but it only makes them stronger
I've talked alot recently about the dynamics of men and women. The roles we play, what's expected of us. We live in a society where men are still the dominant sex, but women are becoming more equal. Compared to when our Grandparents were young we've come a long way, but we still have a long way to go. No matther how much we want to be equal, it will never happen. I don't say this lightly, but there are fundamental differences between men and women that will make it impossible for us to ever be equal. The biggest one is men are physically stronger. There's no way of getting away from this, and this tips the balance. This puts women in a vulnerable position. Men have a power over women, and though the majority of men would never dream of exerting this power over women, it's there, in the back of your mind.
I consider myself to be a strong minded young woman. i don't consider myself weak, I'm not weak. I am vulnerable though. When I walk down the street and it's dark, and a man's walking behind me, thoughts do cross my mind. Maybe I'm paranoid, but to that man I am an easy target. I'm sure men go through the same thing, but I can only speak from a womans perspective. If we're talking from a males perspective, I'm sure they don't feel vulnerable if a female is walking behind them on a dark night. It's all about the physical threat. Nobody likes to admit a weakness, if anything you do your best to hide it. So it can't be taken advantage of. I think females do a similar thing. I was discussing married couples with my friend and how the female tends to wear the trousers. My friend thought it started off the male in charge and slowly but surely the balance tipped until the female ruled. I'd like to think most relationships were equal, but in experience and watching others, this isn't always the case. Males do tend to roll over for women. If we generalise this, and I am generalising, women are known for nagging. We want things done a certain way, and as in general we have a nesting instinct, this is implemented mostly in the home, and it lead to differences. Men and women are different. We want different things. This leads to different behaviours, and different reactions to these behaviours, hence the gender stereotypes we can all fall into.
Now some would argue that if men are physically stronger, women are mentally stronger. In some cases this could be the case, but there's not enough evidence to support this claim. Women in general have the upper hand when it comes to emotions, mostly due to the fact we are forced to face them so much. There's much more of a taboo for men showing emotion. It's seen as wrong. Men should be seen as strong and unable to convey emotion, they should just be able to grunt well! So unlike nature making men physically stronger, society attempts to make men emotionally retarded, therefore giving women the upper hand mentally. Women use this power to the best of their ability. They have to use what they can in a society dominated by men.
So what got me on to this subject? Someone close to me was in an abusive relationship with a man. Now she's not the first and unfortunately she won't be the last woman to go through this. This man, if you can call him that, beat her up, to the point where she had to be hospitalised on more than one occasion. I thought that was bad enough, but I found the mental affect he had on her was far worse. He lead her to believe she was nothing, without him she had nothing and the worst thing is she believed it. This man blamed her for making him beat her on a regular basis. She made him do that, and this she believed to. This wasn't normal behaviour, men just didn't randomly beat up women. Tha wasn't the normal thing to do. So it had to be her fault. It had to be something she did to make him react like that. When it first started, she hid it, she was ashamed. She was weak and she was letting him do this to her. She'd allowed a man into her life, she'd allowed herself to love him and this was what had happened. It was her fault. When people eventually did start to find out, because he had done such a good job of convincing her that she was worthless, she wouldn't hear a bad word against him. That was the most frustrating thing, you saw someone you cared about in so much pain, and they weren't allowing you to help them. They were going one step further than that and protecting the monster that was causing this. She wouldn't hear how terrible he was, and this phase went on for a long time. It alienated her from friends, which served his purpose even more. She came to rely on him more and more. He'd punch her and then tell her he loved her. Can anyone be that desperate for love that it's worth a punch in the face everyday.
She soon reached the next phase, fear. The sad thing is, to this day I think she's still in this phase. She realised what was happening to her wasn't right, she realised it wasn't deserved, she realised she wouldn't live long enough to feel real love, unless she got out of this relationship. For the moment his mentality advantage had gone. She realised she had to leave. So what did he do? He used what he had, the physical advantage. She was to scared to leave him. She feared for her life, and though the law helped, it didn't help enough (it has since improved a great deal though). She left him a few times, but after threats and begging and empty promises she returned to him and the same would happen again. This infuriated me! Why couldn't she see it was all going to happen again. I wanted to do what he was doing, control her, make her do what I wanted, but I couldn't. I had to let her make her mistakes and be there for her when it all came crashing down. This happened a few times, until it reached the point where she'd had enough, and you could tell, I don't know how, but I knew just looking at her that, that was it. She'd found strength from somewhere and that was it, and he knew it to, and it scared the hell out of him!
So did it all end there? If only things were that easy. This is when it got worse. you'd think it was impossible, but the saying, things have to get a whole lot worse before they get better, so true. He started stalking her, and those close to her. Stalking at this time still really wasn't recognised by the law, they were still at the early stages of implimenting laws against it, so she got little help from them. She lived in fear. He followed her, he phoned her, he stood outside her house day and night. It was the element of not knowing that was worse. You'd stay with her and the fear you felt listening to him outside shouting and making threats, unbelieveable. The police would be called, he'd get moved on, but you'd lie in wait of his inevitable return. This girl was to scared to sleep, to scared to go out, to scared to stay in, to scared to live.
Now I haven't said much about the guy as a person, and to be honest i don't think he deserves to be even mentioned by name. I tried to understand his behaviour. Was he on a power trip and when it got taken away for him it sent him over the edge? I don't know, I don't understand any of his behaviour. I think we can safely say he wasn't stable. I feel foolish, I to thought he was a nice guy. I guess you never can tell. So what was the conclusion of this. She was scared half to death, but when his actions actually scared him, that's where it stopped. he almost killed someone close to her. They told him what they thought of him, pushed him even further, till he snapped, and he lost it, by huge proportions, put this person in hospital for two weeks, and with that he disappeared, never to be seen again. He never went to prison for what he did, but I'd like to think there's a worse fate waiting for him. My friend recovered, slowly but surely, but she'll never be the same. This guy dominated her mentally and physically for a long time. I guess there's an exception to every rule. This does not mean we should live in fear. Because then we aren't living. Anyone can have power, it's how we use it that counts. And as fast as we gain it, we can lose it, never forget that.
If you made it to the end of this, thank you for reading, and sorry about the length!