Friday, January 13, 2006

Incidents in London

Every Friday myself and two colleagues go to lunch at the neighbourhood pub. Not exactly riotous living - a sarnie and a spritzer. But even a mild splurge means cash, so last week I went to raid the piggy-bank and they went on ahead. The queue at Lloyds was over-long, and once I’d collected the money, I walked fast back to the pub. I’m in my middle fifties, and, yes, I’m overweight.

As I strode along in my jumper and jeans I was hailed by one of two lads standing outside another pub before the Pig and Whistle. Young men not above eighteen, one clutching a pint mug, the other smoking a fag, both rosy with beer and adolescence.

“Hey, missus! You’re doing a grand job of juggling them.”

Now in a college with a few hundred students, most of whom use the library, more of them know you than you can ever know yourself. I assumed they were greeting me as someone they recognised, and I didn’t quite catch, or fully understand what was said. So I stopped.

“Pardon?”

The one with the fag grinned. He cupped his hands, and moved them up and down suggestively. “You’re doing a grand job of juggling them, missus.”

I was flooded with rage. I had thought I was past the age of catcalls and wolf-whistles, and these boys were thirty years my junior. I said sharply, “I’d juggle your balls if I thought I could find them.”

That wiped the grin of his face, and set his partner laughing. I marched into the pub, sat down fuming, and told my girlfriends why.Brenda leaned forward. She’s a quiet girl, in her late twenties, attractive with her long black hair, but not a raver - her figure slight and boyish.

“I get it, too,” she said, “when I’m jogging, from boys as young as seven or eight. Making rude remarks about my breasts, telling me not to get jogger’s nipple.”

We were marvelling over this as evidence of early socialisation into the cult of the ‘macho male’ when an old gentleman, easily in his 70s, toddled over. He dropped a hand-written card in front of Maggie, winked broadly and retreated. She picked it up. In his spiky, old man’s hand, he’d written, “If you smile, I’ll know you want to sleep with me.”

This called for more talk, and a second spritzer. Ten minutes later, he returned for his answer. Maggie pursed her lips. “I’m not smiling”, she informed him. (Not seventy either.)

“Oh, well, worth a try!” he picked up the card - to use again? - and stood there, chatting. “It used to work better when I was younger”, he told us regretfully, “but I had them printed then. I think the printed cards worked better.”

(And you too, mister.) Aloud I suggested he staple his bank statement to it to make the bargain irresistible.

Just two nights later I was walking home from the tube when I was propositioned by two boys, about twelve. They told me they'd give me a fiver if I let them 'do it' to me. They seemed to think this was an irresistible offer. I was a woman, wasn't I? Over the hill, too, and therefore likely to be grateful. Perhaps I'd even do it for free. I was flabbergasted. I don't consider myself flashy, and I was dressed warmly and informally. No high heels. No make-up. It was eleven o'clock. What were they doing up? Who had taught them it was O.K. to accost any woman who came along and ask her for sex? Who had taught them that sex is something you pay for? I was angry then and I am angry now.

When ARE women safe from the unwanted attentions of any casual male passer-by? (“Cheer up, ducks. It may never happen.”) They begin to intrude on us - make passes or personal comments, force a response - in such a minor fashion, though never with our permission. We think we’re being silly if we resent it or resist it. Men often tell us we are being silly. “It’s only fun.” But where does encroachment end, and total invasion begin?

Last year in America I read a report that said appeal judges had reduced a man’s sentence for rape because his victim was ‘provocative’. She was four years old. Last night I heard on the news about an 88-year old woman raped in her own home. Today I read about a 12-week baby gang-raped by four perverts.

I suspect all this has to do with an assumption that men still have rights over women, and the power to enforce them. I suspect that it always begins with what's insidious and denied. “Only joking.” Hardly discernible at all, unless you’re on the look-out for it.Yes, it begins in small tyrannies, but all too often it ends in female terror and resentment. At how so many men feel free to exercise their ‘right’ to comment on or possess any woman. And yes – it does make me angry. It always will.


(First published in Everywoman [UK]. Oh, how I loved that magazine - and Spare Rib. Thank God we've still got Mslexia.)

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