Accumulated Wisdom —

I was surprised by the response to my post on xkcd's comic. I'm glad I didn't alienate people and the people that disagreed with me did not seem to take offense. But in their responses I found a lot of good takeaway I thought I'd share:

From Heidi:

"What followed after that would be key. Would it just be a friendly guy/person/whatever or would it be skeezy dude who then tried to hit on me? If the former, fine. If the latter, then the tirade. Much as I like SP, I thought that post was overreacting."

From Laura:

"Is the solution to see all subway rides as merely transitional space between our real work and social spaces and therefore not available for the possibility of other connections? Maybe in a society where privilege is so invisible to those who have it the answer is yes. But I truly hope we can figure out a different way to negotiate our world so that language which is truly intended to expand our universes and give us opportunity to make new connections isn't always reduced to confrontations of opposing powers."

And just for you:



From starling:

"Hey, Shannon--take a look at the commentary over on SP. I think you may begin to understand that this is a huge trigger for many women because of the exceedingly common creep-threat factor that we experience in these interactions. I think men in general are pretty oblivious to the amazing and horrible ways in which their fellow men harass women on a regular basis."

From Bree:

"If we aren't allowed to talk to each other or make random non-threatening comments on each other's clothing, accessories, etc., then it's a pretty sad world."

From Anonymous:

"I understand that men harass women far, far too often and I understand that women should be allowed to decide where and when they want to interact with men. But I'm really floored at the suggestion that a simple interaction between two people could be considered harassment (and yes, I live in a major city and take public transportation every day). If anything, it seems as though the guy in the comic was experiencing both a massive attack of low self-esteem and an attempt to be as respectful of the girl as possible. And basically, the comic just made me wonder...male or female, how valuable could some strangers have ended up being to my life if only I'd been brave enough to talk to them/vice versa."

From Ruth:

"Let me give you an example that's happened to me more than once: I'm in the bus, reading a book. I'm in no mood to talk. Some guy sits next to me and asks, "What are you reading?" Or, "Oh, I've heard about that book--how is it?" Even if I very politely say that I don't want to talk, I am likely to be called a bitch (or worse). If I start talking, then I have to listen to the guy talk about his opinions about the book, etc., etc. And I should have a choice of whether or not I want to talk. But I usually don't."

And the winner for the best summation, Whiner:

"Naturally, everyone is wrong except me, so I will explain. :)

The comic was not intended to be offensive, I think that's fairly clear. And really, if you read carefully, Shapely Prose etc don't *think* the comic was meant to be offensive. I have never seen anyone actually think that the stick-figure guy is meant to be a pervert or rapist!

Most readers of xkcd can recognise that both male and female geeks can be lonely, unable to communicate, and shoot themselves in the foot. Many such readers just smiled wistfully upon reading it and thought it was cute.

So what's the problem? Well, part of the problem is that there really are these guys out there who think that women exist for no other reason than to attract men, and after having had to deal with enough crap from those guys, many women are a little touchy about a comic that appears to say "See? She REALLY WANTS you to bother her!"

And when that comic first came out, comment threads immediately started up with lonely guys who were getting the message that they should be more outgoing and approach strangers more, and asking for the secret strategies of how to make women like them.

And they got advice. Unsurprisingly, this advice NEVER involved "Say hello. If the other person doesn't respond, or just grunts hi and goes back to what she's doing, leave her alone." It was always bizarre complicated rituals to force women into interacting with them...

Now, XKCD is not a dating guide, and it is not their job to hold the reader's hand and teach them exactly how to deal with members of the appropriate sex in every single strip. However, the content of this strip did legitimately, for some readers, trigger a sigh and a "Please don't encourage them!""

And Fat Acceptance, I'm just going to let your comment stand as is. :)