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Women’s fear has rational basis
A woman s Icar is genuine.
How w'ould I — a man —
know? I use my imagination.
Purple daylight melts behind the
hori/on. 1 walk home from campus
along 13th Street (an unlucky number
□to begin with) and a
white car pulls next to
me. It rolls in sync with
my pace, which now
increases speed with
every step.
The car’s windows are
dark, ominous. Fora few
ipinutcs it haunts me,
then it speeds away. My
heart rate slows.
A few minutes later, a slow motor
hum brushes against my car again.
The car is back. Someone behind the
dark windows watches me.
My fear propels me to run. Run!
Run! My apartment is a block away
now. My sanctuary.
At my door, my hand trembles to
push the key. I look around. That car
is there again, like torment. Parked in
front. Those deep, black eyes peering
at me. Devouring what little strength
and courage I have left.
I push the apartment door open and
fall to the center of the room. I -sit
there, in the dark. Weak and afraid.
Through the blinds, amid the purple
dusk 1 watch the car circle the block
like a vulture — hungry, but patient.
My apartment wal Is close in around
me. I dare not move from my spot or
close my eyes to sleep. Fear, a cold
fright, shakes me violently and I sit
there.
My liberty lifted, I am exposed.
My life will never be the same.
My frail imagination can take me
into a woman’s Icar only so far. Be
yond the point where my imagination
ends is the very personal fear women
feel.
I seldom, if ever, FEEL the fear of
being attacked or physically harassed
by anyone. I bet most men feel this
way. It’s not a macho-sexist or ego
thing to say. Rather, it’s a reflection of
a disparate society dominated by a
strange assortment of males.
In essence, no matter what social
and economic leaps women have made
in this gendered society, ostensibly
primal strength and power still rule.
I can’t feel the draining agony of a
woman worrying about whether a man
behind her on a downtown street is
going to abduct her or walk by. Nei
ther am I leery of getting in a car
wondering whether a rapist is hiding
in the back scat.
So before writing this column, I
talked to scvVral women about eerie
little things that have happened to
them.
By far, the following story is the
eeriest.
One summer night, a friend was
asleep in her first-floor' apartment.
She said she happened to wake up in
the middle of the night. When she
opened her eyes she saw a man stand
ing in the shadows at the foot of her
bed staring at her. She was shocked,
literally. And he just walked away,
like a ghost. She didn’t know who he
was.
Another woman told me a man
called her at her job and said in a
cheap, gradc-D hofror/thrillcr movie
voice: “It won’t be daylight forever,”
and hung up. Whether he knew her or
she knew him is a mystery.
These arc just two examples of the
many stories I heard. And the strange
part is that most of the women I talked
to had more than one to tell.
Whin odd mental or physical ad
diction propels such predators? Is it
sex? In the ease of my friend and the
man in her room, nothing happened,
but it could have easily. Or is the
motivation power, or a combination
of both?
These arc the stories few ever hear
about. It’s the snatching and later the
killingof women that makes the thrill
ing headlines. But these arc the ex
treme examples of reality.
I’ve always heard women tell
gloomy stories of some man watching
them. Preying upon them like beasts.
Until recently, I never actually lis
tened to what women were saying,
what they were feeling.
For example, when a woman would
ask me to walk her to her car or to a
class somewhere on campus, I would
growl: “Oh, slop being a paranoid
chicken. Your car’s only two blocks
away.”
But now I realize that it’s not the
distance that frightens her. It’s what
or who lurks between the distance in
the night.
I walk in a society where my gen
der hands me the privilege of seldom
thinking about harm. Female friends
find this amazing.
Maybe my fearlessness is analo
gous to being a while male in the
United Slates (enter imagination). A
white friend of mine once told me:
“Man, I’ve never once in my life
experienced discrimination, but you
talk about it all the time.”
Amazing, I thought. We arc all
victims in some capacity.
There are twisted men out there,
stalking women and imposing a grim
fear on their lives. They arc invisible,
anonymous and find pleasure and
power in that.
The question I ask is, what is a
woman to do? Short of locking your
self in a room, at night especially, for
the rest of your life, there seems no
real defense. You could be very care
ful and cautious, but your capacity to
do that is limited.
Meanwhile, blue lights have
bloomed on campus like beacons of
safely. Anti-assault/Takc Back the
Night rallies, self-defense classes,
seminars and eye sprays arc held up
like impenetrable shields.
However, these arc tissue-th in lay
ers of security. They arc reactive
measures against an implicit threat
that is abstract, formidable and based
on brute strength and a morbid men
tality.
These lurking men could be any
one of us. Women ^now that and arc
leery of us all, to a point. Such gener
alizations lick us off.
How can men — the indifferent
bystanders, the unphased headline
readers, the unpreyed upon — under
stand any of this? Maybe we never
will. Butawoman’s fear is not simply
a woman’s concern.
The women in fear arc our moth
ers, wives, sisters, girlfricndsand col
leagues. Imagine if something strange
and sadistic happened to them.
Muss is graduate student studying an
thropology and a Daily Nebraskan colum
nist.
Life runs smoothly in commune
Well, bill Clinton is moving
into the big While House,
along with his wife and
daughter. Around here, at one of the
more conservative campuses in the
nation, the reaction was mixed.
Some Republicans l talked to were
actually afraid for the country, which
I find somewhat hard to understand,
because whatever plans Clinton has
for the nation, he will
only be the president,
after all.
A few radical right
wingers have gone so
lar as to foretell doom
and destruction, as those
evil Democrats slip us
deeper into socialism.
Flags will burn, draft dodgers will
, rule, everyone will be doing crazy
things like toking up and silling on lop
of poles w hile listening to really loud
music. Alack!
Even if that were the case, I
wouldn’t mind much. I live in a com
mune right now, and it’s not so bad.
Sure, communist living has ils down
side — Stalin comes to mind — but a
small, self-contained unit can be use
ful.
Any society, however, must have
laws that citizens must follow lo avoid
anarchy. Guys who live in communes
have historically come up with a num
ber of lime-tested rules. It is my theory
that one of the reasons ihc Soviet
Union collapsed was they failed to
obey one or more of the Laws.
In my house, everyone gives ac
cording to his ability and takes ac
cording to his need. For instance,
when bill-paying time comes ‘round,
which in many male living units is
approximately one week al ter the first
disconnect notices arrive, whoever
has money pays them, and the rest
join a Harris Lab study.
Two members of my six-to-seven
person commune just got out of a
I. *
nicotine study in which they were
forced to cal aw ful -lasting anti-smok -
ing pills. It was worse than most Har
ris Lab studies because some other
inmate recently stole the “Doors” vid
eotape my roommates used to watch.
Anolhcrcommuncmatc, Dave, was
released from Harry Slab’s Fun Pal
ace after 17 days last month, four of
which he spent with a lube stuck down
his nose. I guess the lube-nose thing
would be another downside, like
Stalin. But now- Dave can loan money
for other communemates who arc
between studies in these lough eco
nomic times.
When commune members arc off
at Harry Slab’s house, there arc many
fine points of etiquette to be observed
by the other, idle members. For in
stance, any lixxl left out by study
participants is to be eaten by the re
maining citizens. And if any other
junk is left behind, it gets stapled to
the wall. The right to revenge is sa
cred.
I don’t think my house is all that
different from other houses full of
guys. We can easily gel along in the
communist, Red and Black Caf6-ish
lifestyle. If other citizens keep me
awake late at night, 1 know I can
avenge the deed some other time. If
someone doesn’t clean up a dish or
bowl, I know it’s OK for me to put it
under the offending member’s pillow
or melt a slice of cheese between two
pages of their favorite book. If some
one gels really drunk, we can drive his
car across town and leave it there —
no questions asked.
Everything we do is lor the gotxl of
the commune. Just folks helping folks.
And when everyone follows the
rules, life hums along smoothly. We
have time for other pursuits not open
to the working dass of bourgeois,
capitalist societies.
If a member brings something cool
home, we eat it, or if it can’t be eaten,
wc hang il up in inc living room —
unless il is loo heavy, like the big rock
wc brought home on Election Day.
Wc can watch “The Good, the Bad
and the Ugly” over and over again.
Wc can call friends up on one of the
Harris lines. Wc can talk to Univer
sity Operators whenever wc feel the
urge.
We can live! Wc can grow our hair
and dance and prance and blow bugles
and smear paints on our bodies like in
“Lord of the Flics.” Thai’s what il
means to be an American. Thai’s what
commune living has done for me.
Most of the women I know haven’t
caught on to the secrets of commune
life. Recently, a female friend of mine,
confronted with the glories of our
society, a living monument to free
dom, said only, “Il could use a good
cleaning.”
Sadly, I shook my head, and shed
a tear for my grandchildren yet to
come. Did not she see what was about
her? It was as though she was a two
dimensional Flallandcr, able to see
but one aspect of our three-dimen
sional beings.
Sure, we’ve got a few dust rhinos
lurking in dark corners, and, yes, there
could be something living under the
sink, something small perhaps that
drools and snarls from time to time,
but come now! We’re in the midst of
a glorious revolution, a noble experi
ment, a big, old, smelly Battle for the
Future of Humanity!
Bring on Clinton, say 1. Bring on
all his friends from his Moscow days.
Bring on the O/one Man. Thousands
of guys like me across college towns
throughout this country already have
been living the dream, breathing the
life of plenty.
None of our furniture matches, but
our visions do.
Phelps Is a Junior news-editorial major,
the Daily Nebraskan w ire editor and ucoluni
nist.
-a
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