A Message to All Women
(CW) All girls and women need to take a self-defense class right now. We need to be prepared.
The Threat
Another day dawns and you realize it wasn’t a nightmare. These are the actual election results we’ll have to live with…for…how long? Ugh. And, as an older White woman, I am beyond disappointed and appalled by the number of White Women who voted for this disgusting excuse of a human being.
So, I do not say this lightly but after what I’ve already seen and heard online, and from what I’ve heard from a few women, misogynistic men have gotten even more publicly brazen, and, frankly I fear for their wives, girlfriends, and daughters. It is critical that girls and women learn how to defend themselves, even from their husbands or partners should they be married to these sorts of men.
The vile comments from some men, responding to the idea that women en masse are going to abstain from sex (for fear of getting pregnant, then forced to carry and/or dying from a miscarriage), are threatening.
A white supremacist man responds to the above post with:
“…like she has a say in it.” ←These despicable men have been given the right to reveal their true selves and to say and do whatever they want to women, by the Orange Fascist (formerly TFG=The Former Guy because I refuse to give him the attention he craves by using his name) and all who support him.
And another young white supremacist (26-years old) tweeted out: “Your body, my choice. Forever.”
There is a section of an entire generation of young men who feel the way he does, and that’s a danger to our daughters and granddaughters. We are seen as inconsequential. They don’t need our permission to do anything to us.
This is horrifying. There is no sugar-coating it. What we are about to embark on is going to be BAD and we must be prepared.
What can we do about this threat?
Step 1: Report them all. Every single post and comment. Report them as harassment, and/or a threat. Report them when you see them, even if it is not directed at you.
Step 2: Now, more than ever before, all girls and women need to take a self-defense class, (age-appropriate, of course): in-person, check out a library book, or watch a YouTube video. Do whatever you can to be prepared.
Step 3: Those of you who are married or partnered with a good man, please talk to them and make him understand how terrified you are and that you will be calling on him to stand up for you and all women more than he ever has before. He needs to become *aware* of misogynistic and threatening comments in his workplace or anywhere else and shut them down.
This is no time for “bathroom humor, locker room talk”, this is a call for all good men to protect women at all costs. If they don’t know how, take a class, read a book, find something to give them the confidence on how to handle misogynistic remarks, de-escalate advances, so they are prepared to help us.
Women are already fairly well prepared. We’ve been trained since we were little to be hyperaware of our surroundings and some of us have already taken self-defense classes. The majority of us know what we need to do to protect ourselves from strangers: spiked heels into the man’s foot so we can flee; keys held between our fingers as we walk to our cars ready to be stabbed in our assailant’s eyes; a sharp knee to the groin so we can flee; carry pepper spray; check the backseat before getting into our car; don’t walk to our car alone, esp. at night; and so many more steps we take to keep ourselves safe which men have never realized we do, as part of our normal daily lives.
This, however, is different. The election of this man, his running mate, and all the Republicans behind him, have given misogynistic abusive men a stamp of approval for married men to assault their wives, and I foresee domestic violence cases rising, as they did during his first term in Office, and he rewrote those definitions, taking us back 50 years.
Final thoughts
Please, if your husband/partner is an abuser, make plans to leave as soon as possible. Find and contact a support organization or group for abused women, start saving NOW, if you haven’t already. The abuse is about to get worse. These men have now been given permission by their nation and their leaders, to abuse women, to see us only there to serve their every desire, their every need…”whether we like it or not.”
Please stay safe. Sending protective wishes to us all. 💜
Another Day Dawns is a reader-supported publication. Trying my best to rebuild my life after loss and become financially independent again, and failing miserably, but…another day dawns to make another attempt.
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