ellen@reed.UUCP (Ellen Eades) (07/13/85)
This is a variation on the standard "Bicycles, Violence and Hatred" theme, and also a modification of part of my statements in net.women regarding "Last Night." I've been biking to work now for over a month daily and I have noticed that *every* *single* *day* *without* *fail* I am harassed by some asshole who wants to hang out the window of his car and prove he's macho by yelling some obscenity at me. I don't know whether this is a comment on the insecurity of males upon seeing a female bicyclist or what, but it's the truth. So ... In my discussion of verbal harassment in net.women I commented that I would not yell obscenities back at the man who exposed himself on a street corner to me (in my car). I'm discovering that you can't be politically correct while traveling down a street at 30mph (what a discovery), and that there are, indeed, times when all I want to do is flip the guy off and let the incident pass from my now-untroubled mind. I haven't yet run into anyone who has circled the block and come back to "get me." Besides, after five weeks of this stuff, I don't care about convincing the asshole to respect me; I don't respect him. So yesterday when I was harassed I gave the guy the finger, said "F*** you," and kept going. To the idiot who yelled "Nice tits," I came back with "I didn't grow them for you!" It felt *wonderful*. Ellen Eades -- - - - - - - - - - - - - - "Who's been repeating all that hard stuff to you?" "I read it in a book," said Alice. - - - - - - - - - - - - - tektronix!reed!ellen OR tektronix!reed!motel6!ellen