The Fear of the Public

Before Christmas I took a trip to Cardiff to go and see my friends from university. Living in Bristol, this is neither a long or hard journey; yet with the combination of train strikes, network errors and a sea of football fans, it became both.

After a few initial cancellations I made it to Cardiff and had a wonderful drunken evening with my friends. At the time I needed to leave I was about a 30-minute walk away from the station. It was a very easy walk along a well-lit, very public road (I’d lived in Cardiff for a year prior to this so was fairly familiar with the route). But my friends would not let me walk. I insisted I’d be okay, having done it many times before, but I was told I wasn’t allowed and that they’d book me a taxi to the station. Walking myself to the station was too dangerous. I arrived at the station, got to the platform and waited. The platform was rammed as it was the weekend of a football game (the one where Wales lost) which started a feeling of unease: drunk, rowdy men disappointed and angry at their loss.

The train was due to leave at 21:00. At 21:15 it got cancelled. My friends had left Cardiff. I was alone in the city I no longer lived in, with train cancellations left, right and centre. I asked the platform attendee (unofficial job title) when the next train to Bristol was: 21:40. That train was delayed. Next train at 22:00. That one was delayed. I was stuck on a platform full of football fans – alone. Instantly I started to panic and feel more and more uncomfortable, noticing every person around me, how close they were to me and what they were doing. I felt vulnerable. An easy target. Thankfully, there were so many people in the same boat which made the uncertainty of getting home feel less overwhelming. I also made an unlikely friend of a middle aged man who was also stuck after going to see the football. In the end, I got on a train around 22:30 and got home safely, with no problems (other than the trains).

Although my fears and concerns were completely valid, with the 97% of all women statistic[1], it did make me wonder why I was so paranoid? I was in a public place with loads of people around me, and my boyfriend picking me up at the other end. Really, there was no need for me to be so fearful. Have we, as women, been conditioned to have fear as our predominant feeling when alone? It is because even just the potential (even when as minimal as mine was) is so real? We see it day in and day out with the media. And with social media spreading the information and stories as quickly as it does, before you know it that story is everywhere.

For me, this is a double edged sword. We need to hear these stories to shine a light on the dangers women face on an everyday basis. Allow them to teach young girls to be wary. To be cautious. To not listen to music when walking alone at night. To carry their keys in between their fingers. To walk along well-lit streets. Because these threats are real. But to see this frequently and relentlessly creates an extreme level of fear; that as soon as you leave your house and you pass a man you will be attacked. How do we find a balance between making sure girls and women know how to protect themselves without scaremongering them? In an ideal world this isn’t something we’d have to think about or consider. Parents wouldn’t have to teach their daughters these behaviours. But we don’t live in an ideal world. We live in a world where threats to oppressed groups exist. And for women this threat is men. How can we change this? Teach boys that girls are not objects. That we are equal. Remove the systemic oppression that allows men to control our actions. Perhaps an impossible feat, especially in my lifetime, but maybe one day we’ll get there. But until then, I will be keeping my keys between my fingers and preparing for the worst, just in case. Although an unlikely event, an all too likely one as well.

[1] This statistic refers to the number of women that have experienced either sexual assault or sexual harassment.