A TRUE Story

I wanted to tell you folks about this. I felt that I needed to.

I went for a run after dinner tonight. It was a beautiful night. The moon is full and I wanted to unwind after a long week of work. I was responsible. I wore a bright, white vest so cars could see me. 

About one mile into the run, a car full of black men in their teens or early 20s drove by me. One of the passengers leaned out of the car window and screamed at me. He said he wanted to shoot me in the face. It scared me. But it has happened before and I had my dog, my phone and my goody bag with me, so I was pretty confident I would be okay. Still, I spent the next mile constantly looking over my shoulder (which caused me to twist my knee).

I decided to shorten my route to avoid a dark patch of road. But as I approached my house after just two miles, I felt good and wanted to keep going. I decided I would keep running and loop around the neighborhood. And then, a car full of blacks drove by me and one of the passengers leaned out the window and screamed at me. I went straight home.

I walked in the door far less relaxed than I had been when I set out. In fact, I was furious. Why is it, I wondered, that as a white person jogging alone at night, it is my responsibility to bring my phone and my dog, check over my shoulder regularly, and plan my route based on street lamps, and yet, these black people feel no responsibility for not harassing me or behaving civilly?

If something had happened to me during my run – if I had been attacked – and the incident made the paper, do you think most people reading the story would have first thought, “Why do those blacks behave that way?” Or would their first thought have been, “Why was that white guy running alone at night in that neighborhood??”

Well? What do you think?

Oh SHIT. I'm so sorry. I meant to type all that shit out myself but I accidentally copy and pasted some insane feminist's experience and then went through and changed some language to make it identical to an experience I had in college. SHIT, MY BAD!

I guess, since I'm an honest person who cares about the truth that I should post the original post here with a track back. SORRY HELLO LADIES! MY BAD!

I went for a run after dinner tonight. It was a beautiful night. The moon is full and I wanted to unwind after a long week of work. I was responsible. I wore a bright, white vest so cars could see me. I took my big dog with me so I wouldn’t be alone. And I carried my cell phone and a bag of dog sh*t in case I ran into trouble on the road. That’s what it takes for me to feel safe running at night.
About one mile into the run, a car full of young men in their teens or early 20s drove by me. One of the passengers leaned out of the car window and screamed at me. He said he wanted to shove something up my ass. I didn’t catch what object he wanted to use. It scared me. But it has happened before and I had my dog, my phone and my goody bag with me, so I was pretty confident I would be okay. Still, I spent the next mile constantly looking over my shoulder (which caused me to twist my knee).
I decided to shorten my route to avoid a dark patch of road. But as I approached my house after just two miles, I felt good and wanted to keep going. I decided I would keep running and loop around the neighborhood. And then, a car full of boys drove by me and one of the passengers leaned out the window and screamed at me. I went straight home.
I walked in the door far less relaxed than I had been when I set out. In fact, I was furious. Why is it, I wondered, that as a woman jogging alone at night, it is my responsibility to bring my phone and my dog, check over my shoulder regularly, and plan my route based on street lamps, and yet, these young men feel no responsibility for not harassing me or behaving civilly?
If something had happened to me during my run – if I had been attacked – and the incident made the paper, do you think most people reading the story would have first thought, “Why do those men behave that way?” Or would their first thought have been, “Why was that woman running alone at night?”

And the original post:
http://helloladies.com/2010/10/personal-responsibility/


Disclaimer: Some people are going to read this and assume I'm saying "black people" or "black men" are bad/evil/etc. Absolutely not the case whatsoever. There is only one point to this post: to point out that this instance of "victimization" of women by men is the same thing that whites experience can experience by blacks - BUT THAT DOES NOT MAKE BLAMING ALL BLACK PEOPLE FOR THE ACTIONS OF A FEW A MORALLY ACCEPTABLE ACTION.