Member-only story
TRUE STORY
When We Looked Away
Sensitive men and the violence we overlook
I couldn’t have been more than six when someone first grabbed my buttocks and squeezed my at-the-time non-existent breasts amidst the milling crowds at a railway station we frequently traveled through. I was even younger when I first saw men hit their wives and mothers in a fit of rage.
When I was old enough to walk unaccompanied to and from our home to the school bus, I learned to listen for footsteps behind, always casting a sideways glance for ruffians who may be following, maybe with an intent to graze against a female body — my body—or worse, someone carrying a bottle of acid, who might even throw it at me for no good reason.
For no good reason-except age-old power dynamics, unfairly skewed in the favor of one gender.
I learned that it was okay to be out late at night so long as you had a male companion. When the sun spewed hot lava and sucked all of the earth’s moisture, even then it was okay to go bare-bodied only if you were a man. The idea of a woman seemed like a dog on a leash, loyal to a fault, revealing enticing bits of flesh — cleavage, midriff, a bit too much thigh—for the pleasure of men who appeared almost as if in charge of them.
