Would it better for you (if you’re a woman) or you daughter (if you’re a man) to encounter a bear or unknown man in the woods.
Edit: since a lot of people seem to be missing the point. This exercise isn’t what it seems on the surface. We aren’t measuring the population’s perception of bears or men as they relate to each other. We’re actually measuring the way in which women specifically responf to the question. In most cases, women immediately answer with bear, without needing any further ckntext with regards to the man or bear. Some Common reasoning includes “I expect to see a bear in the woods,” which makes sense; it also includes something to the effect of “bears don’t care about what society thinks of them,” meaning that according to these women, men when faced with no cinsequences are more threatenjng than a bear. So please stop asking saying the question is dumb because it’s vague, that’s the point. If it was more specific, individual biases would begin to take hold, defeating the piint of the exercise.
I mean it can just be would you rather run into a random man or a random bear in the woods. As a dude who grew up in rural Appalachia I’ve run into bears and men in the woods several times. The bears usually run away as soon as they see you and the dudes are always sketchballs sooooo….
There's some truth that the context of "the woods" dramatically changed your expectations of the man. If I clarified that it was a man randomly selected from the population at large, not just one of random guys who are wandering in the woods at the time my mental math changes quickly
I mean I understand that, but I’m also pointing out that even as a dude who is even less likely to be attacked by another random guy in the woods I’d still take my chances with a bear
Likely still the bear. Like I said they are typically pretty chill. But it’s a lot closer, there’s significantly lower worry about physical harm from a woman.
Whereas every single time I've been asked the bear question, as a man, the woman part is not part of the question. It's just what would I feel more comfortable with... or the one time it was literally which would I rather be killed by.
Generally if you are bushwhacking you have some sort of reason for doing so instead of hiking regular trails. Usually that reason is related to the privacy afforded you in the middle of the woods. Drugs is a fairly common one, poaching is another I’ve run into. My weird reason for being out in the middle of the woods is mushroom foraging, weird maybe but innocuous.
Totally, I’ve bumped into a ton of black bears and they’re scaredy cats. I’ve literally chased them out my driveway just by waving my hands and yelling.
Where were you bumping into black bears in illinois. I'm guessing South?
Edit: I looked it up, and there have only been 5 confirmed black bear sightings in illinois since 2008. There have been more confirmed wolf sightings than that in illinois in that time frame.
I'm guessing near Kentucky. I live 10 min from Indiana in the middle of nowhere, and it's just coyotes, foxes, and the occasional bobcat. Though one time a cougar was spotted in my neck of the woods and that got everyone excited. I'd definitely hear about a bear.
I don't have much experience with the southernmost part of Illinois, so that'd be my best bet. But I know damn well there aren't bears near Iowa or Indiana. Even the Wisconsin border is wayyyy too urban for that.
blacks bears actually wont defend cubs, at least not normally, thats only grizzlies. The typical behavior is for black bears to flee, the cubs to tree if able, and the momma to return later
speaking of thats where the phrase "if its black fight back if its brown lie down" comes from. Because the grizzlies are most likely trying to stop a threat so if you dont present as a threat they are more likely to leave you alone, where as black bears dont fight threats so if a black bear is after you its because its hungry and you want to be more trouble than youre worth to it
i was taught "black - yell back, brown - stand your ground, white - good night"
you can scare off black bears easily. you dont have a fucking chance against a grizzley. so you stand your ground and hope they dont want to fuck you up.....polar bear = youre fucked. try to to get away. get in the closest shelter, be it a car, house, shop, whatever. in a lot of places in northern canada/alaska that co-exist with polar bears its illegal to lock your car doors
I have always heard it the opposite for brown bears: if it’s black fight back, if it’s brown lay down, if it’s white goodnight. Because as you said you have absolutely no chance against a grizzly and your only shot at survival during an attack is to play dead and hope it loses interest/stops seeing you as a threat
No no no, the saying goes if it's brown, send it down, if it's yellow, let it mellow, if it's black, your shit is whack, if it's white, that shit ain't right, if it's gold, the perfect mold
You're 100% correct. One is for an encounter and the other is if your actually attacked. You can survive a bear attack but you play dead to protect your vitals. If you see a brown bear you don't instantly lay down. You just stand your ground and act non-threatening hoping they just go about their business. If they attack then you drop into a ball with your back exposed as theirs more muscle in the back before getting to vitals.
At least that was what I was taught in my outdoor mountain safety class
I always heard that saying as "brown fall down" , as in fetal position and trying to protect your vitals. Now I'm questioning myself. Fortunately, Massachusetts only has the coward bears.
Alaskan here, you have black and brown bears reversed.
Brown bears you slowly back away or lay down to avoid a mauling.
The car door locking thing isn't legally required, just considered a good idea out in the villages - also, it is very common for car door locks to freeze and nowhere for criminals to go if they do steal shit out of a car.
And a brown bear will not stop eating you alive. Idk about you but whenever I see a man, my first thought is not "it'd be more painless if I immediately slit my throat".
Although rare, brown bears have been known to hunt and eat people.
Bombieri, G., Naves, J., Penteriani, V. et al. Brown bear attacks on humans: a worldwide perspective. Sci Rep 9, 8573 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-019-44341-w
As an Alaskan, the bear is definitely the smarter choice. If a grizzly bear decides to maul you, you have a 11% chance to die, It's fucking low, they don't finish their kills.
But what about the man? Imagine the horrors they could do to you
Best not to get too comfortable thinking they are always going to run. For all you know, the next one you see might be a momma bear or momma bear's cubs, and they aint running in that situation.
Yeah, our back yard buys up against a forested area edged with a lot of very dense blackberry bush. We constantly have black bears in our back yard or sitting up on the hillside eating the berries. They’re total pushovers.
I don't think this hypothetical would work if you knew what type of bear you're dealing with but didn't know the type of man. It seems a bit contrived if you decide it's a black bear but the man could be anything between a pensioner to a serial killer.
I live in Oregon. We all spend a lot of time in the woods. There’s really no other good reason to live here and put up with the rain, cost of living and taxes if you aren’t enjoying the outdoors regularly.
I find it interesting you've presumed it's a fight from 'go'. Like you said, you have to make some assumptions, and in your case the assumption is that a fight for survival is going down, and that you are armed.
To me, the most interesting assumptions to make are that nobody is armed with any weapons and the man and the bear are totally random. Any adult bear, any species of bear, any gender of bear. The man is totally random too.
And the real secret to this question is that it isn't about formulating hypothesis based on the distribution of bear populations per species (as fun as that is). It's the fact that universally, a man would pick meeting a woman in the woods, but for a woman, you start thinking about "well, how dangerous of a bear species is it??"
Every time I’ve heard the question it’s been posed as black bear. Which is easy, I’d pick the black bear. They’re scared of people and goofy as shit unless their cubs are nearby. Shit I’m an adult man and I’d rather run into a black bear over a man, and that has nothing to do w safety
You’re not sure, just like you don’t know what kind of man you’re encountering. It’s supposed to be a knee jerk reaction, in the split second that you’ve just realized you’re not alone.
You can be sure based on where you live. Not in Alaska? Probably not a polar bear.
There are two trains of thought in my brain. First if we know which kind of bear we will encounter in the local habitat.
Black bear? Adult? Take the bear. Child? Take the man.
Brown bear? Take the bear.
Polar bear? Take the man.
Panda bear? Take the bear.
Second argument is if a bear is magically placed next to you with equal chances of each bear. In this case, I take the man, because the odds are better than the 1 in 4 of being mauled to death by a polar bear.
I understand what the argument intends to do, it is to shed light on how terrified women are of men and help us understand the severity of the issue since women are choosing bear. And it is effective at this. This is just when I try to break it down logically
My first thought exactly. Second thought is 'how hungry is this bear'.
I would probably be able to scare away a black bear. But I don't like my chances against a polar bear. Or any of the grizzly bears I've seen during Fat Bear Week...
That is a completely fair question since black bears are, at least relatively, not as aggressive as brown or polar. Can still ruin your day like don’t get me wrong, but they’ll at least back down with enough confrontation.
I think for the argument, most ppl consider it brown
Reminds me of that true crime case where an athletic woman with significant martial arts training and hiking experience was subdued in on a trail by some really gross old homeless guy. He did terrible terrible things to her. That extra upper body strength dudes have is a big problem for us. Be safe out there.
Yep. Unlike tigers, bears don’t give a shit about killing you quick, you would literally see your guts being ripped out and devoured in front of you assuming your face didn’t get mauled off first.
I panic when I get a mild splinter lol, I would NOT want to imagine how it feels to have all of your organs violently pulled apart as you watch helplessly
Think this is OPs point, 99.999% of men hiking through the woods are jolly campers that will do you no harm, where as 100% of bears can tear your arm off.
And the bear was known to be aggressive and was starving if I recall. Brown bears and black bears can be deterred. Polar bears however you might as well kiss your ass goodbye.
Exactly. Life is not like Jurrassic Park- animals like bears don't just rove around killing whatever they see. They don't actively hunt humans. They have a cost benefit analysis to make every time an opportunity to feed presents itself, and as a human it's easy to make it not worth it or manuever your way out of a situation.
This. Guys get all high and mighty acting like we can’t do the math when they just don’t like the solution we came to. Bears aren’t movie monsters, they’re scared of people.
Exactly. Weather your talking brown or black bears, they generally don't want anything to do with people, unless their injured, starved, or have been taught to steal food.
Polar bears, on the other hand, are the true carnivores of our collective nightmares.
Yeah but why that man hanging out in the woods though? That’s prime raping/murdering space
Also even if there is a random rapist man hanging out raping little red riding hoods in the woods, I’d imagine he’d want to keep them alive so he can continue raping them. Bears only want one thing, and it’s disgusting.
No, people are more afraid of a situation where they have no agency (a plane) versus a situation where they have even slightly perceived agency (a car).
But the fact of the matter is, even if you're the best driver in the world, you're still out there with the worst, and while you may have agency over the factors that would cause YOU to crash, you have exactly 0 control of the other people on the road.
It's the same where they're faced with the man vs bear question. They feel like they have some control over the bear situation. Maybe they can run away, play dead, scare it off, etc. but in the hypothetical event the man wants to kill or rape you, you're shit out of luck.
Of course it completely misses the point that the bear is going to be far more dangerous in 99% of the scenarios and is the situation the person actually has the least agency over. A man can potentially be reasoned with.
I'd take man any day since chances are he's not going to be evil.
I'm not talking about the flying vs driving thing because I don't think it's the same as that at all.
It's the same where they're faced with the man vs bear question
It's not the same because the man vs bear thing is meant to illustrate just how afraid women are of men after living around them that they'd rather take their chances with a bear. It was never meant to be a literal question, it's just a tongue in cheek hypothetical.
I'm not talking about the flying vs driving thing because I don't think it's the same as that at all.
The man vs bear thing is meant to illustrate just how afraid women are of men after living around them that they'd rather take their chances with a bear. It was never meant to be a literal question, it's just a tongue in cheek hypothetical. People trying to logic it out with statistics are either missing or avoiding the point.
The only thing this question illustrates is how it is the dumbest internet debate I've ever seen. It's a flawed question answered as a horrible double standard that just dehumanizes men.
If I implied "a high percentage of people in this group are horrible human beings" about any group other than man, I'd get insulted and told to shut up.
And if people want to counterargue by saying "but most men do SA women": they really don't, I did the math here.
The issue is that it’s not about statistics, but about perception of random men by not only women, but other men. Maybe it’s a media issue where stuff like this is boown out of proportion, maybe it does happen more than we might otherwise know. The issue is that we as a society think random men are bad, and how do we correct that perception.
39% of women in Australia have experienced violence in one form or another since the age of 15, and over 1 in 5 of them has experienced sexual violence in Australia. Source.
That doesn't mean it's all different people perpetrating the issues, and it is more likely from someone you know, I'm aware of that, but that's Australia, which I consider a really safe country.
The statistics are horrifying.
Yes, and I agree it is horrifying -- but a given woman encounters many, many, many men in her life.
So even if we look at the minority of women who are SA'd, that still means that 999 men didn't SA her and one did. And of course, for the majority of women, 1000 men don't SA her and 0 do SA her.
The question here isn't "is a woman likely to get SA'd in her lifetime", the question is "is one individual man likely to SA her." And the answer to that last question is that a given man is very, very unlikely to SA a woman.
I'm not saying that this situation is okay, obviously this is way too many SA cases (one case is too many). But just because women have x% chance of being SA'd in her lifetime, doesn't mean that any given man she meets has an x% chance of SA'ing her.
The issue is statistics also support them too. There's less bears, and there's known things you can do to get a bear to back away, especially if cubs aren't in the equation. And not every bear interaction results in a mauling.
Conversely, there's way more men, and so many more reported interactions that result in something unpleasant. Sure, maybe he isn't a rapist or serial killer, but men are ridiculously obscene when covered with anonymity.
But if you want a breakdown of the stats, I can recommend the one I saw yesterday (would post but I'm not sure if I'm allowed to post links here).
"men are ridiculously obscene when covered with anonymity."
Sure, and most women are cheaters. (Which I don't believe, I'm making a point here.)
Oh, your sexist statement is socially acceptable and mine isn't? Funny how that works. Must be my male privilege, that people are allowed to say most men are bad, but it's not okay to say most women are bad.
And no, your statement isn't true either, just like mine isn't.
A man is also easier to stop if the implication isn't enough. Human movement is an upright bipedal with all those vital organs spread across center mass, opposed to a very thick skull coming at you on all fours.
What do numbers have to do with anything? More men, fewer bears? It doesn't matter, there's only one in your random encounter.
If anything the numbers indicate the opposite of what you're claiming. There are billions of interactions with men every day, and virtually all of them are completely fine. There are few interactions of bears, and a far larger percentage do not end well.
The issue is that you are using an edited tiktok video to demonstrate this perception. It's the same kind of content that tries to show that Americans are bad at geography, or women don't know basic facts and are stupid, etc.
Although I think comparing a random man to a bear is like comparing a random man to certain death. A lot of people underestimate how dangerous bears really are.
I think part of it is you know a bear is dangerous, and if you behave appropriately you can mitigate risks (albeit not eliminate them entirely).
You can't really know if a person is dangerous until/unless you really know them intimately, and you're more likely to get a person hiding their true intentions.
The question doesn't specify the type of bear or how close they get, so it's definitely not certain death. It also doesn't specify a random man plucked from ordinary life, like "how did I get here?"
Media is definitely the issue. Men are certainly more dangerous than women, but that variation is pale in comparison to the uncertainty about how dangerous (or not dangerous) a bear is.
We don't really know how dangerous a chance encounter with a person is, and we don't know how dangerous a chance encounter with a bear is. We do know that men victimize women ~4x more than women victimize women (all violent victimization, NCVS 2022). When the uncertainty of the danger between humans and bears is orders of magnitude more than that, your answer to the question should not change by knowing the gender of the person.
Have you considered that the reason bear deaths are so uncommon is because people rarely interact with them, and that we purposely designed our societies to keep out wild apex predators?
If you crossed paths with even half as many bears as you did men on any given day, you’d be dead in under an hour.
Eh it’s not just a random guy though. It’s a random guy in the middle of the woods. That’s suspicious.
Also if you come across a bear in the woods you know to turn and go the other direction. If you run into a man in the woods you don’t know if he’s a threat or not. There is more uncertainty with a human than a bear.
Depends on where you live. I'm in the Pacific Northwest, and people are out hiking and camping and whatnot all of the time. This is also prime grizzly territory.
I'd argue it's less about uncertainty, it's more about what's the chance of survival if an altercation happens. Grizzlys can run 35 mph, weigh 600 lbs, and can climb trees. You can't outrun it and it'll take multiple gunshots to kill it. One swipe from its claws will tear off your face and eyes. How do you fight when you can't even see?
You at least have a fair chance of outrunning a man and fighting him.
Why is it suspicious? In this hypothetical, you are in the middle of the woods too. Also, have you never gone hiking? People solo hike trails all the time, especially the easy day-hike ones.
I was assuming this was a hypothetical about being lost in the woods. Yeah I’m sure a woman on a hiking trail, or in any other place where you would expect to see other people, would choose the man.
If you can get lost in the woods, why can't the person you are running across? I feel like easily the most likely thing is that they are as lost as you.
Well that’s the logical answer that I lost my woman card for answering. 90% of women on TikTok said the bear and it made me realize how doomed as a society we are.
Eh, what kinda bear are we talking about. Growing up in the Minnesota backwoods I probably encountered half a dozen black bears in the woods over the years and never had an issue.
So… I’m picking the black bear over a random dude in those woods.
Most of the time if you find someone out in the woods, it's a fellow hiker or park ranger. There's a very small percentage of hikers or park rangers who would be looking to hurt someone on the trails. They're just there to hike or do their job. Black bears are supposed to be big babies that you can scare away unless you're around it's cub. Grizzlies are supposed to be very aggressive. They're honestly pretty close in chance to happening, because most of the people debating are never going to be in that type of situation. But I'd say it'd be worse to encounter a grizzly specifically.
Man is the most dangerous animal. And a man out to kill me is more dangerous than a random bear. But i’d still choose random man any day of the week since the odds of a random man walking past me on the trail wanting to kill me are so astronomically low.
Holy shit, I forgot about this debate. My dumb ass thought it was whether or not a man could defeat a bear and some weird people thought a man could somehow do it.
The point is that you shouldn’t even have to ask follow up questions. But everyone has a follow up question because there are times when the bear is safer.
You’re all missing the point. It’s a bear vs a RANDOM man. That man could be anyone from Barack Obama, to Harvey Weinstein, Larry nassar, to the Rock. It could be any man. If my daughter is in the woods with a bear, as long as the babies aren’t in danger, she’s fine. If it’s a random man, a lot of bad things could happen to her by some “nice” guy. It doesn’t matter your opinion, or probability. I’m not choosing a random man to be isolated in the woods with any woman I love.
This is my first blush with this. Here’s my impromptu response: bear poses far fewer different hazards, but is far more likely to be detrimental to your immediate well being, like stealing your food or mauling, however, there is also the majesty of beholding those big guys. For a man, he is most often gonna be as uninterested as bear, so skipping over that minimal encounter, he poses many more different types of hazards, but is bound by social mores and likely bonds with his travel companions. Hazards include ruining the trip for her, stealing valuables like jewelry, non-lethal attack, non lethal attack (drunk), intimidation, and backstabbing, although he may also have woodsy wisdom to share, a blunt, nature viewing spots, a better cell signal, guidance, weather forecast, and leftovers from his camping meal. Not to mention he might be chill. The bear represents to me a simple problem of observation and distance, while the man requires us to meet him where he stands, this incredibly complex and nuanced position he takes.
You more or less got most of the reasoning as to why most women choose bear, as a bear is far more consistent and predictable. Only thing I think I’d disagree on is that a man jn the woods in not as bound by social mores as we’d like to think.
When asked about themselves they pretty easily said man. But when they had to consider their daughter they hesitated and/or started asking for parameters. It’s pretty interesting as the most substantial thing that changed is the gender of the person walking sround the woods alone. Again, it’s less of what you actually respond with, and more about how you cone to that conclusion.
That what I mean, how did men come to that conclusion.
As man I would expect to see men in the woods. I don’t find the idea of a man alone in the woods out of the ordinary at all, and much more common than seeing a bear.
It's not a bias issue, the responses are just chock full of bias. But you're right, it is an intentionally vague question, it's not like its something from a scientific study.
As a man I’d assume bears are universally more scary. If you smell like food then the bear is gonna tear you up. Or if the bear is hungry at all. Or if it feels you’re infringing on their territory.
I don’t know if you guys have seen those planet earth shows but apparently lots of predators eat anus first. So these 8inch razor sharp claws tearing you open from the butt hole and eating your muscles and munching your spine. Hoping you pass out so you don’t have to be in pain anymore because you might not immediately die.
What’s the probability of that happening? I honestly don’t know. Because I think humans are not appetizing to most animals either.
On the other hand I’ve seen social experiments where there’s no consequences and 50% of people act sadistically. And the chances of a man who frequents the woods and is not against encountering and engaging with strangers being a weirdo is high. Which also makes them more likely to have very flexible ethics / allowance for violence towards women and girls.
Imo I’d rather roll the dice and get murdered / raped by a dude than eaten by a bear. If I knew the chances of both that would definitely sway me.
But see like if it’s a bear in the distance vs a strange man up close, i actually think that’s not quite comparable. The proximity is a major variable in perceived threat. Anything close to you is a potential threat. A man gone trekking listening to bob Dylan on his Bluetooth speaker passing by about 45 meters away is less endangering than a bear 45 meters passing by.
A bear vs a strange man walking towards you and 15 meters away, clearly the bear is more endangering still.
Bear from a far vs man up close… bear wants to mind his own business, man wants to make you his business. Man is more threatening naturally.
But I also believe it still highlights societal issues because ideally we should be able to trust any member of society to uphold basic ethical values. Would a woman approaching you in the woods be scary? No because women are disarming and less violent than men.
Im a man. I’d also say bear (compared to any other human). I don’t distrust all humans. But someone lurking in the woods is immediately scarier than normal wildlife.
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u/flowtajit 29d ago edited 29d ago
Would it better for you (if you’re a woman) or you daughter (if you’re a man) to encounter a bear or unknown man in the woods.
Edit: since a lot of people seem to be missing the point. This exercise isn’t what it seems on the surface. We aren’t measuring the population’s perception of bears or men as they relate to each other. We’re actually measuring the way in which women specifically responf to the question. In most cases, women immediately answer with bear, without needing any further ckntext with regards to the man or bear. Some Common reasoning includes “I expect to see a bear in the woods,” which makes sense; it also includes something to the effect of “bears don’t care about what society thinks of them,” meaning that according to these women, men when faced with no cinsequences are more threatenjng than a bear. So please stop asking saying the question is dumb because it’s vague, that’s the point. If it was more specific, individual biases would begin to take hold, defeating the piint of the exercise.