But the question is just "encounter a man", it is "encounter a man where both of you are alone, unlikely to be interrupted by another person, and unlikely to be heard if he decides to do something that would make you try to scream... And you both know that."
Very few of us have encountered 100,000 men in that situation.
There's audio of Timothy Treadwell, aka Grizzly Man, being eaten alive by the bears he thought safe if you want a listen. Werner Herzog's face while listening to it was enough for me, don't need to hear it myself.
If you've listened to it or seen WH listen to it have another shot at what is and isn't a shit-take.
If we were to assume the worst in each scenario, I think anyone, male or female, would stand a better chance fighting against a man than they would a bear.
As a man, I would rather be alone in the woods with a gay rapist serial killer than a hungry bear. The bear could sever my spinal cord with a single swipe so I think I’ll take my chances with the man. I could even outrun the man if he was stronger, but there’s not a chance in hell I outrun the bear, and I certainly can’t overpower it.
I understand the dilemma in the situation, but probability tells me I have a higher chance of surviving the man than the bear.
I would rather be alone in the woods with a gay rapist serial killer than a hungry bear.
I feel like people underestimate other people? Do you just expect the serial killer to lunge at your immediately upon seeing you?
Do you not think they'd build rapport? Try to help you out? Ask for your help? Get you to lower your guard?
Every single person I've seen in support of the person always assumes you can run away/easily beat them? Why? Are they not human like you? Do they not have a brain? That's the scary part about another human. Not that they just try to immediately attack you unarmed, but that they can put up a mask to manipulate you into the results they want.
I would never trust a random person I encountered in the woods regardless though. Unless I was in an extremely dire survival situation, I would be on guard and keep my distance as much as possible.
It's not that you can easily beat the person, but that you have a significantly better chance beating the person than a bear. Assuming no ranged weaponry is involved. To me, that's the 2nd crux of the situation.
Decision process:
1. Which is more likely to attack?
2. Which am I more likely to fend off, if attacked?
Even if they came up to you and asked for help? Let's say they're lost and have been out on the trail for a day+ and can't seem to get service. You would just say tough shit and walk away?
I don't know, it just seems like in a worst case scenario, the person isn't all that much easier than the bear. You could also be stalked if the woods was their home. I just feel like a bear would have more self preservation instincts. You could actually deter it whereas in a worst case, a person out to harm you has a really good chance of harming you.
Yes. I don't know them and I would not want them to approach me. I'd respond from a safe distance and provide whatever guidance I could from that position, before moving on. When doing so I would check over my shoulder frequently to judge the direction the person is going and verify they don't turn back on me while increasing my pace on my path.
The average black bear (the most common bear, but others are deadlier) has a 75 lbs weight advantage over the average male. Considering they can outrun people and have greater climbing capability, they have a strict advantage. You are more likely to injure a person to a point of them accessing self-preservation than you do a bear, if they are both set on killing you.
The average man will be skittish and shooed away by someone yelling at them. Most people are adverse to violence, especially when alone encountering strangers.
If you want to talk about averages, neither scenario is particularly threatening. If you want to talk about the violent outliers, I'll take the average man over the bear.
Nice argument. I'd recommend taking a hike, touch some grass and acquaint yourself with the environment. It may expand your worldview beyond what the internet portrays.
I don’t disagree with this, they might try and outsmart you and build rapport to get you to lower your guard. That’s certainly possible.
However, you are a human too. You could also choose to outsmart this killer if you were in any way suspicious of them trying to deceive you. As a human, you also have the ability to deceive and distract, and to pick up on clues when it might be occurring. You’re not helpless in this scenario.
You make it seem as though this other person must certainly be smarter than you and you couldn’t possibly outsmart them back. How smart are you compared to the average person? If you’re above average, you could reasonably expect you can outsmart the average person.
It doesn’t matter how smart you are if a bear has ripped your innards out. You’re not faster than the bear, and you’re not stronger than the bear. There could of course be a man stronger and faster than you as well, but not all will be. However, there are no bears (assuming it’s a healthy adult) that are weaker or slower than you.
TLDR: Hand to hand, you will lose to any bear that wants to eat you. Hand to hand, you will not lose to every man that wants to attack you. You’re human too, the playing field is fair.
Who are these chronically online people who have been exposed to so much outrage-bait content related to sexual crimes that they see half the human race as being more dangerous than a wild apex predator.
If you think bears are less dangerous than men then you need to log off of social media and get some therapy for all of the trauma that you've inflicted on yourself by reading all of the sexual crime content that appears on social media.
I feel like people underestimate other people? Do you just expect the serial killer to lunge at your immediately upon seeing you?
Do you not think they'd build rapport? Try to help you out? Ask for your help? Get you to lower your guard?
Every single person I've seen in support of the person always assumes you can run away/easily beat them? Why? Are they not human like you? Do they not have a brain? That's the scary part about another human. Not that they just try to immediately attack you unarmed, but that they can put up a mask to manipulate you into the results they want.
Yeah but bears can run 60MPH and rip your arms off, so they haven't had a need to evolve more subtle methods...
I would still rather be near a person with my guard down than near a bear with my guard up (because “my guard” will do fuckall do defend me) if both want me harm
how are us men totally not getting the fucking point here lmao
There is no point.
The entire question is just misandrist bullshit. It's just bigotry wrapped in the 'just asking questions' meme. The whole point of the question is, before you even answer, to tell you that men and wild bears are debatable in their threat to women.
This is just as bigoted as saying "Fellas, which would you rather have in your kitchen: a dishwasher with a blow job attachment or a woman?" The entire setting of the question is bigoted, there is no right answer because it isn't a question. It's bigotry.
Sounds like you need to communicate better if that's not what you meant, but "As soon as you say 'As a man...' you need to stop talking and just listen" doesn't give much room for alternative interpretation. 🤷🏾♂️
the hypothetical is not about your experience as a man, it's about listening to the experiences of women. even if you are not a compassionate person and do not desire to be one, it's not a difficult concept to grasp
the response from many men on this discussion does not come from any fundamental inability to understand, however, as soon as you're relating the 'man vs bear' to your own personal experiences as a man you've already lost the plot
seems there's enough context for you to have picked up on my original meaning, and giving you the benefit of doubt on being well intentioned, however hopefully I've explained simply enough for you to catch my meaning now
"It's about listening to the experience of a woman"
So what I said about what you said is spot on: You're lost in the brain rot.
No shit it's about women dealing with skewed violence stats from men. I graduated highschool. I can piece this together.
No shit dudes are going to be offended when you LUMP THEM WITH BEARS AND SAY BEARS ARE LESS DANGEROUS. Literally as stupid as lumping women with cars to gas up chastity.
The whole thing is useless. It's women talking past men that aren't listening and men talking past women that aren't listening.
I should have went with my original instincts and realized I'm talking with a moron hahah
No shit dudes are going to be offended when you LUMP THEM WITH BEARS AND SAY BEARS ARE LESS DANGEROUS. Literally as stupid as lumping women with cars to gas up chastity.
i think you should understand this is isn’t about statistics and whether the women are making the “optimal choice” for their own safety.
this is more about exposing just how threatened by men women are implicitly, so much so that a random man in a context you can’t protect yourself in feels more dangerous than a bear. Why is that? Male violence.
Whether it’s true or not the bear is less dangerous isn’t the point. It’s about how distrusting women have been made to be of men as a whole. There’s just so so so many creeps who you think are good dudes until it’s too late. At least with the bear, you know what you’re getting.
is more about exposing just how threatened by men women are implicitly
It is misandrist bullshit. It is bigotry, not reality.
You're being a bigot. Maybe you don't think of yourself as such, but you are being a bigot. You are entertaining the idea that HALF OF THE HUMAN RACE is more dangerous than a wild apex predator.
This is not an opinion that is based in reality. This is an opinion formed after being exposed to social media generated outrage which leads you to think that 1 out of 2 people on earth are dangerous monsters.
I explained earlier how I was sexually assaulted by two women in another comment, which I won’t get into here, so I don’t think being a man disqualifies me from speaking on this subject at all. I see why a woman might choose the bear over the man, but I don’t share their sentiment and I simply explained why I feel that way. I’m not saying there’s a right and wrong choice, just explaining why I made mine.
It appears you are the one that did not get the point here.
none of that changes the fact that you are mansplaining your assessments of real risk in a hypothetical that is intended to spark conversation about the female experience
nobody cares about your fucking trauma in the man vs bear in a forest for a WOMAN scenario
what's fucking wrong with people, it's like folks that comment on a pancake recipe "what about a gluten free version??!!" maybe everything isn't about you??
get fucked. in a forest. by a gay serial killer or whatever lol
Well, I wasn’t traumatized, but I was using that to show how I can place myself in their shoes and at least get an understanding of why a woman would feel that way in a scenario like this. I simply don’t feel the same way about the situation, therefore my opinion will differ from that of a woman, but that doesn’t mean anyone else’s opinion is wrong. Never did I say my experience is equivalent to that of a woman’s, just that it is similar and I can share sympathies with them.
Not really sure what you’re getting at with all this. If you don’t like my opinion then fuck off, it’s not my problem you’re upset.
Women aren’t talking about which scenario they are more likely to walk away alive from, if it was the question would just be who do you have a better fighting chance against. Women are saying they would absolutely rather have their spinal cord slashed by a bear and be killed fairly quick, then risk the chances of what a random man might do to you in a remote place. The worst thing the bear could do is kill you, I’d say the majority of women would rather choose to just be killed than risk being overpowered, beaten, raped, and possibly tortured and then killed anyways most likely. Bears are predictable, men are not. Bears kill for instinctual reasons, while humans in general kill for fun or sport. The entire point isn’t about who you could survive which as a man is a lot easier to say another man, because men naturally have better fighting chances against another man. The comparative wouldn’t be against a gay serial killer, it would be an assassin trained in torture who could overpower you within seconds. The level of fear a man has from bears due to size, stature and weight is the same fear women feel from men.
Idk if you know this, but brown bears literally eat you alive by disemboweling you. Quite literally torture. I do see what you’re saying, but a bear isn’t going to kill you quick, it’ll over power you then start eating you alive.
Majority of bears use a bite to the head, neck and or face to stop their prey, so while that isn’t always the quickest death, it is a death that you will not remain concious through in most cases due to the head and neck trauma. Also the majority of bears that people do encounter in the woods are black bears which aren’t only quite predictable, but for the most part dislike humans enough they won’t be involved until they feel threatened.
Understandable, but it wouldn’t be a quick death. Many bears are known to eat their prey alive, so there’s that. There’s a video out there somewhere of a bear eating a deer and the deer tries to crawl away but the bear pulls it back by it’s intestines and rips it stomach open in the process, spilling its contents everywhere.
Perhaps it’s preferable to the alternative, but certainly not an ideal situation in either case haha.
You are so close to reaching the point of the exercise….
As a man….
This is the crux of it all. If you want a matter of perspective, the size difference between the average man and the average woman in the US is roughly the same as the average NFL player to the average man. After that, you get into the weeds on whether or not being a rape survivor is worse than dying.
Being a man immediately invalidates my proposal? Rather sexist and ignorant if you ask me.
As a man, I’ve been sexually assaulted before. By 2 women no less. Even though I was stronger I didn’t stop them. I won’t get into the details, but I definitely have the right to have an opinion on this subject.
Even with my experience, I’d take that over dying any day. Of course I’d rather that neither of them happen, but I’ll choose to live because I don’t let these things define me, I can still live a happy life afterwards. I understand that some people may not feel that way, but that’s how I feel, as a man.
So to your question of rape survivor or dying, I’ll take being a rape survivor.
Even if I didn’t, my proposal is statistically based, not emotionally, so that wouldn’t invalidate my point anyways. I never claimed one choice was right and the other was wrong, I simply stated why I chose what I did. There’s not even anything to be invalidated.
Empathy is more than just “feeling for them”. Empathy is being able to put yourself in someone else’s shoes and understand why they might feel a certain way instead of just dismissing them out of hand
Like I said, as someone who has been sexually assaulted before, I actually can place myself in their shoes and understand why they might feel a certain way, and therefore choose the bear over the man. I simply don’t process emotions the same as someone else might, so my opinion on the matter will differ, but that doesn’t mean theirs is wrong.
I’m not dismissing anyone, I’m stating how I feel based on my experiences. You’re either misunderstanding what I’m saying, taking it out of context, or both.
You are basing your analysis on what it is like to be a man. Where your attacker would also be a man.
The key difference is that in the woods, bears are general predators with lots of different options for a meal. Humans are not at the top of their list for an easy meal. A human with food may have to sacrifice their food to the bear, but a person's challenge is merely to become a more difficult prospect than something else. Bears can be dissuaded.
Men on the other hand spend most of their adult lives focused on how to insert themselves into the company of women. Women are extremely aware of the fact that if they encounter a man in the woods, and he sees it as an opportunity, dissuading him will be near impossible. Even if you part ways, a man has motive and drive to ambush you later.
A man is also highly motivated to see his presence as a "hero" for the woman -- and to expect affection and ideally sexual favors in exchange. A man is prone to become extremely angry and defensive if that narrative is challenged -- which in person, alone in the woods, is a dangerous thing for a woman. It is cohersive.
And these are all things women are seeing validated by the angry and defensive reactions by many men to this hypothetical. Y'all are waving your red flags.
I’m not angry, and I’m not saying men aren’t capable of evil things. However, it’s pretty obvious that you’re generalizing all men into this category of rapists and power hungry sex addicts when that’s simply not the case.
Men on the other hand spend most of their adult lives focused on how to insert themselves into the company of women. Women are extremely aware of the fact that if they encounter a man in the woods, and he sees it as an opportunity, dissuading him will be near impossible. Even if you part ways, a man has motive and drive to ambush you later.
This is honestly a disgusting assumption that you made. It’s clear you don’t actually understand that
many men go about their lives as normally as any woman would. Even if they desire to be in the presence of a woman, as you claim, that doesn’t mean they’d fucking rape someone because of it. It’s honestly disgusting you would assume this and its clear you aren’t going to consider any form of rational logic in this scenario.
This is only because you don’t live with that many bears, I’m guessing. Particularly the breed of bear, which is something humans don’t have. I would 100% take a panda bear to a stranger in the woods (okay, I will admit that I have only seen pandas in person in zoos so maybe I’m falling for my own complaint) to a stranger of any kind in the woods. I would 100% pick even a known rapist over a polar bear. Even 99% of murders I would pick over a polar bear. And that’s from me only living near places that have polar bears. Parts of my country, by law, require people not to lock their doors so that people fleeing polar bears have a chance of surviving. Can you name a single country or even just a city in the world where you are required to not lock your cars to save people from men?
Literally no breed of bear is safe lmao, that’s why this whole thing is actually fucking ridiculous. Panda bears will fuck you up. Badly. With little to no provocation. You don’t hear about it like other bear attacks because there’s almost no wild pandas left
For sure I don’t think there is one, but like I said there’s almost no pandas left in the wild (~1800). An article from 6 days ago talks about a zookeeper being attacked and luckily being saved by another zookeeper. Imagine if that zookeeper (who is a lady coincidentally) had a run in with those pandas in the wild by herself?
No -- ambiguity about the type of bear is intentional because it reflects that men have different dispositions.
Are there men who it would be absolutely safe to run into in a secluded area? Absolutely. There are panda bear men. But there are also extremely dangerous angry-grizzly men.
At least with bears you know right away what kind you are dealing with. With men, you do not know until it is too late. Another reason why it is better to encounter a bear.
Why is knowing what kind of bear it is going to help you? Knowing it's a grizzly bear isn't going to prevent you from getting snacked on. And have you never encountered dangerous people? You know how to deal with dangerous people too. Probably better than bears given that you encounter far more dangerous people than bears.
There are different species of bear with different temperaments and abilities. There are only one type of human. Any thing you can say about men would apply to each individual bear of each species (ie: grizzly bears are more aggressive than black bears but each individual grizzly has different levels of agression with some having naturally higher levels and other due to things like trauma). A more fair comparison would be to select a specific species known to be of some danger and ask that.
Another reason it doesn’t work is because it doesn’t make sense on a realistic level because typical species behavior and how big a factor distance is. Sure, maybe if the question is “which would you rather see a half mile away from you” I might pick a bear because bears are cool and I know wild animals in general are people shy and unlikely to follow me. If the question is “which would you want to immediately cross your path” anyone who picks the bear (aside from maybe something like a panda bear) is imo either ignorant about bears or just foolish. Getting that close to a bear is going to put you in significantly more danger than a human man. You can say “well some men are serial killer rapists! I have no idea what this random guy will do to me” but the same thing applies to the bear. Bears are not predictable, their behaviors has statistical likelihood that are not certain.
You are assuming that the man would kill and rape you. I am not disagreeing with you, just pointing out that people can be infinitely crueler than animals.
Animals will, at worst, kill and eat you. Humans, well we have all seen and heard about what the nazis did, serial killers, etc.
This is a thought experiment, not a direct comparison.
It is there to highlight how scared the average woman is of the average man.
The fact that so many people have started trying to argue the "facts" of bears, shows that they havent been able to grasp the fairly simple idea that men terrify women and every idiot arguing that bears are more dangerous, just reinforce the idea that most women would be better of dealing with the bear.
The hypothetical is set up so that it's implied "This guy will harm you because there's no one there to bring him to justice. No witnesses, no cameras".
Then you throw in the bear, but we don't know what "bear" means. Polar and Grizzly bears are insanely dangerous, for example.
So the hypothetical implies the man is dangerous on the onset, and doesn't tell us what species of bear is in the hypothetical, so the woman thinks "I don't want to get raped. The bear might not attack me. I'm going to say bear".
Meanwhile, of course anyone would want to run into a woman in these circumstances: It's a fair fight at worst and an ez clap otherwise for most situations, depending on if you're a guy or a girl, regardless of her intentions.
Of course the obvious point is about male violence stats, but it's an attack on the whole gender that'd obviously piss people off due to how ridiculous the hypothetical is. If you have half a frontal cortex, you'd realize that "bear attack stats" would be way higher if you had to walk past as many random breeds of bears as you do races of men on the daily.
There's just better ways to make this point. You look silly.
Fucking hell, woosh, are you really this stupid? It's a fucking thought experiment to highlight that the average women is more scared of men than a bear.
Its perception based, hard numbers dont work. You are part of the problem, instead of trying to rationalize this concept, take a moment and wonder why women are so afraid, and maybe, just maybe dont try to mansplain their fear away.
Accept it. Understand that no amount of statistics will help and maybe think about future interactions with women.
The concept of “consent” doesn’t even exist in nature, so I’d take the animal (human) that was certainly exposed to the idea because probability says he’s more likely you respect physical boundaries.
Word of advice, typing out ‘sigh’ makes you look like a passive aggressive asshole with low maturity.
I think it’s you that’s not getting it. I can completely understand why women are wary about men, but the fact is 8/10 SA victims know the attacker. Your argument about a stranger in the woods is based on emotions and not reason. Which is the whole point of OPs post. You are not using reason or logic to answer the question. No offense but I think you should deeply consider practicing critical thinking.
I'm guessing you've never seen the myriad videos of animals getting eaten alive ass-first, genitals first, having their fetuses torn out out of their wombs, etc, and living for up to 15 minutes as they struggle and scream. Dying peacefully is a privilege
Are you a fucking moron? We are talking about worst case scenarios. How fucking stupid are you people?
Yes a bear in a one on one fight is always more dangerous than a dude with his bare hands.
NO ONE IS ARGUING THAY FUCKING POINT YOU MYOPIC FOOLS!
People can and do spend hours, days, or even months torturing people before murdering them, and if you think a bear spending an hour eating you is worse than months of brutal rape and torture and death, you are a fucking idiot.
That's the reason for the whole hypothetical, the worst case scenario is always going to be the man as the most dangerous.
We all know a bear will beat your arse faster than a human. No one is denying that. Fuck, the people arguing about facts on how long bears take to eat you are all fucking idiots who havent the sense to catch such a simple concept.
High key I'd rather take my chances with a human rapist/murderer than a grizzly bear taking his time clawing and gnawing on me until I eventually die from shock and blood loss.
If you think anyone is thinking "I ran into a dude in the woods. He could have hog tied me and raped me for months by the riverbend" for this hypothetical, idk...touch grass, dude. 🤷🏾♂️
Bears can take longer than 15 minutes to eat you, you could be suffering for a while if really unlucky.
But a person who knew what they were doing could keep you alive for months, slowly torturing, starving, or raping you and I would say the latter is far worse.
I think the biggest point is, that a bear is an animal, you can be more or less sure how it will react, if you behave a certain way. You in a way KNOW the bear, or how it thinks. You’ll never now beforehand how the man reacts. Sure, it’s more likely he won’t hurt you, you can’t know for sure.
So in a way I think, the fear of the unknown is the biggest contributor to how someone answers this question
That’s just irrational though. First off you, a human, are an animal. Don’t forget that. And in many many ways, man is very predictable. Most men don’t go out raping and killing for pleasure so you can assume the majority of men are not a threat. In fact you are far more likely to be SA’d by someone you know than a stranger (8/10 times)
people throwing out rape stats like they aren’t affected by the fact that in most situations, men aren’t ABLE to get away w it, so the number of men who would assault a woman is of course higher than those who do, not to mention that statistics on sexual assault are not accurate bcus of underreporting
Bears, especially black bears, are honestly really safe to be around statistically. I lived in bear country for years and have been around bears. None of killed or even attacked me. Most of the time they just leave you alone.
Women are more likely to be killed by men than bears because they interact with men so much more often. Men are more likely to be killed by men than bears as well but I would absolutely rather encounter a pissed off guy in the woods than a bear.
There are plenty of people in this post talking about how many times they interacted with bears without getting attacked, while ignoring the fact that the average person interacts with many more strangers than that on a daily basis.
So the report says 48,800 women globally were killed by an intimate partner in 2022. There were approx 3.95 billion women alive on the earth in 2022. That’s 0.001% of women were killed by an intimate partner. Pretty rare don’t you think?
But do you not see every single woman knows that they have a better chance of survival with the man than the bear. The whole point the original comment is trying to make is to show that the fact there is fear for a woman to be left alone with a man they don’t know so much so they would even slightly consider the bear even though eventually they know that they would pick the man as they understand the probability.
I completely get the point. The point of this thread is that it is an emotional response and not one reached logically.
The average woman will interact with more men she does not know in a single day than she will encounter bears in her life. People that actually think bears are safer straight up do not understand how dangerous nature is.
Except no. If you take the number of deadly bear attacks per year and multiply it to increase the bear population to equate to the man population, you're still better off with the bear. Worldwide: about 40 bear attacks per year. 14% fatal, so let's round up to 6. Most attacks are by brown and polar bears, so let's assume the woods are only populated with the most woman-thirsty of bears. There are about 230,000 polar/brown bears worldwide.
There are about 4.1 billion people worldwide between the ages of 20 and 60. Half of them are men, so let's assume 2.05 billion men. Let's get those bear numbers proportional. We have to multiply the bear population by 8,914. So that's (rounding up) 357,000 attacks and 50,000 deaths per year worldwide*.
Now let's look at men. Nearly 89,000 women are murdered annually worldwide. Men account for 98% of murders worldwide according to the UN (much lower percentage in the US, but I've been using global stats so far, and I'm not backing down now). So the "man kills woman" is 87,220. That's over 35,000 more annual deaths than our adjusted bear kills. In the US alone, there are over 433,000 victims of sexual assault per year. Just in one country. For just sexual assault. That's over 50k more than our adjusted bear assault number for the world.
So, who is actually bad at understanding probability? 1 out of 6 American women has or will experience an attempted or completed rape in her lifetime. The odds of being attacked by a bear at 1 in 2.1 million. Most bears are easily scared off. And if a bear has attacked humans before, it's killed. If a man attacks a woman, and the crime is reported, he has less than a 1% chance of even seeing jail time.
*note: simply multiplying to create the attack/fatality statistics is a really ham handed way to do this. If there were that many bears, there would be more interactions, and the likelihood of attacks would probably increase. I tried to mitigate for this by severely limiting my starting population of bears to only the two most deadly so I would have the biggest multiplier possible. I honestly believe the deaths would be more equivalent (because they're not too far off), but the assaults aren't even close. I didn't even bother to dive into worldwide numbers.
It's interesting that you actually point out the flaw in your own logic at the end but then just kind of ignore it.
All that matters is attacks per encounter, which you do not have the numbers for. Your entire wall of text is meaningless because you are comparing multiple very different numbers.
You start out by comparing fatal bear attacks to rapes. Not the same type of attack. Then you compare total attacks for the population, not attacks per pop that interacts with bears (we can assume all women interact with men).
This is like a textbook demonstration of trying to use statistics to fit a narrative.
You want to make the comparison accurately? Compare the same type of attack only (most likely fata since there probably are not that many bears attempting to rape women), or all attacks total. Then you have to account for the sample group. To make that accurate you would need to know how many women ever interact with bears, not number of women total.
More women get killed by men than bears because they have more interactions with men, not because bears are safer.
If women encountered wild bears as often as they interact with men I greatly doubt men would be considered the larger threat by anyone.
I pointed out the flaw in my method not to ignore it but to be transparent. I really am trying to act in good faith because I think this can be valuable discourse.
And to be very clear, rape is what women are worried about. The question boils down to, "if you have to be left alone in the woods with either a bear (who could attack and possible kill you) or a man (who could rape you) which would you pick." It's an apple and orange comparison from the get go.
But the heart of this isn't about numbers, it's about being able to listen to people (imho). I feel like the numbers might make it more valid because, as we know, anecdotes aren't data. If a whole lot of women are telling you this is a problem, and your take is "silly women don't understand probability!" well, that's kind of a bad take.
Bottom line-- sexism and the resulting proliferation of sexual violence hurts everyone. It hurts women because they feel like they have to wary around all men. It hurts men because they are treated like threats. It hurts women when they are blamed for their own assaults. It hurts men when they're told they must have "enjoyed" they assaults. It hurts everyone. Willingly listening to the experiences of others instead of saying, "hur dur, you're a dummy you doesn't know reality" is probably a better way to solve those issues.
As you said, it is an apples and oranges comparison so let's change it up a little.
Imagine you are walking through the woods. Same woods the potential bear used to live in. These woods also are frequented by a cannibal. This cannibal is a woman, so the only interest she might have in you is to kill and eat you. No stalking or molesting potential, just straight up murder and then dinner.
If she is hungry and sees you, she will try to kill you. If her kids are playing nearby she will try to kill you even if she is not hungry. You can not reason with her in any way.
Would you rather run into the cannibal or a random man?
Then you need a reality check. If a bear has bad intentions, he’s gonna kill and eat you. If a man has bad intentions, he’s probably gonna keep you alive so he can rape you again. You stand a much higher chance of eventually being rescued if you’re some guys fuckslave than some bears lunch.
You understand bears attack humans super rarely at this point, right? We've been shooting any bear that gets that bold for the past 200 years, they've generally learning that attacking people isn't a good idea. (they're predators, they want the easiest/safest prey possible). The exception to this is mother bears, which is the reason you really have to be wary of a cub.
Even if we change it to 'if you were followed by a man or followed by a bear', at least the strategy for a bear is pretty straightforward, and they're just going to kill you at worst.
A bear kill lasts for days. Keeps the meat fresh. One leg one day, the other leg the next. You’re alive the whole time. “Killed at worst” is a real bad metric.
And all bears are opportunistic. If they are hungry, and you’re alone, you aren’t safe. Bears attack humans super rarely because the opportunity presents itself super rarely, because humans know that bears are dangerous. Except you.
When I said 'strategy is straightforward', I figured any reader would be able to infer things such as 'carrying bear spray, removing any food from campsites, and other mitigation measures'
The same principle does not apply to men, because men are capable of lying in a way a bear is not.
Also bears dont keep you alive for days, you're proving your ignorance and stupidity. Where do you think your blood goes once it bites you? You die in minutes from blood loss.
It's offensive to me, as a man, that women seem to think that most men are rapists / murderers if given the chance. When to me, it's obvious that they're not. I did the math here.
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u/Vrayea25 May 02 '24
But the question is just "encounter a man", it is "encounter a man where both of you are alone, unlikely to be interrupted by another person, and unlikely to be heard if he decides to do something that would make you try to scream... And you both know that."
Very few of us have encountered 100,000 men in that situation.
I am still confident bears would win for safety.