Actually, not so funny

Yesterday something disturbing happened to me. I was walking down Fulham Palace Road at about 11:30 PM when a guy on a bike rode by and shouted something at me. I wasn't really paying attention, so I just ignored him and he seemed to ride on, but he did stare at me for a bit. I went on walking, and then saw that he'd stopped ahead, just before a pedestrian crossing I had to cross.

I passed him and he didn't say or do anything, so I assumed nothing was going on, but soon enough he pulled up next to me and asked me whether I was single. I replied that I wasn't. Up to this point, the exchange was unwelcome and uninvited, but if it had stopped there I may have just forgotten about it (even though I don't condone it: approaching someone on the street, especially someone physically smaller, without an excuse me, and with an obviously "sexual" object in mind, is intimidating and should not be permitted). However he went on.

"You look pissed off, something happen tonight?"

I didn't reply to this, kept walking, and something must have changed in my expression because he then said:

"Ah, a smile. So you're really not single?"

"No"

"Why are you walking alone then?"

Maybe I should have just ignored him. Kept on walking without saying anything, or stopped at the bus stop so he'd leave me alone. But I couldn't do it.

"So wait, you're saying if I'm not single I can't walk on the street on my own?"

"Yeah, you need a strong man next to you to protect you. Where is this guy? Why isn't he with you if you ain't single?"

"Wait, so you're saying, if I'm single I can walk down the street on my own, but if I'm with someone, I can't?"

"Yeah, yeah, you need a strong man to protect you!"

"Protect me from what? I should be completely safe walking down the street."

"No, you need a man to protect you"

"Look, that's just not true, and it's wrong. I'm allowed to walk down the street safely on my own. I don't need anyone to protect me, and it's not whoever I'm with's job to protect me."

"So you're saying I'm talking bullshit?"

"No, I said what you said is not true and it's wrong."

"That's the same as saying I'm talking bullshit"

At this point I didn't answer. He was right after all, I was saying he was talking bullshit. We continued for a few seconds, and then he tried another tack.

"Where are you going?"

"A friend's place, not that it's any of your business"

(Don't ask me why I provided this information, it was unnecessary and could be regarded as conversational. I should have just ignored him, but I can't always act how I should. I was still reeling from the fact that he'd told me that because I wasn't single I couldn't walk down the street on my own).

"So, you going out tonight?"

"That's none of your business".

"Where do you live?"

"That's none of your business"

Silence for 10 seconds or so.

"So you live close by?"

"That's none of your business"

"Well, you must live close by, you're walking home"

"No, I said I'm walking to a friend's place, I could've just come from the station"

"Yeah, cos you're going home. If you didn't live close by you would have just taken the bus"

At this point, I felt like I'd had enough.

"Look, I'm not interested. I don't want to talk, so have a good night, OK?"

"Why are you being like that?"

No reply from me. At this point I'm turning into the road I was going to, a much less concurred road, and he follows me.

"Ah, you're turning here, yeah this is the way I'm going too"

"Hey, look, you're following me, it's not nice, it's creepy, please stop"

"Why are you being so aggressive?"

I stop on my tracks.

"I'm not being aggressive. I'm telling you I'm not interested, I don't want to talk, to leave me alone, and you're following me around. What you are doing is intimidating and creepy."

"But I'm just going down this road. It's on my way, you're the one being a bitch about it, I haven't done anything"

At this point I refused to reply anymore. He followed me until I got to my friend's place asking why I was being so rude/mean/aggressive, and then when I turned inside he said something along the lines of, "Oh, so you're here eh? I think you need to be a bit less aggressive tonight, with your friends."

I walked into the house and he left. I can't say I was extremely scared for any of the situation, after all, I had a bag with four bottles of beer which I could have hit him with if he'd tried anything, but that's not the issue. The issue isn't where this guy got the idea that if a girl is single she can't walk down the street on her own (though it could well be), or that he can follow someone around after they've told him they feel uncomfortable and to please stop (though again, that could perfectly well be the issue. Tip: it's one thing to approach someone extremely politely on the street and ask them if they would mind talking, and respecting whatever answer they give you, it's another to open with a personal question and to follow them. This is wrong). The issue here is that I went into the house, sat down with my friends and told them what had just happened. I came off a bit nervous about the incident, but I told it in a comedic fashion. As though what had just happened was funny. It wasn't funny. Not for one second. I felt intimidated. I didn't feel in actual physical danger, but I did think of ways to defend myself in case something happened. And I felt diminished, and disrespected. I clearly stated that I wasn't interested, I told him he was following me and that I didn't like it, and I told him that what he was doing was wrong. And he didn't stop. It was degrading, and scary, and not funny at all. But I walked into the house, saw my friends, and pretty much laughed the incident off.

The reason this is an issue is because recently I told another friend of mine the story of how when I was going for a run in Santa Fe, at one point a man came running behind me and grabbed my ass. I hadn't told anyone before, and I'd sort of written off the incident as one crazy man. I told this friend the story as an example of sexism. She looked at me fixedly and said:

"Yeah, but that's not just sexism. It's assault."

She was right.

I was incapable of recognizing that what had happened to me went somewhat beyond discrimination due to my sex, and went into the realm of consent. This man had touched me without my permission, without any sort of invitation. How did I not recognize this? How did I just write it off?

The fact is, I am sexist. And I'm trying not to be. The fact that I was able to pretty much laugh these incidents off gives me insight into how ingrained this sexism is. If I laugh it off, the idea it gives to other people is that these things are, maybe not "alright", but definitely, "not that big a deal". And they are a big deal. No one should ever be touched against their will. No one should ever feel intimidated when walking down the street.

Because here's the thing: telling someone that they can't walk down the street on their own, that they should be accompanied by someone who will protect them, is akin to threatening that something will happen if they're not. But more than that, it is victim blaming. It's saying that if a person who isn't single walks down the street on their own, they're setting themselves up for trouble. This is victim blaming. Because that morning in New Mexico I just wanted to go for a run, that was all that was on my mind, and this man took that away from me.

Personal freedoms

I've gone on about this before, in the context of abortion, but the more I think about it the more I realise it's not just about abortion.

'My body, my choice' is a question of freedom, of rejecting Stare intervention, of having the possibility to live your life how you want to live it.

The discussion was about drugs, and whether they should be banned or not, not from an economic point of view but from a moral point of view. Does the government have the right to decide for people what is good or bad for them? Of course not. People are not stupid, and should not be treated like they are. People are grown ups and they can make choices, and (in the society I live in) they are generally free to make these choices.

However there is a point of contention here. If I accept that people are free to do what they want with their bodies as long as they don't hurt anyone else, then what about people with dependants? These people may not directly harm anyone by taking drugs, but being responsible for other people, they might indirectly harm them (for example by spending money meant for taking care of these dependants on drugs/whatever else).

Should these people be stopped from doing this by the government? Should different rules apply to people who are responsible for other people? No. The same rules should apply to everyone. Substances should not be banned, no matter how harmful or addictive they are: alcohol is more dangerous than heroin, and it is still legal. It is however possible to make it illegal to not take responsibility for your dependants. 

Let's put an example out there: a man who is addicted to morphine and is responsible for his wife, who happens to have a chronic illness. As long as he's taking good care of her, the government should have nothing to say. But even if he weren't, the solution shouldn't be to illegalise morphine, but to take away his responsibility (and any benefits he receives due to this responsibility). Of course, his wife also has a say in this. If she feels she wants to stick with her husband, no one can stop her, even if he isn't providing adequate care. It's their choice after all. 

In the case of dependants who cannot make their own choices, it is the governments' responsibility to make sure they are well cared for, not to make the people who are at any point responsible for them any less free. In this scenario, parents might be denied guardianship of their children if they are not taking good care of them, but simply taking  drugs is not a good measure of whether they are good parents.

People are more complex than their actions. Kant summarised this by proposing a moral of absolutes, rather than declaring 'good' or 'bad' actions.

Beginnings

It's the final year. After delaying it for as long as I could, I'm here, at the start of my last year of uni, and as much as I'd like to say I'm looking forward to finishing, I'd be lying. No, I like being a student. I love the nights out, and the long conversations, the dropping in, and the not having any responsibilities whatsoever ('cause let's face it, I don't). So I'm starting this year with a lot of apprehension, and doing as much as I can (outside the classroom) to make up for the fact that it's the last time I'll be able to. I'm going out. I'm joining clubs. I'm meeting people. I'm buying drinks. One thing I haven't done yet is write a post here, though.

I started a few posts. A couple of them technical (they're still in preparation, they will be posted at some point), a couple of them stories. But I didn't feel like publishing them, they didn't feel right, partly because I didn't feel right.

I haven't published anything in about a month, because I have not been writing anything publishable. A lot of poems, a fantasy diary (might publish a couple of entries of that in due time), a lot of work on one of the novels, but nothing "suitable" for the blog, whatever that means. I haven't been in the mood, or rather, everything that I tried to write became either too technical or too personal to publish. So here goes.

Uni started a couple of weeks ago, and I've been back in London for a bit less than a month. Since I've come back I've been going out a lot, drinking quite a bit (mum, dad, if you're reading this don't worry, nothing dangerous), and I've met a lot of people. I needed it. I needed to get it out of my system that a lot of people in my year have graduated (though loads of them are still at Imperial, which helps), and that I'd be graduating in a few months, and that this year is going to be tough. I wouldn't say that I've been happy exactly, just a bit frantic about doing as much as I could. I think that mood is over now, and I can go back to being my usual lazy self. Maybe. I've quite enjoyed these two weeks of exciting, but I'm afraid if I keep this up I won't graduate! So let's see, exactly what have I been up to?

There have been celebrations, which were good fun, but I'm not going to talk about here, since they involve my friends and I don't know a) how many of them read this or b) how happy they would be if I did write about them, there have been restarts, and there have been new starts.

Let's start with the restarts. I'm back in ICSE full time! I'm ICSE treasurer, we've already had one rehearsal, and I'm back to being able to attend most rehearsals. The first rehearsal was lots of fun with plenty of new freshers and what I thought was a good social afterwards. I'm so happy to be back playing my viola and back seeing the ICSE crowd, I hadn't realised how much I'd missed them. As a spinoff from that (a fantastic recommendation from a fellow ICSE member), I've been watching the Lizzie Bennet Diaries, which are FANTASTIC, and you HAVE to watch them if you haven't yet (I refuse to explain what they are, no description does them justice).

I'm also back at Uni, which in itself is fantastic. I'm enjoying the M3D (molecules in 3D, about how to determine molecular structure and dynamics) lectures like you wouldn't believe, but also just being around Uni, having interesting people who do so many different things around (this sounds so cliché, but seriously, after working in a place where people's only interest was science for a whole year it's amazing to be able to sit down with someone and discuss films or music or books... not that I didn't last year, but there's just a lot more chances this year). I also love not having to commute though (small confession) I miss having the quiet time to read. It seems that as long as I have internet and a phone I am completely incapable of switching off for a while and picking up a book (to my own embarrassment).

Now for the new starts: I have started going to DebateSoc meetings and I've joined Fellwanderers. The first DebateSoc meeting was great fun, and I think I'm really going to enjoy being part of the society. They talk, they talk well, and they like to argue about stuff. About stuff that they don't necessarily have strong feelings about. This is my kind of people. We'll see how it goes tomorrow, and hopefully I'll go on a trip with them sometime soon: one thing I've learnt is that the best way of becoming a "real" member of a Uni club is to go for a trip with them. It may sound unrealistic, but spending a couple of days with people you don't know that well really does make you more comfortable around them. Which leads to the second start.

This past weekend I went on the Fellwanderers Freshers trip to Snowdonia, and I have to say, I had lots of fun. There was a lot of hiking (which I hadn't done in a while, and it felt fantastic), a lot of talking and faffing about, a few games on Saturday evening and it was just generally a really good weekend. I hadn't realized how much I needed to diversify, do something that I hadn't done in ages, and just spend a weekend from London (of course, I did go to the US, but that was with my parents, and as much as it was an amazing trip, I needed some time off that wasn't family related).

Anyways, that's it for the first post of the (school) year. I hope that I'll be able to post about horse evolution, vesicular transport and maybe a bit about crystallography of membrane proteins soon. Then again, I might just do a really long post on what I think education should consist on. Hope you're all doing well!

H