artemiswasamerf:

My gay male friend revealed to me that he often crosses to the other side of the street when he is walking behind a woman so she doesn’t think he is following her. Before I could say “good” he continued with “I don’t want her to freak out that I’m walking behind her and pepper spray me or accuse me of sexual assault”. It just reminded me of “I can’t even talk to women without them getting all #metoo on me.” He then continued to say that sometimes he’ll speed up to cut in front of her, which I said “you speeding up towards her probably freaks her out more than anything.”

I had to explain to him that walking behind a woman and not acting suspiciously is enough to not make the woman uncomfortable. We know when something doesn’t feel right, and that isn’t exclusionary to when someone is following us or simply walking behind us. I’m just sick of males pretending like our fears are not justified or just some inconvenient thing. Women are stalked, followed, and assaulted on the streets every fucking day but you, a man, feels “inconvenienced” because the woman you are walking behind might feel nervous about your presence? Wow, poor you :/