Safety is not a man’s job

Self-defense and survival are universal skills

The price of one woman protecting herself from a man: a tossed beer bottle. image credit: pexels.com/wal_ 172619

I’ve noticed a pattern. I feel uncomfortable with a man how a man has interacted me, but I remain silent. Unable to find the words. Words that make them feel as uncomfortable as they have made me when they grabbed my waist or kissed my cheek or caressed my hair without permission. I felt like I owed them the courtesy of not embarrassing them, and maybe my discomfort was just the cost of it.

Just as there should not be one person in the household who knows how to cook, there should not be only one person in the home who knows how to defend.

When it was over, I would always feel so ashamed; I, a writer, could not build the proper sentence for the one word that should have sufficed. I thought my tongue should deliver flowers. “I don’t mean any harm, but could you not …”  “Would you mind not …” and “Can you please stop?” because sometimes one-word directives can be dangerous. 

Once, I was short with a man seeking my attention.  His response: to hurl a beer bottle at me. Later, the bottle-thrower waited for me at the end of the street. Another man volunteered to walk me home. 

My mind says, “You don’t have to find the perfect words,” but my body says “You’d better.” Because as righteous of a cause it may be not to censor my language, I want to be heard and still alive. So where does that leave me?  Old habits die hard, so I need safe spaces to practice “stop” and “no.” And I need to practice often enough for my body to remember my body is mine and not someone else’s. I need to prepare myself to keep myself safe, if I ever have to.

Would we have more confidence speaking up with words if we knew we could defend it with action? image credit: Shutterstock

My safety isn’t solely a man’s job, especially in scenarios when it’s a man who’s the very obstacle to my safety. A guy I was getting to know asked me how familiar I was with firearms. I responded I’m not at all, and I really didn’t have an interest in learning because I didn’t want to kill anyone. I’ve always relied on God for safety, and so far it’s worked, so I thought, why expend the extra effort?

I asked his stance. He responded, “I believe in defending my family with as much force as needed. It’s just a question I ask because it is important for me to know how I would need to compensate if we are ever in a situation where one or both of us are in danger.”  I found it sexy but also eye-opening. Without taunting or judging, he made me realize being able to defend a family is not one person’s responsibility. If dangers arise, is it in anyone’s best interest that I am helpless? Not his, my children’s, nor my own. Just as there should not be one person in the household who knows how to cook, there should not be only one person in the home who knows how to defend.

Many of us quietly accept overstepped boundaries because we’re not prepared to protect ourselves, if our “no” isn’t accepted. Many of us would probably have greater confidence in verbally defending ourselves if we were more confident in physically defending ourselves. Maybe it’s not about finding the right words and more about finding the right protective strategy. Though society propagates that “protecting and providing” are a man’s job, this is a stereotype that deserves as much pushback as the one about a woman’s role being in the home and kitchen. Survival skills are universal skills.