# Was this (white) woman acting in a unreasonable/racist fashion n this situation? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [August 9, 2013, 8:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-this-white-woman-acting-in-a-unreasonable-racist-fashion-n-this-situation/665834 "2013-08-09T20:17:25Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![drewtwo99](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/d07c76/32.png) [@drewtwo99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/drewtwo99)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2013, 11:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-this-white-woman-acting-in-a-unreasonable-racist-fashion-n-this-situation/665834/41 "2013-08-09T23:14:18Z")
I vote for a tiny bit of racism, a healthy dose of stranger danger fear, and perhaps sexism to boot. Not that I can honestly blame a lady for being nervous/scared/etc of a large guy who seems to be following her everywhere. ---
**Author:** ![Antinor01](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ecae2f/32.png) [@Antinor01](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Antinor01)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2013, 11:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-this-white-woman-acting-in-a-unreasonable-racist-fashion-n-this-situation/665834/42 "2013-08-09T23:20:46Z")
> [@Asimovian](#): > > This probably expresses a good deal of ignorance on my part, but I don’t think I’d ever realized that other people were as self-conscious about it as I tend to be. I have definitely crossed the street or rushed past a woman in order to minimize the likelihood of being mistaken as a threat. I also tend to be very conscious about not passing (if I can help it all) on the side a woman might be carrying her purse. Those attempts to reassure her, though, definitely have selfish motivation. It can be demoralizing (albeit understandable) to have a woman notice you and then deliberately shift her purse to the other shoulder. > > As to the question posed in the OP, I don’t think her actions were unreasonable, and I think it’s impossible to say whether or not race was a factor. I’m a smallish, gay, white guy and I do the same things. ---
**Author:** ![TBG](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/c89c15/32.png) [@TBG](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TBG)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2013, 11:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-this-white-woman-acting-in-a-unreasonable-racist-fashion-n-this-situation/665834/43 "2013-08-09T23:30:36Z")
I kept reading your post waiting for the racist part to show up. It never did. A woman being scared of a large man who seems to be stalking her (even though he’s not) isn’t racist. (It’s not sexist either, for that matter) ---
**Author:** ![Ibanez](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/a4c791/32.png) [@Ibanez](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ibanez)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2013, 11:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-this-white-woman-acting-in-a-unreasonable-racist-fashion-n-this-situation/665834/44 "2013-08-09T23:45:05Z")
I find it odd that people are assuming she’s being racist based on **Skald’s** account of what happened just because he’s black and she’s white. We don’t know what she was thinking. At the very least it’s a _be careful when walking alone, because some man is eventually gonna get ya_ I, a white dude have gotten the similar reactions from walking behind women who think I am stalking them. Last experience wasn’t long ago, a woman walking her german shepard. She looked back on occasion, so did her dog. Her dog started looking back more. She was walking ahead of me, I sense she was getting nervous even though it was early morning on a busy enough street I decided to walk around a building to take another path to get to work. She pops up ahead around the other end of the building both of us walking in the same direction again, me behind her. Her and her dog looking back at me once again. She finally stops and confronts me. She asks what is up with me and why her dog is always looking back. I told her that perhaps she thought I was stalking her, and her dog is picking up on her nervousness ? At that point I was worried about the dog, and told her to let me walk ahead of her to calm her down. I’m just going to work, and just happen to be walking in the same direction as her. It appears to be a common fear amongst women, why ? I don’t know, hopefully some will come along and explain why. All I know it sucks, sometimes I just cross the street just to avoid the whole thing. I’ve mastered fake loud coughing as well. This however is a little racist imo \*“Even when you’re wearing a suit, you look kind of like a smart thug,” \* ---
**Author:** ![Nzinga\_Seated](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/b5ac83/32.png) [@Nzinga\_Seated](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nzinga_Seated)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2013, 11:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-this-white-woman-acting-in-a-unreasonable-racist-fashion-n-this-situation/665834/45 "2013-08-09T23:46:05Z")
It is impossible for me to tell if racism was involved. I have gotten scared of men at night alone; white, black, didn’t matter. I believe it is MY problem if I am scared of a man at night. It isn’t his problem, so it was extra cool of you to go out of your way not to spook her. (heh heh…slur-pun). You didn’t have to do that. ---
**Author:** ![Rushgeekgirl](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rushgeekgirl/32/3715_2.png) [@Rushgeekgirl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rushgeekgirl)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2013, 11:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-this-white-woman-acting-in-a-unreasonable-racist-fashion-n-this-situation/665834/46 "2013-08-09T23:50:04Z")
You know I’m in Memphis witcha. It wouldn’t matter what color your skin was, you got manparts I’m going to be nervous if I feel like you’re following me. Actually you don’t even need the manparts, but that would definitely put a scare in me. I’ve been assaulted in the past, so I just get skittish, ya know? She could have been the same way…OR she could have been a raving racist. But why does it matter at this point anyway? ---
**Author:** ![Rushgeekgirl](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rushgeekgirl/32/3715_2.png) [@Rushgeekgirl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rushgeekgirl)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2013, 11:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-this-white-woman-acting-in-a-unreasonable-racist-fashion-n-this-situation/665834/47 "2013-08-09T23:52:22Z")
> [@Living\_Well\_Is\_Best\_Revenge](#): > > I’d say racist. You gave her no reason to think you were a threat. Why racist? Why not sexist? ---
**Author:** ![Kaio](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/c68b51/32.png) [@Kaio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kaio)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2013, 11:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-this-white-woman-acting-in-a-unreasonable-racist-fashion-n-this-situation/665834/48 "2013-08-09T23:57:16Z")
> [@Ibanez](#): > > It appears to be a common fear amongst women, why ? I don’t know, hopefully some will come along and explain why. All I know it sucks, sometimes I just cross the street just to avoid the whole thing. I’ve mastered fake loud coughing as well. [Because of shit like this.](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?p=12602768#post12602768) Yeah it sucks, but so does being terrified that you’re about to get beaten up by a stranger with anger management issues. (He was easily twice my mass, pure muscle.) If you are, to all appearances, following me down the street, I can’t tell that you’re harmless, and you look like you aren’t. ---
**Author:** ![lavenderviolet](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/cdc98d/32.png) [@lavenderviolet](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lavenderviolet)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2013, 12:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-this-white-woman-acting-in-a-unreasonable-racist-fashion-n-this-situation/665834/49 "2013-08-10T00:00:46Z")
> [@TBG](#): > > I kept reading your post waiting for the racist part to show up. It never did. A woman being scared of a large man who seems to be stalking her (even though he’s not) isn’t racist. (It’s not sexist either, for that matter) Yes. I had to :rolleyes: at the people bringing up racism and sexism just because she was wary of a strange man who SEEMED to be following her. That is not racism or sexism. It is a rational behavior by a woman who correctly realizes that she is in a vulnerable situation and is more concerned with her own safety than with “being nice”. While she was very fortunate that Skald was harmless, she had no way to know what his intentions were. For all we know, perhaps she had been raped in the past and that was one of the reasons she was so on alert. I am reminded of a quote from the author of “The Gift of Fear”, Gavin de Becker: > [@](#): > > Just like ignoring your intuition, Gavin says the way women are conditioned to be nice all the time can lead them into dangerous situations. “The fact is that men, at core, are afraid that women will laugh at them. And women, at core, are afraid that men will kill them.” > > This conditioning and fear, Gavin says, lead many women to try to be nice to people whose very presence makes them fearful and uncomfortable. They often believe that being mean increases risk, he says, when in fact the opposite is true. > > “It’s when you’re nice that you open up and give information, that you engage with someone you don’t want to talk to,” he says. **“I have not heard of one case in my entire career where someone was raped or murdered because they weren’t nice. In other words, that’s not the thing that motivates rape and murder. But I’ve heard of many, many cases where someone was victimized because they were open to the continued conversation with someone they didn’t feel good about talking to.”** I honestly think that those of you screeching about racism and sexism are contributing to the very sorts of mindsets that cause women to be victimized in our society. When someone is scaring you, your priority is your own safety. You have every right to tell a stranger “fuck off” if they are making you feel uncomfortable. It’s a lot easier for someone to get over the hurt feelings of a stranger being rude than it is for someone to recover from the trauma of being raped or otherwise harmed. ---
**Author:** ![Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skald_the_Rhymer)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2013, 12:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-this-white-woman-acting-in-a-unreasonable-racist-fashion-n-this-situation/665834/50 "2013-08-10T00:02:32Z")
> [@Ibanez](#): > > It appears to be a common fear amongst women, why ? I don’t know, hopefully some will come along and explain why. All I know it sucks, sometimes I just cross the street just to avoid the whole thing. I’ve mastered fake loud coughing as well.😕 😕 Are you seriously saying that, given the history of the human species, you don’t understand why many women are frightened by the prospect of being followed by men whom they don’t know? > [@](#): > > This however is a little racist imo \*“Even when you’re wearing a suit, you look kind of like a smart thug,” \* I didn’t take it as racist. ---
**Author:** ![Rushgeekgirl](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rushgeekgirl/32/3715_2.png) [@Rushgeekgirl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rushgeekgirl)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2013, 12:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-this-white-woman-acting-in-a-unreasonable-racist-fashion-n-this-situation/665834/51 "2013-08-10T00:08:53Z")
Nevermind this here post. . . ---
**Author:** ![Ferret\_Herder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/e47774/32.png) [@Ferret\_Herder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ferret_Herder)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2013, 12:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-this-white-woman-acting-in-a-unreasonable-racist-fashion-n-this-situation/665834/52 "2013-08-10T00:25:26Z")
> [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](#): > > One thing that strikes me as odd about this discussion is that nobody’s mentioned the first girl in the story–the redhead who always made a point to sit beside me on the bus. You said she was of your acquaintance. I assumed she was your friend/acquaintance/coworker/something and thus knew you well enough to know that you were of decent character. Was this not the case? As a woman who has unfortunately encountered sexual violence, I tend to be very wary of being alone with strange men in isolated areas. Crank up the wariness if he seems significantly larger than me, due to the physical difference. ---
**Author:** ![Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skald_the_Rhymer)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2013, 12:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-this-white-woman-acting-in-a-unreasonable-racist-fashion-n-this-situation/665834/53 "2013-08-10T00:29:42Z")
> [@Ferret\_Herder](#): > > You said she was of your acquaintance. I assumed she was your friend/acquaintance/coworker/something and thus knew you well enough to know that you were of decent character. Was this not the case? What I meant was that the fact that she thought it desirable to sit beside me on the bus, in a sense, validated the other girl’s apprehension. I don’t remember her exact words the first time she asked if I minded her sitting next to me, but I think it was something like, “I know you won’t bug me like … certain people.” ---
**Author:** ![WhyNot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/c77e96/32.png) [@WhyNot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WhyNot)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2013, 12:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-this-white-woman-acting-in-a-unreasonable-racist-fashion-n-this-situation/665834/54 "2013-08-10T00:30:12Z")
I would have (probably) reacted the same way. And the same way to a white man, and the same way to a black woman or white woman considerably larger than I am (which isn’t many of them.) Seeing someone I don’t know once is just life. Twice is coincidence and me being me, I’d probably crack a joke like, “hey, stalking me?” Three feels like a stalker for real. I’m going to start thinking you want money, or sex, or to hand me a bible tract. Where I’d differ is the last reaction (the elevator one.) At that point, I’m bright enough to figure out that you probably live here too, and I’d laugh my ass off at a sudden awareness of the misplacedness of my fear and, if you’re cute enough, invite you out to coffee. 😉 I don’t think removing oneself from a situation out of a (misplaced, in this case) sense of self-preservation is “treating someone like a criminal”. If I was treating someone like a criminal, I’d be calling the cops and pulling out my pepper spray, and probably not in that order. ---
**Author:** ![carlotta](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/898d66/32.png) [@carlotta](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carlotta)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2013, 12:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-this-white-woman-acting-in-a-unreasonable-racist-fashion-n-this-situation/665834/55 "2013-08-10T00:33:01Z")
I don’t think her behavior was unreasonable at all. It was an unfortunate situation. Could there have been an element of racism, however despised within herself? Possibly. If all things were equal…your size, your smile, your relentless showing up…and you were white/latino/asian/etc…it’s pretty easy to imagine her reacting exactly the same way. How do you feel about your seatmate’s comment to you Skald? Calling you a thug, even a smart one, seems more objectionable to me than seeming scared of you when you appear to be stalking her. **drifts off into fantasies of whiling the night away on speculation hypothetical and otherwise with a large, smart, suited man who likes to read and bake** ---
**Author:** ![Ferret\_Herder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/e47774/32.png) [@Ferret\_Herder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ferret_Herder)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2013, 12:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-this-white-woman-acting-in-a-unreasonable-racist-fashion-n-this-situation/665834/56 "2013-08-10T00:33:26Z")
> [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](#): > > What I meant was that the fact that she thought it desirable to sit beside me on the bus, in a sense, validated the other girl’s apprehension. I don’t remember her exact words the first time she asked if I minded her sitting next to me, but I think it was something like, “I know you won’t bug me like … certain people.” OK, I really did think she knew you personally, from your wording. Might’ve been the suit. I’ll admit to being a person who thinks suits give some air of respectability. (Unless you’re in certain bars in what’s called the “Viagra Triangle” in Chicago - then forget it, that doesn’t help.) I missed the “screamed” part in the elevator, too. Like **WhyNot** , at that point I like to think I would have face-palmed myself so hard I’d knock myself out. ---
**Author:** ![SeaDragonTattoo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/df705f/32.png) [@SeaDragonTattoo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SeaDragonTattoo)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2013, 12:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-this-white-woman-acting-in-a-unreasonable-racist-fashion-n-this-situation/665834/57 "2013-08-10T00:43:48Z")
As a woman who walks alone at night a lot, she seemed to overreact just a little to me, but I have no idea if she had previous assaults/muggings happen to her that would put her on edge even more. I definitely do not like anyone behind me, no matter gender or race. My solution to this is to fake a shoe-tying, or to “forget” something that should be in my bag and to need to stop to rummage in it, giving the follower time to get ahead of me. So far, it has worked well. If the person has ill will, they know perfectly well I’m aware they’re up to something, and if they’re oblivious, they go on their way with no awkwardness. ---
**Author:** ![Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skald_the_Rhymer)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2013, 12:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-this-white-woman-acting-in-a-unreasonable-racist-fashion-n-this-situation/665834/58 "2013-08-10T00:52:26Z")
> [@carlotta](#): > > How do you feel about your seatmate’s comment to you Skald? Calling you a thug, even a smart one, seems more objectionable to me than seeming scared of you when you appear to be stalking her. It didn’t bug me; in context it was unobjectionable. It was part of a joking conversation. > [@Ferret\_Herder](#): > > OK, I really did think she knew you personally, from your wording. Oh, she did, though only slightly at that point. We got to know one another better when she made it a regular thing of sitting beside me on the bus. ---
**Author:** ![Girlundone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/919ad9/32.png) [@Girlundone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Girlundone)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2013, 12:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-this-white-woman-acting-in-a-unreasonable-racist-fashion-n-this-situation/665834/59 "2013-08-10T00:58:29Z")
I wonder if that red headed chick gets tired of always being referred to by her hair color. ---
**Author:** ![Trinopus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/2bfe46/32.png) [@Trinopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trinopus)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2013, 1:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-this-white-woman-acting-in-a-unreasonable-racist-fashion-n-this-situation/665834/60 "2013-08-10T01:05:42Z")
> [@Miller](#): > > I’m a largish white guy, and I’ve had similar things happen . . . This. Just today, in fact, I was out a-walkin’, and found myself walking just slightly faster than the lady ahead of me. I was creeping up on her by inches. And she was damn well aware of me. About the fourth time she glanced over her shoulder at me, I just shrugged and crossed the street. How do you measure a perception? How do you demonstrate it? A friend of mine got raped (many years ago.) She (a white woman) said, in horrible honesty, that she was thankful that it was a white man who raped her, because, had it been a black man, she would never have been free from the racist fears and prejudices that it would have left her with. She knows how irrational that would be, but the mind is not a rational place. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-this-white-woman-acting-in-a-unreasonable-racist-fashion-n-this-situation/665834.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-this-white-woman-acting-in-a-unreasonable-racist-fashion-n-this-situation/665834.md?page=4)