{"id":132503,"date":"2019-01-07T13:01:42","date_gmt":"2019-01-07T18:01:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/?p=132503"},"modified":"2019-01-09T11:08:16","modified_gmt":"2019-01-09T16:08:16","slug":"on-being-a-woman-in-america-while-trying-to-avoid-being-assaulted","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2019\/01\/07\/on-being-a-woman-in-america-while-trying-to-avoid-being-assaulted\/","title":{"rendered":"On Being a Woman in America While Trying to Avoid Being Assaulted"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>

Etching by Martin Lewis<\/p><\/div>\n

Lately, I\u2019ve come to suspect that maybe a lot of people, especially men, still have no idea what it\u2019s like to be a woman in America going about her life while trying, and at times failing, not to be assaulted. So, these past weeks, I\u2019ve been observing myself.<\/p>\n

I, for instance, elect to walk on certain streets, not others. The elevator doors slide open, and there\u2019s one man inside: I evaluate his size against mine, calculating how well I could fight him off, if I had to. I check the backseat of my car before getting in, just to make sure no one\u2019s waiting there. I don\u2019t leave my drink unattended; when I have to use the bathroom, I take it with me. It\u2019s a multiperson bathroom. I take it into the stall. I lock my car as soon as I get in, then I start driving, pronto, no dallying. While I\u2019m waiting at the bar to buy a drink, a man starts talking to me. I respond politely, if briefly: I hope to indicate, without provoking his ire, that I\u2019m not interested. I get unsettling emails from a stranger, a man. I try to decide what\u2019s safest, if I should create a filter that directs all his missives to the trash or if I should remain aware of what he\u2019s saying. I make the filter, then I delete it. I should be aware, I think.\u00a0<\/p>\n

I park close to the gym. I get catcalled; I pretend I didn\u2019t hear him. It\u2019s after nine at night, so I decide not to walk home alone from my subway stop, paying instead for a short Lyft ride. I make sure the license plate is correct before I get in. The bar bathroom\u2019s in the back, through a dark hallway; I have to piss, but I decide I\u2019ll hold it, I\u2019ll wait until I get home. I stand at a distance from the subway tracks: a friend who works in public transit once told me women are more likely to be pushed than men. It\u2019s dark, and I park beneath a light. A stranger on social media sends me a direct message: \u201chey beautiful.\u201d I ignore him. No, I block him. I walk through the parking lot with my keys out, bright points spiking between my fingers, in case I require a weapon. Several years ago, after a serial rapist attacked women in my neighborhood, I enrolled in a three-day self-defense class. The first thing I learned was that it might help if I walk fast, with a purposeful stride. I\u2019ll look less vulnerable. It\u2019s night, so I walk fast. I try to look purposeful. I don\u2019t make eye contact.<\/p>\n

I make fake phone calls while I walk to a party in the Mission, listening to old voicemails I\u2019ve saved, the voices of people I love piping again like songs. The doorbell rings after sundown; I\u2019m home alone, so I pretend I\u2019m not there. I get catcalled; I glare, but I don\u2019t say anything. I\u2019m traveling, and I realize I forgot to lock my hotel-room door while I was gone for a few hours. I check the closets, the shower, to make sure no one\u2019s in there, waiting. I see three people walking toward me. It\u2019s dark, and I think they\u2019re all men, so I tense up. I get out my phone. When I realize one\u2019s a woman, I relax, slipping the phone into my bag. I make so many more fake phone calls than real ones. I\u2019m exhausted. I\u2019m in a rage. While walking, I accidentally make eye contact, and I tell myself, Look stern. Look frightening. Don\u2019t look so fucking afraid.<\/p>\n

*<\/p>\n

Sometimes, I\u2019ll read a novel written by a man in which a woman walks home alone, late at night, in America, without having a single thought about her physical safety, and it\u2019s so implausible that I\u2019ll put the book down.<\/p>\n

*<\/p>\n

A few months ago, I published my first novel. I\u2019ve been traveling a lot, talking about the book, and people sometimes ask why there\u2019s sexual violence in my novel, or why there\u2019s so much of it, or why multiple women are sexually assaulted during the course of a short novel\u2014the question has variations, but the central inquiry is the same, and it\u2019s most often from men: why did you make that choice.<\/p>\n

My go-to response is that I tend not to write with overarching whys, that I don\u2019t have any special messages in mind. Writing, to me, is less akin to actions as willful as inventing and deciding than it is to discovery, a slow revelation in which I am more like a conduit. I sometimes think I\u2019m a witness, rather than a person who makes. I don\u2019t write to provide answers, I say. I quote Cort\u00e1zar, whom I love: I\u2019ve remained on the side of the questions.<\/p>\n

But here\u2019s what else is true: for all the attention I\u2019ve paid to the ongoing project of my personal safety, it\u2019s still not enough. The gropings, men\u2019s hands where they shouldn\u2019t be, the strangers in bars, the editor who, when I said I didn\u2019t want to go up to his room at the end of the night, put his hands in my hair and pulled. My novel\u2019s mostly set on a college campus. In my experience of college, as well as of life, I haven\u2019t known how to get through a day without considering the possibility of violence against my person. So, perhaps, sexual violence shows up in my novel the way light does, or dialogue: it\u2019s so intrinsically a part of my life that I find it hard to imagine leaving it out.<\/p>\n

*<\/p>\n

On the day Brett Kavanaugh was voted into the Supreme Court despite multiple, very credible accusations of sexual misconduct, I left my apartment. I went around town, running errands while trying not to cry. I walked along Market Street. A man catcalled me. \u201cAre you fucking kidding me,\u201d I said, flaring brave, for once, with fury. \u201cToday, of all days.\u201d<\/p>\n

It was late afternoon and I was on a crowded street, but even so, when I saw his face go rigid, I was terrified. I wished I hadn\u2019t said anything. I walked away as fast as I could.<\/p>\n

*<\/p>\n

What I\u2019ve learned about angry men is that they can turn dangerous.<\/p>\n

*<\/p>\n

Joking with a friend, I said, \u201cI\u2019m often so angry, these days, that I\u2019m a little surprised I haven\u2019t turned physically incandescent. Why haven\u2019t I started glowing in the dark?\u201d<\/p>\n

*<\/p>\n

I went to the same college, Yale, that Kavanaugh attended, the Ivy League school reported to have the highest incidence of sexual assault. During the first week of school, I was instructed as to the purpose of the blue boxes stationed across campus: phone stations equipped with large blue lights, glowing lambent at night. If we pressed the emergency button, help would come our way, I was told. Throughout the rest of my time at Yale, I didn\u2019t know anyone who pressed for help. I wasn\u2019t acquainted with a single woman who, having been assaulted, felt safe enough to report the crime. Night after night, I walked past those phones, the blue boxes lighting my way home.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

R.O. Kwon is the author of the award-winning\u00a0<\/em>The Incendiaries.<\/em>\u00a0Kwon\u2019s writing has appeared in<\/em> The Guardian, Vice, BuzzFeed, Noon, Time, Playboy,\u00a0and elsewhere.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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