A tale about putting yourself in women’s shoes — and how girls react in amazing ways
Here’s a funny litlle lesson about creating empathy towards women. It happened this week in Brazil.
So, a guy posts a message at his university’s group page on Facebook. (It’s called Te Vi no Mackenzie, or “Saw you at Mckenzie”, in Portuguese). It is known for being a space where students go to flirt with people they spotted on campus.
The guy, in summary, says this: he and his friend went to a bar next to the university and noticed, not for the first time, that there were two guys spending extra time at the bathroom, just so they could stare at penises.
There’s an expression in portuguese for guys who behaves like that: “manja rola” (or: guy who stares at dicks — is there a English equivalent for that?)
His post on Facebook explained that he was very upset about it, and how he was not going to tolerate that kind of behavior anymore. He officially “declared a war” against it.
According to the post, he and his ‘bro’ went to the bathroom and confronted the guys about it.
He even added: “I want to make it clear this is not a homophobic thing, but this is an abuse”. He also added a hashtag: #mydickmyrules.
It sucks, I know. And I am not celebrating the guy’s harassment either, it sucks. People should be able to pee and walk around freely all the time, peacefully, boys and girls. I know.
But that said, behold, HERE comes the fun part. Lots and lots of girls responded to the post on Facebook repeating the exact kind of things women are used to hear when reporting similar situations.
While I am writing this, his post has 5,5k likes and over 3k shares. You can read them all here, in Portuguese. They are worth even some Google Translator effort, in my opinion.
Let me try to curate and translate some of those comments for you. Very witty-funny stuff.
Nina Chrispim “So much complaint! You should be flattered, is just looking a crime now? The guy just thought you were cute!”
Nina Chrispim “Are you sure you were not insinuating yourself for the guy in any way?”
Nina Chrispim “If you were my boyfriend I was going to ask: couldn’t you have waited for the guy to leave the bathroom before you peed? You know you can’t pee anywhere like this! I love you babe, but you have to be more careful next time!”
Luisa Moraleida “So you put your dick out and you don’t want people to watch? Men are used to all this victimization, what a bitchy generation. If you thought that was bad you should have stayed home changing some tires or opening a bottle of olives!”
Ana Laghi “You were at the bar, probably drinking ALCOHOL, and you want to complain about harassment? Spare me, what is the credibility of a guy that goes to bars!??”
Letícia Alvares “If the guy was handsome you would never complain. But as the guy is ugly, you say is harassment!”
Marcella Regino “You had complained before. If you did not want that, you would never go there again. I am sure you were asking for it”
Bruna Mendes Brossa I am not machista, far from that, but I believe that biologically men have sexual instincts that NEED to be fullfilled. Don’t feel invaded because he looked at you, he was just fulfilling his role as a man”.
More empathy is what we need.
If you want to read more about being on women’s shoes, you can do it here. If you find any value in this article, do not forget to recommend it using the heart below.
Ligia Guimarães is a 2016 fellow at the Tow-Knight Center for Entrepreneurial Journalism, at Cuny. She is also a reporter at Valor Econômico, in Brazil, and worked for G1 and Gazeta Mercantil. She thinks brazilian women are amazing and we should be telling their stories.
