap my bead around all this. Is it purely the up bringing that creates it? Or is it the media, peer pressure? Maybe all the above, I don't think will ever understand.
As I now sit comfortably on my sofa, sipping on my tea with the dog snoring next to me. The thoughts of knowing that right now, a boy is born into this world and he will be raised by a loving mother or at least meet with wonderful women that will impact his life. And even though these women will iimpact him, he will one day go to far with a girl or a woman and it saddens me. How can we in the society raise men that will one day grow up to respect the women in this world? Isn't it everyone's responsibility to make that both men and women, girls and boys walk safely on our streets? I do think so, because a boy doesn't born into becoming a rapist or someone who sexually abuses our young girls on festivals.
Maybe I am wrong in all this, maybe I am right. But I do know that we all play a part in how the society ends up.
