This week a blog post titled “I Debated Whether or Not to Share this Story” by a blogger named UnWinona spread through the internet like wildfire. The premise of her post focused on her frustration and outrage with clueless and crude men who hit on her during her daily commute on a Los Angeles train. She concludes her post by stating in bold italicized font: It’s not my fault I’m pretty.
It's not her fault she's pretty. Most recent picture of UnWinona I could find on her blog.
I read this woman’s story and immediately had mixed emotions about it. On one hand, I completely identify with her story. Being approached by men in an aggressive manner while taking public transportation, in the grocery store or simply walking down the street can make every day activities seem like a battlefield. As a woman I can concur that I’ve been obnoxiously hit on and even physically accosted in public places on a pretty regular basis. It’s annoying at best and a consistent invasion of privacy at worst.
On the other hand…
The first thing that jumps out at me about UnWinona’s post is the severity and extreme nature of the situation she describes. She says that one man who harassed her screamed at her and “screamed at his dead mother.” That doesn’t sound like aggressive flirtation or even sexual harassment. That sounds like a mentally disturbed passenger having a minute with his sanity, regardless of her being so impossibly “pretty.” Maybe she was trying to make a joke by suggesting he was yelling at his dead mom, but the rest of her post is so serious I can’t really tell.
Nevertheless, I have empathy for her. Like many women, I’ve also been called a stuck up bitch and a whore for rejecting men. Thankfully aggressive behavior is usually the exception, not the rule. In fact, most of the time when a strange guy strikes up a conversation with me, I’m flattered. Even if I’m not interested in him romantically I can appreciate the effort. Recently (and maybe this comes with age and a general feeling of warmth and curiosity towards my fellow man regardless of gender) I actually like to engage in conversation with random people who approach me.
I wonder if Unwinona dislikes being chatted up by all men, or just the pesky men on the train. If a “hot” guy approached her – one that she finds attractive – would she still be as offended or would she be flattered and happy to chat with a cute one? Keep in mind this is a woman with such a high opinion of her own appeal that she admittedly wears a fake wedding band to ward off all the unwanted male attention she receives.To be honest, I really don’t know what to make of this chick. At the very least her blog post brings up a lot of questions about male attention vs. “unwanted” male attention.
For example, women complain about being approached by creepers at bars. A guy they find unsuitable offers to buy them a drink and they get pissed off and feel like some weirdo just invaded their space. However, five minutes later the same woman might be excited, happy and totally open to receiving validation (and a free cocktail) when a “hotter” or more appropriate suitor approaches her at the same bar, for the same reason, in the exact same manner. Hot guys aren’t creeps but ugly ones are? How do men know if they are going to be deemed a creeper or a suitor? What are the rules? When is it okay to approach a woman and when is it an invasion? This contradictory conduct from women must be confusing and extremely infuriating to men.
I know I’m going to get flamed for this, but maybe UnWinona should talk to some of the men who approach her. Not because she “owes” it to them, but because men are people too. Obviously the men she describes in her post are not the type of dudes you want to befriend, but I bet many of the other males who try to strike up conversation with her on the train are just like the rest of us – lonely, bored, curious or simply trying to make a connection with a person they find attractive or interesting. What’s wrong with that?
About a year ago I made a decision to be more open minded about talking to strangers. When time and circumstances permit, I talk to pretty much anyone who approaches me. Not just men I find attractive or guys who” look like” a man I would date. If someone asks me what I’m reading or what type of tea I’m drinking, I look at it as an opportunity to meet a new human being and learn something. I never feel threatened and most of the time the experience is positive. Occasionally I even make a new friend.
One time I was sitting alone at a coffee shop. I was in a terrible mood. My boyfriend and I just broke up and I was annoyed, cranky and just wanted to stew in my anger and sip my drink in peace. I noticed two guys checking me out through the glass window and I thought to myself: “Please God do not let them come over here and bother me. I just want to be left alone.” A few minutes later, sure enough, they were standing at my table asking if the other two chairs were free. As cranky as I was, for some reason I replied “Yes. They are free. But I just went through a break up and I’m in a really bad mood so sit at your own risk.” The guys laughed, but chose to sit down with me anyway. Within a few minutes the three of us were talking, sharing shitty break up stories and laughing our heads off. A few hours and a gallon of ice tea later I was in a great mood. It’s now more than two years later and one of the guys and I are still friends. He even hooked me up with a job once!
My conversation with these men never materialized into dating or a romantic relationship, but that isn’t the point of just talking to people, is it? As a culture are we so jaded and selfish that we only want to engage in exchanges with people who provide us with an immediate benefit? Why do we see members of the opposite sex simply as a “yes” or a “no” even for basic conversation?
As children we are taught “Never talk to strangers.” That’s because we were KIDS. Young people don’t have the experience or decision making capabilities that allow us older folks to sense danger. Talking to new people seems inappropriate because it’s drilled into our heads since birth that there is “Stranger Danger” everywhere. Is it truly dangerous for an adult to communicate with another adult, even in public places? If so, that is really sad.
Back to her blog post…
I do entirely agree with UnWinona on some things. Women have a right to their personal space. A woman should not feel obligated to talk to a strange man, nor should she be emotionally and/or physically attacked just for trying to ride a train in peace. Sexual harassment and male entitlement is a dark and very serious aspect of gender relations in our society. Being called a bitch simply for rejecting a man’s advances is completely unacceptable and those men she described have serious issues that extend well beyond harassing women on a train. They are kooks.
Speaking of kooks, in a loose reference to the Todd Akin controversy, she uses her blog post to address to the idea of “legitimate rape” but then only uses examples of mentally unstable men acting like legitimate lunatics on a public train to illustrate a rapey scenario. Then she blames all this unwanted attention on the terrible burden of being “pretty.” I’m a little worried Unwinona is misrepresenting the female experience. I worry about type energy she is putting out there, particularly in the name of women. Or more accurately, “pretty” women. All I know from her blog post is that Unwinona is very adamant about two things: Most men on the train are creeps and she is pretty.
Really? Yikes. Being pretty – or even female – sort of becomes irrelevant once dudes start invoking the ghost of their dead mother.
This does NOT mean I am saying she deserves any of what she experienced or that she is “asking for it.” No means no, go away means go away and fuck off means fuck off. Trust me: I’ve lived it. I’ve been harassed. I’ve been scared. I’ve been called names. I’ve been “legitimately” raped. So I get it. Being a woman can mean having to deal with some pretty heavy and frightening experiences with men.
I wasn’t there so I don’t know what she experienced but it did sound awful. She should not feel unsafe or be harassed on a regular basis while using public transportation. I don’t have a lot of experience with the Los Angeles red line so I might have to hop on the metro and check it out. If there’s one thing about her post that isn’t debatable it’s this: That sounds like one crazy train and I’m not afraid to climb aboard and see.
This is a really well done and articulate post. I had the same mixed feelings of empathy vs confusion when I read Unwinona’s post. On one hand I have experience the unwanted harassment and have been frightened that I may be in trouble at times by the continuation of forced, unwanted attention given by men, but these are usually extreme circumstances. Unwinona’s post was not about the typical way a typical man approaches a woman he finds attractive in my opinion. Further more, what you said about being more open minded, and also about being flattered by some of it are also things I completely agree with. Not only does being approached sometimes bring me new friends, enjoyable conversation, or even a decent date now and then, it’s not really for me to say who is “worthy” of making an attempt at conversation with me in the first place. If I say no, or I tell you to go away, then sure..that’s exactly what you should do, but I don’t feel like it should be viewed as ignorance, or harassment to want to approach a woman in the first place. I think of that as a compliment personally. Like you, I also certainly agreed with her about many things she said about both harassment, and fear. It’s never okay, and overtly aggressive behavior is never something that any of us enjoy, welcome, or ask for. I do feel like the focus of her post was off though. I also feel it was a bit too insulting to the average male. What makes men so unworthy to approach Unwinona if done in a respectful manner?
I say all of this mostly just to say thank you for articulating the way I felt when I read her post. I respected it, felt sympathy and empathy with it, but also felt confused enough/disagreed with it enough to not re-post or promote it. Very nice post, Jenn.
I don’t know if you just missed the part where they guy actually said to her, “It’s not my fault you’re pretty” or if you deliberately ignored it but she only said it because he did. It was a “callback”, a literary device. The bulk of your article is spent arguing against a strawman because she didn’t argue that this happened because of her looks. Nor did it happen because of a lack of attractiveness on the part of the males who harassed her. It happened because she was female and in public.
I don’t understand why you’d bother saying that she should talk to more strange men when you acknowledge that she doesn’t owe it to anyone to do so. If she’d rather read than talk then who cares?
Most of these online responses have been attacking that very same strawman. Patriarchy is one helluva drug
The point she’s trying to make is that women are taught to be polite and flattered by male attention, and by rejecting it we are somehow stepping outside the norms of society, as if male attention is supposed to validate the fact that a woman is beautiful. As if the more attention you can rack up, the more beautiful you are, and rejecting this attention is somehow snotty and bitchy. UnWinona actually has a natural talent for making friends, she makes more friends faster than anyone I know and she has no problem talking to people, and she most definitely doesn’t discriminate because someone isn’t “hot”. I do agree that it must be very confusing for men to understand what is acceptable and what is not, as I will say that I have definitely tolerated behavior from one man that I would be creeped out by from another, just due to their personality or how well I know them. I think a good rule of thumb is just for men to accept that sure it’s OK to approach a woman, but understand that a woman on her own will have her defenses up and no means no, even if you were being polite as can be. Your post makes some good points, but you are making a lot of assumptions about UnWinona’s character that you have no evidence of except for the one blog post of her’s you’ve read.
Why is it when someone is street harassed by someone they label “creepy” everyone makes it about their looks?
I can tell you, it’s NOT about their looks.
I’d call myself average-looking. I work in a restaurant and PLENTY of fairly attractive men are constantly trying to hug me, touch me, say fucking creepy comments to me when none of them male servers or managers are around to ‘come to my defense.’ ATTRACTIVE MEN CAN STILL BE CREEPY ASS MOTHERFUCKERS. It’s not about how attractive they are, it’s not about how attractive I am. It’s about them making unwanted sexual advances.
What unwinona went through was a traumatic experience. If everyone could stop picking her apart, that would be just fucking lovely.
What she, “it’s not my fault I’m pretty,” is a response to what the man said to her, “it’s not my fault you’re pretty” it was a callback and it was used appropriately, not to talk about what a beautiful woman she is. Unwinona doesn’t take herself that seriously and if you followed her or even looked through her blog, that would be apparent.
And that is NOT the most recent picture of her. There are way more recent pictures all over her blog. You chose that one maybe because she’s covered in men, maybe because the other pictures put her in too good a light for you, I don’t know why, honestly.
But if everyone could just leave unwinona alone and stop dragging up this clearly traumatic experience, that would be lovely. I don’t know about you, but I wouldn’t like people picking apart an experience I had where I was sexually and otherwise harassed and threatened by a crazy person in a situation I couldn’t escape. That is what is wrong with our culture, anytime a woman shares something traumatic that happens to her, it has to become an object of scrutiny “it wasn’t really that bad” “he was just crazy” “If he were hot, you wouldn’t think that” those kinds of comments are not helpful. The fact that he was crazy doesn’t make the experience any less scary, it’s actually A LOT scarier. How do you people not realize that?
No, how do you people not realize that what you’re doing, tearing unwinona apart because something bad happened to her, and something very worse could have happened to her if she hadn’t gotten the fuck out of there is messed up?
Would you say these kinds of things to your best friend if she this were her? How about your mother or sister?
Then don’t say them about a girl who’s just been stuck with a crazy guy on a train and threatened with physical violence, all right?
Wow, that post had a lot of typos. I’m sorry, I wrote it very quickly and failed at proofreading.
*the male servers
*what she said, “…
*if this were her
You’ll see my early-morning typing failures if you read my comment. Which you should.
Oh my fucking God, you missed the entire point. Way to be an idiot and totally zero in one the last sentence she posted instead of what really fucking mattered.
Imbecile.
Seriously? You scrolled through her entire blog to find a picture, seemingly ‘read’ her whole train post, and STILL came to the conclusion she thinks all these things happened to her because she’s pretty? That line was just a callback. I really don’t think you read the whole post, or at least read it objectively and critically.
UnWinona shouldn’t start taking to more of those guys. She should whatever makes her comfortable, because she doesn’t owe anyone a conversation. End of story. If guys get mad that she doesn’t want to talk to them, fine that’s their beef, but they shouldn’t feel that it’s acceptable or that they are validated in taking their anger out on her, either verbally or physically. It’s the attitudes in society caused by patriarchy that is causing these things to happen to her.
I pity you for missing the entire message of Unwinona’s post. When someone shares an experience like hers, it’s not for you to dissect and pick apart based on your appearance (as evident by the fact that you needed to see a picture of her for comparison) and how you like to be approached by the opposite sex. This was an amazing piece of writing that used “a kook” as a way to demonstrate how something as simple as turning away an unwanted advance can escalate, especially when social norms allow it to. You made a point to state that you are not afraid to hop on the terrifying red line, but maybe you should embrace the inside of the public library to better understand underlying meanings behind someone’s writing and the ever-elusive callback.
However, the thing I pity you the most for is that you don’t know the woman behind this experience and, after reading your comments about her blog, I don’t think you deserve to. She is the kindest and most compassionate person I have ever known and I have never seen these characteristics waver. I should know, I’m her sister and her biggest fan.