Coffee Scented Misogyny
He threatened to beat me, yet his generational wound was real
The connection bus was a full ride. I sat down next to a woman who took a window seat. We glanced friendly hellos, then down to our phones and ahead toward the bus driver.
It was the end of a long day.
The bus driver was new and he had a supervisor with him. The ride was a little bumpier than normal, expected and still just fine.
The man behind me had got on the bus with an open coffee, no lid. On a second “umph,” a bump in the road, his coffee spilled.
The cheap grounds filled the bus’s air conditioned aroma, and I could detect alcohol on him too.
He leaned up, close to my ear and hers “What the fuck?!” he yelled, “Why you driving like ass?!” he screamed at the driver.
He spewed curse words, called the bus driver a “fucking maniac” and bitched that it was driver who spilled his coffee (never mind he brought a full open cup onto a bus).
The woman next to me sighed and looked out the window and back down at her phone. I adjusted in my seat, checked the map and said nothing.
He continued yelling at the driver. A mix of alcohol and any other struggle he was having at that point didn’t have him in a coherent space.
The teenage girls standing next to him vocalized loudly, the driver was new, maybe they thought it would temper him. It didn’t.
The woman next to me reached for the cord above us to request her stop, a few before mine.
I took the chance to move away from the man yelling in our ears. As I let her out I moved to the row in front of me which sat adjacent.
Ah, yes Flee mode of my sympathetic nervous system.
I pulled my two bags onto my lap and that’s when I heard him start to yell at me, “Why don’t you mind your business, I’ll yell if I want to yell.”
At this point, I hadn’t said anything or made any eye contact. But whatever was going on, he saw one woman leave, me move away from him and he didn’t have ears to scream into anymore.
I raised my head, “Be merciful, he’s new.” I waved toward the driver and I ignored his comments at me, I was tired enough.
Then he lodged, “Don’t tell me not to curse, I can use curse words if I want to! Fucking shut up and mind your business. 400 years of this shit from you.”
“Yelling in my ears isn’t appropriate, and I don’t appreciate it, alright?”
There, I’d said it.
Fight Mode now, whispering now from my nervous system, “He’s not safe.”
“You better be glad that’s all I did, I’ve put up with your shit for 400 years, mind your business.” He spat the words at me.
“Ya know, you could take your own advice, do the same, do the same.” I looked down to check the map on my phone.
He repeated, “400 years of your bull shit…”
“You’re right” I said, “white folks did awful things…” This wasn’t going to end well.
He interrupted. “I oughta beat you, you better be glad all I did was yell, you deserve to be beat, you wanna to get beat?!”
“Is that what you want to do? You’re threatening to beat me? Is that what you need to do?” I raised an eyebrow and played with the rings on my hand, holding as steady as possible.
I looked at the bus driver and his instructor. The driver met my eyes in the mirror, he said anything.
I looked back at the man, he fumbled, “I said is …is this how you run your mouth at your man beats you?!” He yelled, “he needs to beat you!”
“My man wouldn’t beat me, he’d treat me with respect.” I stared at him dead on. He moved and shifted in his seat.
“Mind your business,” he yelled.
Calmly, I ended it, “Do the same. do the same.”
He fell silent and muttered obscenities. The teenage girls moved to the back. No one said a word. My stop came, finally, I went to the back door to exit.
I took a deep breath. I’ll be honest it was a sigh of relief.
Still, I get it, as a white woman, in his likely drunken angry state, he couldn’t see me, he saw representation of white women who’ve harmed black men. Yes, that wound is real. He’s right to have anger about that. I can have compassion for that.
AND yet…
My response was to a man, a person with a penis, bigger than me who could swing and hit, spewing verbal abuse on a bus.
I believe identifying trauma is valuable for healing and pursuing true justice. But exploiting one’s trauma to justify abuse is wrong, it’s a vengeful perpetuation of harm and often a behavior of narcissism and assertion of power (this also applies to a certain geopolitical story we see playing out, mm?).
I’m trained to be alert in situations like that. Most women are, some freeze, I’m certain the ones on the bus did just that. And others likely didn’t see me too favorably. I do get it.
And yet,
What made the situation worse, was before he yelled at me, were the two men up front, the bus driver and instructor — who said and did nothing.
They do have the authority to give him a warning. They do have authority to escort him off the bus. There are signs telling people not to abuse bus and metro drivers.
Yet, they did nothing.
A woman at the wheel wouldn’t have put up with it. I’ve seen female drivers lay down the law when a passenger gets testy.
He yelled at a female passenger, misdirecting his anger at me when they didn’t acknowledge him.
The bus driver and the instructor saw it. They watched it.
They did nothing.
Was he harmless? Maybe they thought so, but does it matter? I encouraged that man to show mercy. He refused. Maybe the bus drivers thought they were doing so. Then again, when does accountability matter?
Is accountability only for physical violence? What’s the conversation WE as a culture are not having? Especially when it comes to verbal and emotional violence?
Misogyny continues because men don’t check each other.
Accountability does not exist between them. Recent appointments by the president elect are case in point.
That must change. Complacency is complicity.
Yes, the climate of racism and generational wounding is real. Many Black men have struggled under a horrifying system.
I will stand with my brothers, ah, but my brothers who are going to step into that conversation from a place of willing vulnerability. The goal is to heal together.
AND so, it’s vital to recognize: sexism is also very real, verbal threats and misogyny are evident and accepted without impunity.
This man was looking to lodge his violence at me, more so than other men. He didn’t threaten beatings to the other men, just called them names and screamed curse words, which of course is violent and unacceptable.
But my Body was far more at stake.
I have experienced misogyny from men of every background. It’s in the rhythm of our very culture.
Men will still choose men over women because the privilege is just too great.
Women’s bodies are seen as something to be beat, owned or enslaved. “Her” strength is perceived as a threat to his nervous system because “he’s” been taught dominance.
I get white women have done a lot of damage, we have to own that and fight better against racial injustice, especially after the display of the last election.
And yet, and yet, more than one thing must be true.
I will not let a man speak violence like that to me or do what men have done to me in the past. I am a survivor, I know the stakes.
I value fight mode as holy, when it is grounded in resistance and this was a gender oppressive moment.
I did my best to meet it as steadily as I could, and honestly, I don’t know if I did it well. I tell this story with a bit of uncertainty.
I do want to make sure and acknowledge: my Black sisters deserve better too. Domestic violence numbers among Black and Indigenous women are often higher, at least that’s what’s reported, not accounting for the cases which are not.
Overall, the stats say 1 in 4 women. Yes, of course, 1 in 7 men too.
Our fight against Patriarchal culture must be under an abolition rainbow coalition of feminist unity to bring about a participatory Matriarchal culture that heals us, and joins us and enacts justice.
So, yeh, we also need men in the game, with us, not just to check other men, but to open spaces for emotional support, so that men feel safe to express their pain in sober spaces where they’re accepted by other men.
In a brilliant documentary, The Feminist in Cell Block Y, course organizer, Richard Edmond Vargas said,
“Men who are whole can speak their fear without shame.”
When they can speak without shame, they won’t shame others, they won’t shame women.
When women can speak up and stand up for ourselves, our shame also sheds and transforms into self-sovereign empowerment.
Racism and Sexism have a lot of interweaving parts, and both are about body-shame, which must be dismantled.
Fighting against misogyny takes all of us.
I’m not mad at that man, I don’t know him. I see our situation as an “in” for a bigger conversation, bringing “the dangerous” to the table.
Can we find each other in this?
Can Women of all colors, and expressions come together to fight against violence and embrace each other?
Men, what will you do in your community to bring men together?
May WE, all, find a way to break through some of these barriers of pain, and start talkin.
Ash is a writer, activist & community organizer, to work with her and expand these conversations, find more info at ashgallagher.com and contact her here.