On International Fucking Women’s Day

Yesterday:

“Can I ask you a question?”

“What’s up?”

“Why are all the girls in Austin hotter?”

Awesome. This is definitely the kind of thing I want to hear from my Lyft driver while wearing a slinky black tank top and getting a ride home alone after dark.

And on International Fucking Women’s Day.

I bullshit an answer while smiling and going through my emergency escape options. I don’t need any of them. He’s just an awkward guy asking awkward questions and apologizing for them. There’s no real danger, just the reminder that some people think that it is okay to say that to a woman they’ve never met while driving her home alone. The reminder that most men don’t even register the vulnerability of being a woman in that position, heightened by some casual objectification disguised as flattery.

A few hours earlier at a SXSW event with my friends a man came up to us raising money for non-profit. He did so with a rude humor routine and handing out stickers to us like “Girls Kick Ass”, “FedSex”, and the superman logo with the “BItch” printed in the center. It’s not my style of comedy but I can smile along – there’s the same toilet-humor vibe at the Renaissance Festival as well and I can take it in stride.

Yet. As the man singled us out for comments and sticker distribution, one of the first “flattering” things out of his mouth to me was about my sexiness and that I must be underage. Or something of the sort. As in, being an underage girl would make me even more fuckable.

And on International Fucking Women’s Day.

I would have liked to make him spell it out. That he’s sexualizing children. That having sex with an underage girl is rape. That making rape jokes normalizes sexual harassment and assault in our culture and allows the violent acts to keep happening. Hands rapists permission on a silver platter.

It’s just a joke. Easy to say when your safety is not the target.

But we poliety smiled through the rest of the bit and I gave a few bucks to benefit the non-profit.

Likewise with my Lyft driver. I made conversation all the way home. When I got out he asked if there was anything he could do better next time. He was just awkward, trying too hard. I wished I could have said, “don’t begin rides by objectifying your customer.” I didn’t. I said, “You’re great. Have a good night.”

I still had him drop me off on the other side of my apartment complex and walked through the dark parking lot rather than lead him to my front door.

None of these keep me up at night. It all feels normal which makes it feel all the worse. I might not even have written about them at all.

But come on. On International Fucking Women’s Day?

With Love,

Natalie