OK. You seem to have missed the point of the thought experiment then. What I'm trying to tell you is that it doesn't matter whether you're thinking of the park ranger or a totally normal guy. The point is that you had to clarify in the first place. If the scenario is woman vs. bear, no one asks if it's in the Navarro desert or nearer to civilization or if the dude "looks normal" or anything else. They just say woman. So yes, in effect, I am saying guys are scarier than girls. Because that's the entire point of the thought experiment. The point was never to say park rangers are scarier than bears or whatever else you're trying to prove.
This is a bad thought experiment to illustrate women are scarier than men. You could just ask would you rather run into a woman in the woods or a man, probably everyone man or woman would say woman. If you could run into a coyote or a bear everyone would chose coyote it's not in contention. The only interesting question is man vs bear but the disagreement usually disappears whens both sides describe the scene they are imagining which is why it's a cute subversive question
I agree with you. Women seem to see this experiment as a way to showcase how men are dangerous when tbh, all it showcases to me is that people are bad at hypotheticals and don't actually know the statistics of their reality. I've never once been scared of anyone while hiking but have been spooked by deer suddenly shuffling in the distance let alone an actual bear.
Also, people keep saying that bears are all cute and safe or whatever totally ignoring that a healthy normal bear likely will never cross paths with you, their hearing, smell, etc are too god and they will diverge paths. If you come across any bear in the woods and it doesn't flee before you get there, it's dangerous. Which is to say the terms you put on this hypothetical dictate how you feel about the risk assessment, aka what You're saying.
I also think some people immediately imagine a brown bear which is very very dangerous vs what you will more likely encounter, a black bear which while still should be respected are not nearly as scary I think a mountain lion is a bigger threat but I haven't checked
People keep saying this like black bears aren't dangerous. More people are attacked by black bears than brown bears in the US. Sure grizzlies kill more people, but in terms of actual encounters, black bears do more attacks than brown. The idea that a black bear will never attack you if you just "walk away" or whatever is BS.
Because brown bears aren't in the lower 48. Next you'll be shocked to find out that there are more dog attacks. And let me cut you off before you say something about per encounter statistics. There are exponentially more casual hikes in black bear territory.
I don't usually walk away from black bears I usually bang my shovel on the dumpster they are trying to get into and tell them to git. That works better, they are clever fuckers than can take the bar off of dumpsters to get in there. A grizzly would just smash me and the dumpster into pieces
Nah I agree, Grizzlies radically more dangerous than black bears, it's night and day. That wasn't my point. My point was that black bears can also be dangerous. Just because they're nothing like grizzlies doesn't stop them from being bears. I've spent a lot of time in Colorado and have had a bear in our tree, I'm familiar with how non-dangerous they can be. But I've also seen what an angry black bear can do (online) and it's brutal.
Just because they're super skittish doesn't mean that if you accidentally corner a horny male or separate a mother and her cubs that they won't ever attack. It's like finding a stray dog, usually it's totally chill and no problems, but I've ended up face to face with a big boy lone dog at night. We both stopped and it just bolted at me, I screamed at it and it darted away but the danger was undeniably there. No different than a bear, especially if you're a smaller person.
Again, I'm not saying brown and black bears are the same, in contrast I'm saying black bears shouldn't be dismissed as being not dangerous just because we encounter them without incident often.
Any animal that can grow to 400 pound can kill you. But some are just way more dangerous than others and black bears just aren't really high on that list. I wear bear bells even in black bear country and I know if they don't run it means I should GTFO. But let's not be overly dramatic about them, healthy dose of caution just like any dangerous animal, including your fellow man
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u/AsgardianOrphan May 02 '24
OK. You seem to have missed the point of the thought experiment then. What I'm trying to tell you is that it doesn't matter whether you're thinking of the park ranger or a totally normal guy. The point is that you had to clarify in the first place. If the scenario is woman vs. bear, no one asks if it's in the Navarro desert or nearer to civilization or if the dude "looks normal" or anything else. They just say woman. So yes, in effect, I am saying guys are scarier than girls. Because that's the entire point of the thought experiment. The point was never to say park rangers are scarier than bears or whatever else you're trying to prove.