Stop Complaining That We're Demonstrating Entitlement or We'll Hit You With Even More Entitlement

Twelve years ago, I took a walk to my local DVD store. Three women had been abducted in the neighbourhood that week, but when you need DVDs, you need DVDs. On the way back home, I spotted a car that was moving at an impractically slow pace, so I did what I always do in those scenarios: Stopped a block ahead and waited for it to drive away. It stopped. I turned around. It turned around. I turned a corner. The car turned a corner. So followed 15 minutes of abject terror. Ultimately, I turned into a one way, forcing him out of my path and into a main road.

I can’t tell you if he had nefarious intentions, but I can tell you that he was fuming at my behaviour by the expletives he was screaming at me for being impolite.

This is not the most harrowing experience I’ve ever had with a man, but the Man vs. Bear conversation has brought it to mind. I spent a good four days running threads on the debate last week. One man was late to the party, though, so he got me on a particularly exhausted day. I set a grownup boundary: I’d debated this enough. Please move along. I’m tired.

He didn’t move along. He slid into my DMs. I repeated the same boundary several times, but by the time the next morning had dawned, he was already raging about how I dared refuse him the conversation he was entitled to. I ignored him, so he hit “follow” on me and a dear friend, then waited for another opportunity. When it arrived, he pounced again.

I had to block him to enforce the boundary.

This man believes I owe him a conversation, just as the man in the car legitimately believed I owed him my space. My experience is not unusual. The woman who originally asked the Man Vs. Bear question is exhausted. The woman whose post went viral on Facebook is exhausted. Any woman who’s trended on this topic is exhausted for the same identical reason: Men have felt entitled to our time, shouted us down, and ignored our boundaries.

When I was three, I used to bite my sister while shouting, “Stop biting me.” I can’t tell you why I was an asshole toddler, but I can tell you that these men are doing the same thing: Pushing past boundaries, demonstrating entitlement, and complaining because we’re tired of men pushing past our boundaries and demonstrating entitlement.

Same year, same neighbourhood, different street. This time I was walking to work when a car stopped at an intersection I was approaching. As always, I stopped a block ahead and waited for the car to move on. It didn’t. It did two U-turns, and when it was close enough, the man started screaming that I was a bitch slut who really wanted it. He was masturbating.

You never know when the man of the hour feels entitled to directions, a wank fest, or your body, but it gets exhausting sometimes. Every man who’s showed entitlement over the last few weeks is demonstrating why women choose the bear.

Those men don’t think they’re the problem.

They think they’re perfectly nice men who have been assaulted by a roving internet argument.

They also think they have a right to express their rage over a mere metaphor, but that we don’t have a right to share our fear of rape and femicide.

These, I’ll remind you, are the very men who are always telling us to block and move on when we receive crass messages because words can never hurt you.

Those men have taught me something useful: I was right to choose the bear.