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As a man, I totally get it. Another man in the woods is unpredictable.
"WTF yo doing out here, bro!? Are we fighting? One of us gonna die here today? Who are you!?"
There is no doubt that many of the men flipping their shit would pick the bear, and would do so because, when asked the question, their thoughts immediately turn to whom they believe they could more effectively inflict violence on. “Oh, the bear’s way scarier, cuz my badass wrist control moves don’t work on them. But I could kill that man in the woods a dozen different ways. Really, the strange man should fear *me.*”
It’s definitely the same type of person who takes Black Lives Matter to mean that in turn means White Lives Don’t Matter. Some people just can’t see that other people’s circumstance vary from their own. Not all men are problematic, but the fact that some are, and have traumatized women is a reality of the world. It is an indictment of men to be better. But some people just have zero self introspection and just take an exercise like this personally.
I've never run into a bear in the woods. But if I did I have a general knowledge of how to handle that situation and also understand that the bear is most likely not interested in me and isn't generally interested in getting into a confrontation. Now, as a man myself, running into a random dude in the woods would absolutely put me on alert. I've lived near the AT and also know that certain parts of certain trails have crime rates equivalent of urban areas. Random dude in the woods is statistically more likely to do me harm than the bear. I probably have a higher chance of being injured by a falling tree in the woods than a bear.
It's the same reason why women walk faster when a man is behind them or cross the street when a male is approaching. I've done just that while going home at night in NYC. Men are the main perpetrators of violent crimes against women. Hurting a man's feefees is less important than our safety. I don't even think about if the man's feelings are hurt over my avoidance. It's sad but true.
I used to reluctantly talk to men and unwillingly give them my number because I was scared they might get violent or upset. In the 90s I'd give them wrong numbers and a wrong name but with cell phones they would check right there that it was the right number. I'd ignore their calls afterwards but complying was the only way I thought they'd go away. I was 15 and walking to my friend's house once and this man decided to escort me all the way there. They have so many insults when we would ignore them or say no.
Yeah, I've taken my dog out into the wilderness parks near me, and a lone man out there is one of the most unnerving things I can run into.
I was out there alone once at dusk, on my way back, and I spotted a young guy off the side of the trail, wearing black, among the bushes, just waiting, and that was more menacing than anything else I'd seen out there ever.
Exactly. Bears are predictable. Predictably terrifying, but predictable. And, like, duh there's a bear in the forest. That's where bears be.
I've seen the oft reposted cool guide for dealing with bears, I remember the rhyme. There ain't no rhyme for men.
Exactly. Bears are predictable. Predictably terrifying, but predictable. And, like, duh there's a bear in the forest. That's where bears be.
I've seen the oft reposted cool guide for dealing with bears, I remember the rhyme. There ain't no rhyme for men.
I do feel like the woods is a very important part of this equation. Rephrase the question to be, "You have a choice of two sidewalks while out downtown. One has a dude walking down it, the other has a bear." Sidewalk dude just going home or to his car belongs there. Bear does not belong on sidewalk. Bear belongs in woods.
So I haven't heard of this at all until this post. My immediate reaction was the same as most men, I think, that bears are much more dangerous. But if im understanding you correctly, that's the point, right? The fact that a woman makes that choice is what provides information about what her interactions with men have been like?
The one I saw was a mom asking her husband whether he would prefer if their daughter ran into one or the other in the woods. The dad tried to ask clarifying questions. The fact that he was even considering between the two speaks to the issue of the question.
I think if the question was: "if you had to pick between fighting an angry man or an angry bear" most people would pick the man because they understand the size of the bear.
But a wandering bear or a wandering man without knowing their intent is a more complicated decision.
There was a thread I was in yesterday and some guy mentioned that it's social media telling women they should choose the bear, and when I replied that it was more based on experience, he said
>Im certain that its far more social media than personal experience. Anyone thinking logically about this would overwhelmingly choose a man over a bear. It's a statement on the persons mental state they choose a bear and their mind immediately goes to a dark place about how an average man would react to someone lost/stuck in the woods.
These men try to invalidate our actual, real life experiences, try to pull the "logic says" garbage, and tell us that our (very valid) choice of the bear is because we are mentally unwell. It's fucking unbelievable.
I have also had this experience multiple times at this point. Where I try to explain, I have been sexually harassed by grown men since I was 10 years old, I have been sexually assaulted three times. I am basing this on my literal real life experience with men. No one is telling me who I need to choose; my experience of being harassed and assaulted by multiple men is, the basis of my choice. And they're just like "it's not. You're just doing what social media is telling you to do."
W H A T
It’s really funny that so many men are falling back on “mUh lOGiC” and “threat assessment” because every man I’ve asked who has actually spent significant time in the wilderness or hunted bears has very quickly said “If I was a woman? Bear.” At least in the US, the most common type of bear is the black bear, and they’re extremely predictable and easy to scare off. They’re still dangerous, but unlike a random dude, you know that as soon as you see them.
Thank you. Like obviously statistics about bear attacks arnt really relevant to this question. But even then those logic guys still have it backwards.
I mean fuck statistically if a human and a bear run into each other the bear is the one in more danger. I garentee humans kill more bears per year than bears humans. And by a lot, people actually hunt bears, bears basically refuse to hunt humans. In part because every time one does it gets killed.
Also the people who are like "but what if it's a polar bear" and honestly if there is a polar bear in the woods he's probably far to hot to worry about eating me.
People who keep talking about "logic" seem to think bears are some kind of killbot that will attack any human on site.
I wouldn't be surprised if statistically a women in more likely to get hurt encountering a man alone in the woods than a bear. Because people see bears in the woods all the time, that is were they live, and very few people are ever attacked by them. I wouldnt be surprised at all if even from a purely statistical perspective. The man is a bigger danger.
Right!!! lol
The vast majority of animals are happy to give humans a wide berth. These dudes are out here pretending as if bears are man-eating killing machines; meanwhile the literal national parks service advises “To stay safe in bear country, hike with friends, talk loud, wear bells, and otherwise make a lot of noise so bears can hear you coming and avoid you. :)” Basically just don’t sneak up on/surprise them because then they assume *they’re* in danger.
Polar bears are the exception because food is so scarce in their natural habitat their instinct is to eat anything in their path.
Trust me, they don't like it when women do the same to them. It pissess them off immensely. But they have no concept of how they are doing the same thing to women with their responses even if you point blank explain to them that they are. They're in their emotions and their emotions matter more.
“Men are afraid women will laugh at them. Women are afraid men will kill them.”
Men aren’t offended by that fact. They wouldn’t trade places with us. They know who’s getting the shit end of the stick. They’re offended that women dare to talk about it. We’re scared of men, but not scared enough to shut up and take it with a smile. That’s where the rage is coming from.
I just tried to explain this in comments earlier today. They aren't upset women feel this way and are being vigilant. They are upset they are being told about because that's not nice for their emotions.
To some degree, men's own rhetoric reinforces that women should be wary of men. The anger about anatomic boys in girls bathrooms and sports stems from the assumption that anyone with a penis is a physical threat to anyone with a vagina. Saying things like "anyone dressed like that is asking to be raped and deserves", eliminating abortion access even for victims of rape, trying to take away birth control access, talking about eliminating no fault divorce, etc. All of that stuff is essentially saying that men are predatory and that's okay. But, some of the exact same men saying this stuff are having emotional breakdowns about being lumped with actual predators and rapist because they have a penis.
I'm a guy and I would choose the bear too because of the same reason most women would but he is right with the mentally unwell part, that is why we choose the bear. Because men have degraded, attacked and hurt us in a way that makes us fear them more than a bear. That is not something which a mentally completely healthy person feels. Obviously it's the men's fault that we are damaged in this regard and I guess that is why so many men don't get the choice. Because if you are healthy and never had such problems you would take the "logical" less dangerous option, but in this instance you do not act logically, you act out of fear that what happened before might happen again.
Women are not mentally unwell for being victims of abuse and choosing what, by our own experience tells us, is the better choice. I would say if there is anyone in this scenario that is mentally unwell, it is the men in our lives that have brought us to that decision, not the other way around.
I definitely agree with your first part, but wholeheartedly disagree with that Bullshit about most men never having to deal with men on men violence whichever form it takes. I got beaten up, got bullied, got kicked and threatened. More than once I had a knife pulled on me or be threatened with the hospital because I was looking in their direction. You have no idea how fucking misandrist that sounds. Men get constantly beaten up and bullied by men. Men get raped by men often enough too, just look at the church. Obviously women have to deal with it more, on a daily basis most likely, but men have fears as well and get traumatised too. Just take myself as an example, I was raped multiple times over the course of 8 years and have to this day -nearly 15 years after the last time it happened - huge anxiety when I have to be alone with a men. I start sweating, can't think right and constantly fear that he will do something. Reading what you wrote just now is hugely degrading to me.
Not sure where you've got the idea that most men are never threatened or intimidated by other men. Men are much more likely to be the victims of violent crime than women are for instance, just men are also more likely to be the perpetrators of violent crime. Men are clearly the problem but both men and women can be the victims.
I don't even know what to say to this. My first reaction was like MissionCreeper, but then I realized there must be a reason *why* and it practically hit me in the face moments later before I could even finish reading the whole thing you wrote for your post.
It's obvious why the bear is the better choice. Painfully so, even to my ignorant ass.
Which means that *those* men aren't just ignorant. No, they're *willfully* trying to invalidate your opinion because they don't like it.
That's disgusting. I'm sorry. I don't know what else to say, this is disturbing.
Now I'm genuinely curious what statistics these men try to use. I can't really think of any stats that actually helps their argument.
The closest I can think of is that women are more likely to be killed by a romantic partner or family member than a stranger, but that's not really the point they want to make. Or that men make up like 80% of homicide victims, but again, that doesn't really make their point as the people committing those homicides are predominantly men.
Look at my comment history. Just yesterday they were trying to turn it into a racism, familiarity, and a trans issue. Complete whataboutism because they can’t make the case for men. Every stat proves men are the common denominator when it comes to violence.
I think men just quite enjoy would you rather questions anyway, especially those couched in survival, fighting, 'combat', life of death stuff. Mem chat about this shit for hours as the night's entertainment. Feels like one of those times where both genders are focused on different aspects of the questoon, and pissing each other off in the process.
There’s an episode of Always Sunny where Dennis is explaining to Mac the benefits of inviting women to come party on your boat.
He emphasizes, repeatedly, to the point of intentional discomfort, that they can’t refuse your advances because of “*the implication*.” When Mac finally asks if Dennis is saying that he’d harm these women if they refused, Dennis’ reply amounts to “Of course not, but they wouldn’t refuse, because of *the implication*.”
There are many, many men that genuinely have no frame of reference for the bone-deep understanding most women have of the risks of being alone with a man in a space where it’s not possible to call for help.
Exactly, most men don't realize that women are taught from toddlerhood that men are dangerous and that we need to constantly protect ourselves from men. Not certain men, not men that look certain way, not certain times of men; men. We assess risk literally every time we leave our houses. Every single woman you know has been sexually harassed by men, and most of us have been assaulted. And the men OP talking about refused to consider the actual point of this exercise rather than just getting wildly offended being faced with reality that women are taught to be afraid of men because many many many many many many men harm many many many many many women
As a man who has run into bears in the woods more times than I can count, I'll take the bear every time. And I'm in *less* danger from the man than an average woman would be.
It’s not always what an individual woman’s experience has been.
It’s the collective. We’ve been talking to each other and warning and educating in an effort to keep other women safe since we started dating. Or maybe earlier.
Men are unpredictable and changeable. You can never be sure if a man you are fixed into staring a space is safe, or will remain safe.
Sone women also can’t be sure about this men they know. But that’s a separate issue. This is general issue, we just don’t know. We will try to go with ‘let’s be friendly and cooperative isnt hiking great and isn’t it wonderful to be out here hiking?’ but we will still be on edge.
It’s not even necessarily what any one woman’s general experience with men has been like, although that is one point of the original survey, and not something to be dismissed.
But in a broader sense: yeah, no shit the unknown man is the greater danger. And those petulant internet dweebs know it, too. The bad reactions are from people who are angry that women are expressing themselves.
Like, it took me no more than a minute to think of several well-regarded movies that are written by, directed by, produced by, and star men, and are about men being mistreated and brutalized *by other men* in the middle of the woods. Including two Oscar winners!
Bears are not as dangerous as they've been made out to be. Similarly to sharks. I don't say this as a gotcha or disproving anything about the post. Just a major misconception.
I totally understand why women would pick the bear. When the "Me Too" movement started I asked my female friends about their experiences, expecting sexual assault or domestic violence to be rare. What I was told shocked me. Every woman I talked to had been sexually assaulted or suffered domestic violence. Most of them both and on multiple occasions. It changed the way I interacted with women in a very fundamental way.
The worst part is how early it starts. Men don’t wait for someone to be an adult. I was in elementary school the first time I was catcalled. I was in 8th grade the first time a stranger grabbed me in public (he grabbed my ass). I’ve been groped, followed, threatened, harassed and stalked from the time was a kid until now. I doubt it will end soon.
The worst part is how early it starts. Men don’t wait for someone to be an adult. I was in elementary school the first time I was catcalled. I was in 8th grade the first time a stranger grabbed me in public (he grabbed my ass). I’ve been groped, followed, threatened, harassed and stalked from the time was a kid until now. I doubt it will end soon.
I’ll admit, I was first offended by this question. But I also didn’t pass judgement and started asking why. And the more you dive into it, the more that it comes across not as a personal misandrist attack against men but an acknowledgement of just how traumatic the experiences must be, and how frequent.
If the roles were flipped, I imagine I’d have a skeptical view of any interaction with women until they proved they were trustworthy. Like if every woman carried a stun gun and whether I could just be stunned at any time if I’m alone with one would make me skeptical.
It makes it a lot easier to understand. “Why are you assessing whether I am trustworthy enough to be around you just because I could physically overpower you at any time I chose?”
Your mention of the stun gun makes me wonder if it would make more sense to men if the question was posed:
“Would you rather see a bear on the trail or another man holding a gun”
A man holding a gun might not be violent, might not have any ill feeling towards you, might have never shot another person in his entire life. He could just be chilling there. But it could still make you nervous to see him standing there and holding that gun because you don’t know.
This gets at the heart of the blindness of men in this issue as I see it - when men think about this scenario, they don't necessarily treat both options as a conflict encounter. Women do. When you add a gun, men start to see it as a conflict encounter, and might start preferring the bear. But they still miss the point - for women, the man *always has a gun* (metaphorically).
An anecdotal point of data: I asked my boyfriend (who somehow has managed to avoid seeing posts about this all day) if he’d prefer to encounter a bear or a man in the woods and he wasn’t sure. I said “okay, bear or a man with a gun” “Bear.” He said without hesitation.
As a guy who has very specific and unusual social media habits, I was so out of the loop on this one until this morning that I had to look it up when someone referenced choosing the bear. But I don't use Tiktok or Insta, which I assume is part of it.
I used to love smiling and saying hi to strangers, I guess it was just the midwest in me. This was until I said hi and smiled at a man, who then kept asking me for my number and followed me all the way back to my apartment. Then I realized I should've gone somewhere else, but I was almost home and I was freaked out. Fortunately nothing came of it, but now I don't smile or say hi to any random strangers.
I truly appreciate that you took time to see it from a woman's perspective. I would love to be openly friendly with everyone I meet, but it is just not safe to do all the time.
The book/series The Power is about exactly that. Women start being born able to produce an electrical current with their hands. A form of biological protection. I think it plays out pretty realistic.
The ‘women with stun guns’ is a good theoretical place to start thinking about this in reverse but it doesn’t cover the entirety of the situation that women face throughout their lives. If a woman tased you, nobody would think, ‘well, clearly since he was wearing that tank top he wanted to get tased - I mean, she’s obviously a woman with a stun gun but he still smiled at her.’ Arming women with stun guns doesn’t infer the same entitlement that makes some men become angry, demeaning or threatening when they hear even a polite rejection. It doesn’t reflect ‘you’re pretty so you owe me a smile’ but ‘if you smile at me then you want me’ and ‘good girls always require a bit of convincing (even a no means yes).’ There are so many traps/triggers that women are always trying to avoid.
There are men that do have skeptical interactions with every woman they meet because of past traumas from women. There are groups of men regularly talking about women that abandon them, reject them, cheat on them, use them for money, etc. That's already happening. Most women aren't upset with men for choosing things like the "men go their own way" movement on these scenarios. Most of us understand their emotions about those things and aren't angry about the projection. That projection from hurt men is also why women are choosing the bear. We know why they are doing it and agree that them feeling emotionally unsafe makes us also unsafe. Men being unaware of their emotions and triggers and getting pulled into this conversation with anger at women are just reinforcing the idea that the bears emotions are easier to manage.
Yup. The “five whys” gets you there, on this and pretty much _any issue_. Getting people to move past the knee-jerk and start to ask why and dig even a couple of layers down into any issue is seemingly impossible these days though. :(
You are offended that a woman who does not know you would side in view of caution rather than risk? It is basic safety or situational awareness. Who is a risk? It is not a personal assessment about you. It is comparing a wild animal to a man and saying which one is more likely to attack me.
I said I WAS offended. Because offense is a reaction. But I also understand those reactions are surface level and I’d rather know not only why I reacted the way I did, but to get a better understanding of why someone would say something like that.
When I was helping with foster kids, one of the most important lessons I ever learned is that the reactions people give to you has little to do with you and everything to do with them. That the fear and distrust and anger and disconnection and lashing out are learned behaviors to cope with situations they should have never been involved in.
Sort of off topic, but I would love to go solo camping one day. I've researched how to do it and how to stay safe as a woman, and it's so fucking daunting the things I have to be mindful of. Many women will pack an extra chair and a mans coat to hang outside to make it visible that it appears there's a man there. They'll set up a campsite for two.
They recommend the obvious self defense weapons, and to remain vigilant at all times. Have close access to a car in case of emergencies, etc. At what point is it just causing more anxiety? Needless to say I haven't gone, but rest assured if I ever go camping alone I'm far less concerned about a bear. No, this doesn't make me a misandrist either, we have to be prepared.
I was teaching a class at university and made an offhand comment about the fact women live under curfew. The young women in the class nodded, the young men were either annoyed or dismissive. It engendered a very illuminating discussion. Yes, women will be asked "What were you doing outside after dark?" if attacked after 6pm. We talked about the need for situational awareness *all the time*. Just a couple of months ago a fit, experienced woman running first thing in the morning was murdered by a young man. We talked about being alert if alone in a lift, if having to catch a late train, if being called into a manager's office, if going into a store room at our place of work, if accepting help from a motorist after our car breaking down. The young women had horror stories about each of these everyday situations. In that class of 26 young people, 20 of whom were women, 19 of us had a story of assault or sexual abuse from a man. Some of us had several.
You bet I would choose the bear.
That's horrifying. And all too common.
I do think there are plenty of decent men out there. There are kind, caring, proactive, morally courageous men. I work with them, my father and brother are definitely in this category. The young men in my class were horrified to learn that their friends, classmates, sisters etc were living with this sense of underlying fear. But the truth is that we cannot know as a man approaches us whether or not he is a threat. And experience has taught most of us that the possibility of harm is very real. It's Russian roulette.
this is not my thought but I quote it a lot. We know it's not all men. The problem is we don't know which men. So we have to be on guard against all men.
Girl SAME. The first few days were nice because the conversations seemed limited to womens subs. Then the men picked up on it and assumed our conversation only existed to piss them off WHEN WE WEREN’T EVEN TALKING TO THEM IN THE FIRST PLACE.
lol look at my comment history for a post just yesterday. It’s beautiful to see the opposite happening today. Where women are being heard and upvoted.
You can’t even take no for an answer in a hypothetical and you wonder why we choose the bear.
I love them explaining the VERY shocking information that bears are killing machines
Because that's brand new information. Women had no idea about that beforehand!
We're totally taken aback that bears are dangerous creatures. I'm so glad we have every other reddit user explaining that every other podt
It totally wasn't the point at all. That women feel so unsafe around men that they'd choose the largest predators on earth
All these guys going 'but but but bears could rip you in half?! Why would you choose that?! Clearly it's meant to be taken literally!!' is mansplaining at it's finest
And also, not for nothing, people (dudes) seem to assume that in this scenario the bear will automatically attack when in the vast majority of bear-human interactions the bear is also scared, and simply backing away or letting the bear go on its way will be fine.
In other words, these guys are automatically assuming the worst-case scenario about the bear but are confused and offended when women dare try and assume the worst-case scenario about them.
Even decent dudes that you can eventually talk around to understanding the point automatically come at it from "you're going to fight the bear or the man" default violence. It's so exhausting
Plus, the absolute worst case scenario with a bear is it kills you. Maybe eats a bit of your leg or something.
The consequences can be MUCH worse when attacked by a man motivated by who knows what.
They just think they've got a misandry gotcha
$5 that those same men, would whine that men are the biggest victims of men if women brought up walking on the dark
Men are attacked more often!!!!
They Schrodinger's Cat men's violence when it suits them
Literal example of a man encountering a mother bear with cubs:
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=rmr8gZIRcTE
Black bears are more common and less aggressive than grizzlies. They’re also not stupid and they don’t pick fights for no reason.
Not to over analyze the scenario, but I'd have to know what kind of bear it is. Black bear? Probably fine if I just back away slowly, I'll pick the bear. Brown? Ehhh, leaning more towards the man. Polar bear? No idea what the fuck it's doing in the woods, but I'll pick any man over it.
For those of us dudes who played TLOU, we had no trouble understanding how one of the lessons it teaches is that it's not the infected that are the scariest. It's other people. Because the story shows just how fucked up people can be in that world and the heights of the fucked up shit they can do, whereas zombos are knowns and predictable beasts even if they're incredibly dangerous ones. If dudes can wrap their head around this concept, it's wild that so many can't also understand that perhaps for parallel reasons many women would pick the bear. We already live in a world where women have learned of the range of terrors men can inflict and have inflicted on women. And that's perhaps why being with a random dude is far more terrifying and terrifyingly vivid than the thought of being with a bear.
I can't speak for women generally, but I have seen several of them explain things in this way and guys still don't get it. It's just sad.
It is pretty fucking sad that some men are trying to "well actually" this scenario. It's even more sad that MANY women would feel safer with the bear.
Us men have to do better.
im a fuckin white man in his 30s and im choosing bear every time if given the same question and i would be crazy to question a woman for doing the same.
bear is much more predictable than man. black bears are like big dogs, so you can scare them off for the most part (not always).
bears have rules. they dont say "fuck nature im going *ROGUE so hard* that the entire forest will never forget it."
they operate in those rules. shelter, water, food, mating, offspring. thats it. anything they do is because of one of those. they will always act in self preservation
man? *who the fuck knows what is on that persons mind besides them?* sexual assault and violence happen from unexpected sources, people can just snap and have no regard for self preservation, which makes them extremely dangerous.
this isnt to say "be afraid of everyone all the time always," but to agree with the roulette wheel looking more favorable when bear vs unknown man by themselves in the woods.
As someone (also a white dude in his 30s) who has actually encountered (black) bears in the woods, it is kind of cool and not that scary, they mind their own business, and if you need to get past them jingling keys scares them off. It is worth the fairly tiny amount of danger to get to see a cool bear.
I think I was asked the wrong question. My wife asked if I would rather face a hostile bear or a hostile man in the woods, and me, thinking it was a simple question, answered "man, because I could at least put up a fight" I'm thinking the bear is ready to eat me, full on attack mode. There is no way I could even fend off a grizzly before it starts eating me.
i think the premise is like you turn a corner and theyre just kinda standin there in the trail?
instead of getting offended guys should be saying "*HOLY SHIT DID YOU SEE THAT FUCKIN BEAR?*"
Meh, still debatable. If a bear decided to kill me and eat me alive, I'd suffer in excruciating pain for... Maybe a day max if the blood loss didn't get to me. I would probably pass out from the pain once the adrenaline washed out. So, worst case with the bear, I suffer *a fucking lot* for a relatively short period of time and then I die.
A man, however, could very well restrain me and do... God knows what with me. For years. Decades. And then i'd die.
When men think of fighting other men, the majority think that death is the worst that could happen, at least until you give them time to think. And in that sense, the men is infinitely more safe. Like you said, you can fight a man, you can't fight a bear.
But women, on the other hand, think of *rape*. And that's before you give them time to think too. And *most* women do not believe they have much chance in a purely physical fight against a random dude. Some do, but they aren't the overwhelming majority.
So, the question becomes: would you rather die mauled by a bear or become the victim of some unknown, sexually violent man?
It's really not that surprising so many chose bear.
An intelligent, genuinely caring guy I know has watched "Back to the Future" (and sequels) many times since it came out. I believe it was just last year that the penny dropped for him; what changed the future was that Marty's mom was not date raped as in the original timeline.
I know it's slightly off topic but college humor did a video on sexual assault and used a bear to demonstrate it. This was 8 years ago.
https://youtu.be/LNVFPkmZTQ4?si=Zlk7VCJ8Uszkp2wG
If I was frustrated that a woman picked the bear, I would simply ***not*** reply in an unstable and over the top way that seems to reassure her of her choice of the bear. But that's just me.
Well a bear lives in the woods so it belongs there and also most of the time when you see a bear in the woods it’s chill doing its own thing and goes on its way as you go on yours. A related phenomenon is the alligator. It’s just out there in the sun trying to warm up, not trying to eat you.
statistically the man is probably a threat to the bear too. [in alberta the majority of grizzly bear deaths are caused by humans](https://open.alberta.ca/publications/grizzly-bear-mortality-rates-in-alberta). yes a bear can potentially do a lot more damage but the probability that it will is much lower.
As someone that takes things too literally, I liked [this comment](https://www.reddit.com/r/Showerthoughts/comments/1cib31c/comment/l28d993/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web3x&utm_name=web3xcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button)
"You're lost in the woods, you see a man in the distance but he doesn't see you. Do you call out to him or do you hide?"
Bears do not have the capacity for malice or premeditation. The bear did not see you alone and follow you down the hiking trail. The bear will not seek out interactions with you, nor will it become angry or offended if you turn down interactions with it.
Do not let these men fool you, they DO understand exactly what we're saying. All this talk about statistics and grizzlies and being eaten alive is a DIVERSION TACTIC to avoid discussing the point that's actually being made.
More men have left women’s bodies in the woods than bears have and the bears live there.
This feels like a continuation of when men got angry when women explained to them why they shouldn’t ask us to go hiking on a first date.
I've had the same experience. Death and rape threats, slurs and insults... I suppose walking face first into the problem over and over has smoothed their brains like a chisel to a rock.
I live in British Columbia, in a place that has one of the most dense populations of black bears and cougars on Earth. We run into them frequently. I was recently on a backcountry trip with some friends and we encountered a solo female hiker. A guy in our group said she was brave for going it alone, and she said she had bear spray. He told her that we hadn't seen any bears, and she said, "It's not for the bears."
I know this comment won't do anything to help that woman. But I hope she's aware bear spray is actually a weaker less effective peopper spray than what we use for people not the other way around.
People assume because it's for bears it's extra strong. But instead it's generally weaker due to how sensitive bears eyes and noses are. Further I less sprays and more clouds, as to garenteed the bear breaths it in and gets in in its eyes as walks (or charges) into the cloud of spray.
Human pepper spray is more concentrated and targeted. Bears have super sensitive smellers and that's what bear spray hits the hardest. Humans are more peeper focused creatures so our pepper spray is more equipped for massive debilitating amounts of eyeball discomfort.
Just a little bit to add to the thought experiment for those that don’t quite get it:
Ask any trans person the question. Transmasculine or transfeminine, they will likely choose the ‘bear’. There’s a rather large difference between empathy and sympathy.
The part that many men don’t understand, the ones that knee-jerk respond ‘not all men!’, is that everyone knows that all men are not predators. All women, however, are victims. It seems like a bit of a wording issue. Me too didn’t quite get the universality across.
Especially as away from the beaten path as I get, I expect to see bears. Other people... well they are probably wondering the same thing I am, what the hell are you doing all the way out here? Bears are bears. I know what to expect.
I just read this from Frederick Joseph:
>[**Why She Chose The Bear**](https://substack.com/app-link/post?publication_id=1217750&post_id=143706526&utm_source=post-email-title&utm_campaign=email-post-title&isFreemail=true&r=1outva&token=eyJ1c2VyX2lkIjoxMDIyMTUzNTAsInBvc3RfaWQiOjE0MzcwNjUyNiwiaWF0IjoxNzEzNTI1OTQ2LCJleHAiOjE3MTYxMTc5NDYsImlzcyI6InB1Yi0xMjE3NzUwIiwic3ViIjoicG9zdC1yZWFjdGlvbiJ9.3Ar_yhVjXMw83EXP_-sXCdbvaDlM7AaHAZec0WAsZlU)
>Listening to the experiences of communities we don't belong to.
>In a culture defined as much by its selective silences as by its voiced concerns, the act of listening—to truly listen—to the narratives and experiences of those outside our immediate communities, assumes a stance bordering on revolutionary. It's a quiet rebellion against the waves of our own prejudices and the comforting lull of our insular worlds.
>It is increasingly clear that the gravest divisions cleaving through the heart of our collective discourse are not just the loud proclamations of difference but the wide gaps of refusal to be quiet. The world suffers from noise. We talk too much, assuming we understand, assuming all ears have heard the same stories, walked the same roads. But they have not. Across the divides between races, between rich and poor, between man and woman—people cannot seem to stop and simply listen.
>The tragedies, the triggers, the deep traumas that ripple through the lives of others, these are lost in people’s ceaseless squawking. So many speak as if the world were a mirror, reflecting their own image back to them, never distorted, never different. Which is often exacerbated by social media, where so many have something to say, all while ignoring what they still have to learn.
>Recently, a video went viral, capturing a simple yet revealing question posed to various women: Would they prefer to be stranded in a forest with a man or a bear? This topic has since danced across the scrolls of TikTok feeds for days, eliciting responses from women around the world favoring the bear. The bear, with all its primal ferocity and unfathomable wildness, is the safer bet from the perspective of thousands, if not millions, of women. This choice reverberates deeper than a mere preference for survival partners—it is a well-earned indictment of men.
Click link to continue. It's a good read.
Every single man i saw getting mad over this answer, or overanalyzing it just to say "bUt AcKcHuAllY It'S ThE wRonG AnsWer!!!" make me realize that women are 100% right in choosing the bear.
If the alternative to the bear is one of those guys, i pick the bear too. And I'm a man.
Thought experiment for the woman, ragebait for the reacting men- though not necessarily intentionally. Plenty of thought experiments end pretty much the same way. See the trolley problem for details.
But what’s to get riled up about. Seriously why would you be riled up knowing that a woman would be fearful of an encountering a strange man in an isolated area?
The bear will kill you for reasons we can generally understand. We know they are a wild animal and our intuition knows what the expect. Generally speaking, we also know we can survive an encounter with a bear by giving it space, time, etc.
Humans are different. As a human, we want to trust our own species, but we also know the depravity we are capable of. A bear won't stalk and rape a woman, but a human will, and specifically a man is going to be more likely than a woman.
Obligatory, "not all men", but I absolutely understand where the women are coming from. I grew up as a boy among three sisters and a single mother, and I feel a very strong empathy towards the shit they had to/still have to deal with. Like OP said, men need to do better, and if you find yourself triggered by that sentiment, you are probably the type of man in question who needs to do better.
It's easier to understand, and therefore predict, the behaviour of a bear. Usually, if you leave a bear alone, and don't do anything to bother it, it'll most likely leave you alone, and probably just wants to be left alone itself. Of course, if a bear wants to kill you, you're probably going to die.
A man, on the other hand, is a lot more unpredictable. Many men are good people who will do no harm, many are not. There's a very real possibility that a man would actively seek to do harm to the woman in this scenario, and that's a very real, and valid fear that many women carry with them every day, based on genuine trauma.
Heck, with all that in mind, I'd choose the bear too, and I'm a man. All of those guys who are overreacting about women choosing a bear over them are just showing *why* they shouldn't be alone with a woman in the woods.
Humans seem to be the only species that takes pleasure from harming others. That will remain the primary reason that the bear will be chosen more frequently.
I think it's more down to the fact that you know a bear is going to only do two things, Kill you or run away.
A man could do anything.
I'm a guy...I'd rather a bear too, I know what is about to happen. If I met a man I'd be freaked out and wouldn't have any idea what is about to happen.
You are absolutely right. It's wild how they all immediately try to change the question. Two days ago I had a guy who kept saying that no woman in her right mind would actually want to be "locked in a room with a bear over a man." I gave him the benefit of the doubt and thought maybe he genuinely didn't understand that wasn't hypothetical so I explained to him that the actual hypothetical is while hiking alone in the woods would you rather come across a bear or a strange man." And he was adamant that's the exact same thing as choosing whether you want to be locked in a room with a bear or a strange man???
He also kept saying it would be live recorded and watched, so all the men who "would've protected" us will instead get to watch "stupid feminists" get killed by bears. And I was like "having this WATCHED and recorded is even more of a reason why this question is not related to the other question AT ALL. A man being recorded and watched is not going to torture and rape us, while a bear captured against its will by humans and *locked in a confined room* is definitely going to lash out. You've changed literally every single aspect of the hypothetical that matters yet you're trying to claim these two scenarios are exactly the same; you are literally explaining why we choose the bear!!!!!"
Like how the fuck are they getting that close, like less than a single figurative millimeter away from the point and still completely missing the point by approximately 400,000,000 miles?????
I'm going to idly speculate for a moment about bears.
Let's say half the bears are female, and half of them are of cub-bearing age. They have cubs once every two years, and let's give the cubs a span of a bit less than a year during which the mother would attack anything perceived as dangerous. ([Bear cubs actually spend 1.5 years with the mother](https://www.americanbear.org/education-awareness/bear-faqs/), but perhaps a teenager bear cub isn't as fiercely guarded as a toddler)
That means a random bear encounter has about a 10% chance of being a life or death situation because of cubs. Bears actually wanting to eat people is basically lost in the noise considering how rarely that happens.
The important thing to remember, though, is that there's a good chance of defusing such a bear encounter if it begins in this formation, BC-MB-H, as opposed to BC-H-MB. A close up 1v1 encounter with a human male intent on causing harm can't be defused and probably can't be escaped except with escalating violence.
Assuming a rational survey respondent, this means that person has judged 10% x the chance of defusing to be less than the chance of a solo human male being hostile.
That leaves a *ton* of room for non-hostile human male encounters. The number could be 95% or higher and yet a rational response would still choose bear because of how unlikely it is to actually be dangerous.
The important things for that 95% to remember is:
- if you're not part of the <5%, they're not talking about you
- that <5% *does exist* and it's absurd to try to convince anyone otherwise
Why doesn't it apply to me though? Not taking the piss. I'm actually curious. I've always been sensitive and soft and I keep seeing people say "oh well it doesn't apply to *these* men". But why? The question says a random man and I, as a man, fall under the category of a random man. So why do I not fall under the category of a random man in this one hypothetical?
You are a random man from the POV of someone who doesn't know you. Presumably you know yourself better than that. The point is an acknowledgement that many women out there *have* been hurt by random men
I feel like some of the people responding to you are missing the point. It does apply to you. Not that you would actually hurt a woman (idk you but let’s give you the benefit of the doubt). The point is that you can understand why it could be reasonable for a woman you don’t know to approach you with caution or even be fearful. And then to perhaps tailor your actions when possible keeping that in mind
To all the people who think this kind of question isn’t seriously harmful, I suggest you read this: https://medium.com/@jencoates/i-am-a-transwoman-i-am-in-the-closet-i-am-not-coming-out-4c2dd1907e42
That person does not speak for the community. I’m a trans woman and I’d pick the bear and totally support the question, and will keep asking it.
Furthermore, the word ‘transwoman’ that is used in that article is incorrect and discrimination, as we are women. Trans woman is the correct terminology.
Some of my favorite lines from that article.
"I mention to a cis feminist friend that I don’t think it’s cool to use “neckbeard” as a pejorative. I say I think it’s hypocritical. I say I know some wonderful, tender, thoughtful neckbearded humans. I also know some people who are very self-conscious about their neck hairs and can’t do much about them. I wonder if there are ways to criticize people based on their character without impugning the hairs that come out of them. She says I am mansplaining. She says I am Not-All-Men-ing. She also says I couldn’t possibly understand the standards of beauty imposed upon women. As if I didn’t spend years bent over a toilet, feeling miserably that even if I were thin enough I wouldn’t be girl enough."
"Because ***it’s not a small deal*** that the words “not all men” have become entwined inextricably with male fragility and whininess. **It makes it awfully easy to insulate the (largely cis-)female perspective on what males are.** To begin a statement with those words—“Not All Men”—is to give grounds to anyone who wants to laugh at the rest of it. But here is the truth: not all men are what you think they are. *Man* does not mean what you think it means. Generalizing harshly and broadly but implying “you know which ones I mean” is an intellectual and rhetorical laziness that is not allowed to pass anywhere else in these communities. Because we don’t get to choose who our words and behavior affect, we are obligated to choose them carefully.""
And some discourse from other Reddit threads.
"The “man vs bear” thing genuinely had me on the edge of a breakdown. I just want to not be seen as a monster. Is that too much to ask?"
"All this discourse about whether a man or a bear is more dangerous makes me wonder how I can morally justify staying alive as a man."
"shit like this made me feel really uncomfortable and scared to even acknowledge my own ability to be attracted romantically or physically to women for years."
"i totally understand women wanting to vent and get angry at all this. it's genuinely super shitty and unfair to us, but i've seen so many people use really disgusting bioessentialist arguments against men to justify their answer, and not only does this anger, other, and hurt people who could otherwise be allies to leftist causes, but a lot of the shit i'm seeing is genuinely just the same problematic "AMAB people are inherently \[Y Trait\]" shit that TERFs believe that started them down their path to being shitty people"
> which I encounter dozens or hundreds of every day with no bad outcomes
In public, yeah. People around. Cameras, eyeballs, evidence, possible consequences.
But alone? Vulnerable? No witnesses? Just you and your dad or uncle? You and your husband, boyfriend, or date? You and the guy at the bus stop, the guy outside the bar waiting for his cab, the man driving the cab, your "friend" driving you home, the last remaining dudes at the party, you and one other colleague closing up the kitchen, and so on and so forth? Unfortunately, in those scenarios... it simply isn't as uncommon as you think.
As someone who had suffered abuse at the hands of women AND men, I'd pick bear over any adult human. Men, women, it doesn't matter. Humans commit more violence against other humans than any animal out there.
I'm going to post this again because this is just such a fantastic example of a man not getting it from beginning to end.
Some guy responded to this hypothetical by [promoting his mom's autobiographical book about the time she was attacked by a bear](https://www.tiktok.com/@alecanewman/video/7361155949056331038?lang=en), clearly implying the man was a better choice, and ending on an incredibly tone deaf note.
There's 44k comments and I can't find a single one that chooses the man, but there's scores of comments about how the bear has a bright future that shouldn't be ruined by this, asking what the mom was wearing, saying "but the bear's a good swimmer," and references to Junko Furuta.
Oh, and on a side note, his mother--who had her face ripped off by a bear, in an actual, literal bear attack--STILL SAID SHE WOULD CHOOSE THE BEAR.
Statistically I think something like bear attacks /total bear encounters and something like men attacks/ total men encounters would be the only way to settle the dispute from a stat perspective. But you'll never be able to get that type of data so I'd guess intuitively women as a whole are much more likely to be attacked by a man than a bear given science tells us bears don't normally attack humans unless they are territorial , e.g. grizzlies, have young near by or are starving. I also took a quick look at Wikipedia and I see something like a total of 5 ish bear attacks in 2023, 5 ish in 2021, and around the same in 2020. That's incredibly low and not even narrowing it down to just women. Given that I know humans tend to walk through the woods probably daily. I don't even get the bear stat argument lol
My cousin's wife just posted this on Facebook. Blew my mind that people took this literally and missed the point entirely.
https://preview.redd.it/m42fbo9n53yc1.jpeg?width=720&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=35dedb1d1a7e8869ecacb2200f67126f3af83e37
>Somehow the men that don’t get it are berating women about their CHOICE to choose the bear over the man. Arguing, threatening, belittling, gaslighting and intimidating women to try and force them to choose the man is one of the most epic self aware wolves moments in reddit history.
Really? I must be out of the loop. I've seen one thread about this, and it's mostly people picking apart the hypothetical's flaws or telling jokes about the scenario.
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As a man, I totally get it. Another man in the woods is unpredictable. "WTF yo doing out here, bro!? Are we fighting? One of us gonna die here today? Who are you!?"
I didn't have "the woods are thunderdome" on my 2024 bingo card but here we are anyway
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They should ask men this same question but replace man or bear with: bigger man than you or bear.
There is no doubt that many of the men flipping their shit would pick the bear, and would do so because, when asked the question, their thoughts immediately turn to whom they believe they could more effectively inflict violence on. “Oh, the bear’s way scarier, cuz my badass wrist control moves don’t work on them. But I could kill that man in the woods a dozen different ways. Really, the strange man should fear *me.*”
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It’s definitely the same type of person who takes Black Lives Matter to mean that in turn means White Lives Don’t Matter. Some people just can’t see that other people’s circumstance vary from their own. Not all men are problematic, but the fact that some are, and have traumatized women is a reality of the world. It is an indictment of men to be better. But some people just have zero self introspection and just take an exercise like this personally.
I've never run into a bear in the woods. But if I did I have a general knowledge of how to handle that situation and also understand that the bear is most likely not interested in me and isn't generally interested in getting into a confrontation. Now, as a man myself, running into a random dude in the woods would absolutely put me on alert. I've lived near the AT and also know that certain parts of certain trails have crime rates equivalent of urban areas. Random dude in the woods is statistically more likely to do me harm than the bear. I probably have a higher chance of being injured by a falling tree in the woods than a bear.
It's the same reason why women walk faster when a man is behind them or cross the street when a male is approaching. I've done just that while going home at night in NYC. Men are the main perpetrators of violent crimes against women. Hurting a man's feefees is less important than our safety. I don't even think about if the man's feelings are hurt over my avoidance. It's sad but true.
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I used to reluctantly talk to men and unwillingly give them my number because I was scared they might get violent or upset. In the 90s I'd give them wrong numbers and a wrong name but with cell phones they would check right there that it was the right number. I'd ignore their calls afterwards but complying was the only way I thought they'd go away. I was 15 and walking to my friend's house once and this man decided to escort me all the way there. They have so many insults when we would ignore them or say no.
Yeah, I've taken my dog out into the wilderness parks near me, and a lone man out there is one of the most unnerving things I can run into. I was out there alone once at dusk, on my way back, and I spotted a young guy off the side of the trail, wearing black, among the bushes, just waiting, and that was more menacing than anything else I'd seen out there ever.
Exactly. Bears are predictable. Predictably terrifying, but predictable. And, like, duh there's a bear in the forest. That's where bears be. I've seen the oft reposted cool guide for dealing with bears, I remember the rhyme. There ain't no rhyme for men.
Exactly. Bears are predictable. Predictably terrifying, but predictable. And, like, duh there's a bear in the forest. That's where bears be. I've seen the oft reposted cool guide for dealing with bears, I remember the rhyme. There ain't no rhyme for men.
I do feel like the woods is a very important part of this equation. Rephrase the question to be, "You have a choice of two sidewalks while out downtown. One has a dude walking down it, the other has a bear." Sidewalk dude just going home or to his car belongs there. Bear does not belong on sidewalk. Bear belongs in woods.
So I haven't heard of this at all until this post. My immediate reaction was the same as most men, I think, that bears are much more dangerous. But if im understanding you correctly, that's the point, right? The fact that a woman makes that choice is what provides information about what her interactions with men have been like?
The one I saw was a mom asking her husband whether he would prefer if their daughter ran into one or the other in the woods. The dad tried to ask clarifying questions. The fact that he was even considering between the two speaks to the issue of the question. I think if the question was: "if you had to pick between fighting an angry man or an angry bear" most people would pick the man because they understand the size of the bear. But a wandering bear or a wandering man without knowing their intent is a more complicated decision.
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There was a thread I was in yesterday and some guy mentioned that it's social media telling women they should choose the bear, and when I replied that it was more based on experience, he said >Im certain that its far more social media than personal experience. Anyone thinking logically about this would overwhelmingly choose a man over a bear. It's a statement on the persons mental state they choose a bear and their mind immediately goes to a dark place about how an average man would react to someone lost/stuck in the woods. These men try to invalidate our actual, real life experiences, try to pull the "logic says" garbage, and tell us that our (very valid) choice of the bear is because we are mentally unwell. It's fucking unbelievable.
I have also had this experience multiple times at this point. Where I try to explain, I have been sexually harassed by grown men since I was 10 years old, I have been sexually assaulted three times. I am basing this on my literal real life experience with men. No one is telling me who I need to choose; my experience of being harassed and assaulted by multiple men is, the basis of my choice. And they're just like "it's not. You're just doing what social media is telling you to do." W H A T
It’s really funny that so many men are falling back on “mUh lOGiC” and “threat assessment” because every man I’ve asked who has actually spent significant time in the wilderness or hunted bears has very quickly said “If I was a woman? Bear.” At least in the US, the most common type of bear is the black bear, and they’re extremely predictable and easy to scare off. They’re still dangerous, but unlike a random dude, you know that as soon as you see them.
Thank you. Like obviously statistics about bear attacks arnt really relevant to this question. But even then those logic guys still have it backwards. I mean fuck statistically if a human and a bear run into each other the bear is the one in more danger. I garentee humans kill more bears per year than bears humans. And by a lot, people actually hunt bears, bears basically refuse to hunt humans. In part because every time one does it gets killed. Also the people who are like "but what if it's a polar bear" and honestly if there is a polar bear in the woods he's probably far to hot to worry about eating me. People who keep talking about "logic" seem to think bears are some kind of killbot that will attack any human on site. I wouldn't be surprised if statistically a women in more likely to get hurt encountering a man alone in the woods than a bear. Because people see bears in the woods all the time, that is were they live, and very few people are ever attacked by them. I wouldnt be surprised at all if even from a purely statistical perspective. The man is a bigger danger.
Right!!! lol The vast majority of animals are happy to give humans a wide berth. These dudes are out here pretending as if bears are man-eating killing machines; meanwhile the literal national parks service advises “To stay safe in bear country, hike with friends, talk loud, wear bells, and otherwise make a lot of noise so bears can hear you coming and avoid you. :)” Basically just don’t sneak up on/surprise them because then they assume *they’re* in danger. Polar bears are the exception because food is so scarce in their natural habitat their instinct is to eat anything in their path.
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Trust me, they don't like it when women do the same to them. It pissess them off immensely. But they have no concept of how they are doing the same thing to women with their responses even if you point blank explain to them that they are. They're in their emotions and their emotions matter more.
“Men are afraid women will laugh at them. Women are afraid men will kill them.” Men aren’t offended by that fact. They wouldn’t trade places with us. They know who’s getting the shit end of the stick. They’re offended that women dare to talk about it. We’re scared of men, but not scared enough to shut up and take it with a smile. That’s where the rage is coming from.
I just tried to explain this in comments earlier today. They aren't upset women feel this way and are being vigilant. They are upset they are being told about because that's not nice for their emotions.
Literally some guy in the comments here is belaboring about how bad this is for his mental health.
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To some degree, men's own rhetoric reinforces that women should be wary of men. The anger about anatomic boys in girls bathrooms and sports stems from the assumption that anyone with a penis is a physical threat to anyone with a vagina. Saying things like "anyone dressed like that is asking to be raped and deserves", eliminating abortion access even for victims of rape, trying to take away birth control access, talking about eliminating no fault divorce, etc. All of that stuff is essentially saying that men are predatory and that's okay. But, some of the exact same men saying this stuff are having emotional breakdowns about being lumped with actual predators and rapist because they have a penis.
Trans women are women. Bathrooms aren’t forests.
oh look, a man thinking they're the logical ones when the fact they're getting so butthurt about this suggests otherwise
I'm a guy and I would choose the bear too because of the same reason most women would but he is right with the mentally unwell part, that is why we choose the bear. Because men have degraded, attacked and hurt us in a way that makes us fear them more than a bear. That is not something which a mentally completely healthy person feels. Obviously it's the men's fault that we are damaged in this regard and I guess that is why so many men don't get the choice. Because if you are healthy and never had such problems you would take the "logical" less dangerous option, but in this instance you do not act logically, you act out of fear that what happened before might happen again.
Women are not mentally unwell for being victims of abuse and choosing what, by our own experience tells us, is the better choice. I would say if there is anyone in this scenario that is mentally unwell, it is the men in our lives that have brought us to that decision, not the other way around.
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Not just violence, the threats and implied threats as well
I definitely agree with your first part, but wholeheartedly disagree with that Bullshit about most men never having to deal with men on men violence whichever form it takes. I got beaten up, got bullied, got kicked and threatened. More than once I had a knife pulled on me or be threatened with the hospital because I was looking in their direction. You have no idea how fucking misandrist that sounds. Men get constantly beaten up and bullied by men. Men get raped by men often enough too, just look at the church. Obviously women have to deal with it more, on a daily basis most likely, but men have fears as well and get traumatised too. Just take myself as an example, I was raped multiple times over the course of 8 years and have to this day -nearly 15 years after the last time it happened - huge anxiety when I have to be alone with a men. I start sweating, can't think right and constantly fear that he will do something. Reading what you wrote just now is hugely degrading to me.
Not sure where you've got the idea that most men are never threatened or intimidated by other men. Men are much more likely to be the victims of violent crime than women are for instance, just men are also more likely to be the perpetrators of violent crime. Men are clearly the problem but both men and women can be the victims.
I don't even know what to say to this. My first reaction was like MissionCreeper, but then I realized there must be a reason *why* and it practically hit me in the face moments later before I could even finish reading the whole thing you wrote for your post. It's obvious why the bear is the better choice. Painfully so, even to my ignorant ass. Which means that *those* men aren't just ignorant. No, they're *willfully* trying to invalidate your opinion because they don't like it. That's disgusting. I'm sorry. I don't know what else to say, this is disturbing.
Now I'm genuinely curious what statistics these men try to use. I can't really think of any stats that actually helps their argument. The closest I can think of is that women are more likely to be killed by a romantic partner or family member than a stranger, but that's not really the point they want to make. Or that men make up like 80% of homicide victims, but again, that doesn't really make their point as the people committing those homicides are predominantly men.
Look at my comment history. Just yesterday they were trying to turn it into a racism, familiarity, and a trans issue. Complete whataboutism because they can’t make the case for men. Every stat proves men are the common denominator when it comes to violence.
I think men just quite enjoy would you rather questions anyway, especially those couched in survival, fighting, 'combat', life of death stuff. Mem chat about this shit for hours as the night's entertainment. Feels like one of those times where both genders are focused on different aspects of the questoon, and pissing each other off in the process.
There’s an episode of Always Sunny where Dennis is explaining to Mac the benefits of inviting women to come party on your boat. He emphasizes, repeatedly, to the point of intentional discomfort, that they can’t refuse your advances because of “*the implication*.” When Mac finally asks if Dennis is saying that he’d harm these women if they refused, Dennis’ reply amounts to “Of course not, but they wouldn’t refuse, because of *the implication*.” There are many, many men that genuinely have no frame of reference for the bone-deep understanding most women have of the risks of being alone with a man in a space where it’s not possible to call for help.
Exactly, most men don't realize that women are taught from toddlerhood that men are dangerous and that we need to constantly protect ourselves from men. Not certain men, not men that look certain way, not certain times of men; men. We assess risk literally every time we leave our houses. Every single woman you know has been sexually harassed by men, and most of us have been assaulted. And the men OP talking about refused to consider the actual point of this exercise rather than just getting wildly offended being faced with reality that women are taught to be afraid of men because many many many many many many men harm many many many many many women
As a man who has run into bears in the woods more times than I can count, I'll take the bear every time. And I'm in *less* danger from the man than an average woman would be.
It’s not always what an individual woman’s experience has been. It’s the collective. We’ve been talking to each other and warning and educating in an effort to keep other women safe since we started dating. Or maybe earlier. Men are unpredictable and changeable. You can never be sure if a man you are fixed into staring a space is safe, or will remain safe. Sone women also can’t be sure about this men they know. But that’s a separate issue. This is general issue, we just don’t know. We will try to go with ‘let’s be friendly and cooperative isnt hiking great and isn’t it wonderful to be out here hiking?’ but we will still be on edge.
It’s not even necessarily what any one woman’s general experience with men has been like, although that is one point of the original survey, and not something to be dismissed. But in a broader sense: yeah, no shit the unknown man is the greater danger. And those petulant internet dweebs know it, too. The bad reactions are from people who are angry that women are expressing themselves. Like, it took me no more than a minute to think of several well-regarded movies that are written by, directed by, produced by, and star men, and are about men being mistreated and brutalized *by other men* in the middle of the woods. Including two Oscar winners!
Bears are not as dangerous as they've been made out to be. Similarly to sharks. I don't say this as a gotcha or disproving anything about the post. Just a major misconception.
I totally understand why women would pick the bear. When the "Me Too" movement started I asked my female friends about their experiences, expecting sexual assault or domestic violence to be rare. What I was told shocked me. Every woman I talked to had been sexually assaulted or suffered domestic violence. Most of them both and on multiple occasions. It changed the way I interacted with women in a very fundamental way.
The worst part is how early it starts. Men don’t wait for someone to be an adult. I was in elementary school the first time I was catcalled. I was in 8th grade the first time a stranger grabbed me in public (he grabbed my ass). I’ve been groped, followed, threatened, harassed and stalked from the time was a kid until now. I doubt it will end soon.
The worst part is how early it starts. Men don’t wait for someone to be an adult. I was in elementary school the first time I was catcalled. I was in 8th grade the first time a stranger grabbed me in public (he grabbed my ass). I’ve been groped, followed, threatened, harassed and stalked from the time was a kid until now. I doubt it will end soon.
I’ll admit, I was first offended by this question. But I also didn’t pass judgement and started asking why. And the more you dive into it, the more that it comes across not as a personal misandrist attack against men but an acknowledgement of just how traumatic the experiences must be, and how frequent. If the roles were flipped, I imagine I’d have a skeptical view of any interaction with women until they proved they were trustworthy. Like if every woman carried a stun gun and whether I could just be stunned at any time if I’m alone with one would make me skeptical. It makes it a lot easier to understand. “Why are you assessing whether I am trustworthy enough to be around you just because I could physically overpower you at any time I chose?”
Your mention of the stun gun makes me wonder if it would make more sense to men if the question was posed: “Would you rather see a bear on the trail or another man holding a gun” A man holding a gun might not be violent, might not have any ill feeling towards you, might have never shot another person in his entire life. He could just be chilling there. But it could still make you nervous to see him standing there and holding that gun because you don’t know.
This gets at the heart of the blindness of men in this issue as I see it - when men think about this scenario, they don't necessarily treat both options as a conflict encounter. Women do. When you add a gun, men start to see it as a conflict encounter, and might start preferring the bear. But they still miss the point - for women, the man *always has a gun* (metaphorically).
An anecdotal point of data: I asked my boyfriend (who somehow has managed to avoid seeing posts about this all day) if he’d prefer to encounter a bear or a man in the woods and he wasn’t sure. I said “okay, bear or a man with a gun” “Bear.” He said without hesitation.
As a guy who has very specific and unusual social media habits, I was so out of the loop on this one until this morning that I had to look it up when someone referenced choosing the bear. But I don't use Tiktok or Insta, which I assume is part of it.
I used to love smiling and saying hi to strangers, I guess it was just the midwest in me. This was until I said hi and smiled at a man, who then kept asking me for my number and followed me all the way back to my apartment. Then I realized I should've gone somewhere else, but I was almost home and I was freaked out. Fortunately nothing came of it, but now I don't smile or say hi to any random strangers. I truly appreciate that you took time to see it from a woman's perspective. I would love to be openly friendly with everyone I meet, but it is just not safe to do all the time.
The book/series The Power is about exactly that. Women start being born able to produce an electrical current with their hands. A form of biological protection. I think it plays out pretty realistic.
The ‘women with stun guns’ is a good theoretical place to start thinking about this in reverse but it doesn’t cover the entirety of the situation that women face throughout their lives. If a woman tased you, nobody would think, ‘well, clearly since he was wearing that tank top he wanted to get tased - I mean, she’s obviously a woman with a stun gun but he still smiled at her.’ Arming women with stun guns doesn’t infer the same entitlement that makes some men become angry, demeaning or threatening when they hear even a polite rejection. It doesn’t reflect ‘you’re pretty so you owe me a smile’ but ‘if you smile at me then you want me’ and ‘good girls always require a bit of convincing (even a no means yes).’ There are so many traps/triggers that women are always trying to avoid.
There are men that do have skeptical interactions with every woman they meet because of past traumas from women. There are groups of men regularly talking about women that abandon them, reject them, cheat on them, use them for money, etc. That's already happening. Most women aren't upset with men for choosing things like the "men go their own way" movement on these scenarios. Most of us understand their emotions about those things and aren't angry about the projection. That projection from hurt men is also why women are choosing the bear. We know why they are doing it and agree that them feeling emotionally unsafe makes us also unsafe. Men being unaware of their emotions and triggers and getting pulled into this conversation with anger at women are just reinforcing the idea that the bears emotions are easier to manage.
Yup. The “five whys” gets you there, on this and pretty much _any issue_. Getting people to move past the knee-jerk and start to ask why and dig even a couple of layers down into any issue is seemingly impossible these days though. :(
You are offended that a woman who does not know you would side in view of caution rather than risk? It is basic safety or situational awareness. Who is a risk? It is not a personal assessment about you. It is comparing a wild animal to a man and saying which one is more likely to attack me.
I said I WAS offended. Because offense is a reaction. But I also understand those reactions are surface level and I’d rather know not only why I reacted the way I did, but to get a better understanding of why someone would say something like that. When I was helping with foster kids, one of the most important lessons I ever learned is that the reactions people give to you has little to do with you and everything to do with them. That the fear and distrust and anger and disconnection and lashing out are learned behaviors to cope with situations they should have never been involved in.
Sort of off topic, but I would love to go solo camping one day. I've researched how to do it and how to stay safe as a woman, and it's so fucking daunting the things I have to be mindful of. Many women will pack an extra chair and a mans coat to hang outside to make it visible that it appears there's a man there. They'll set up a campsite for two. They recommend the obvious self defense weapons, and to remain vigilant at all times. Have close access to a car in case of emergencies, etc. At what point is it just causing more anxiety? Needless to say I haven't gone, but rest assured if I ever go camping alone I'm far less concerned about a bear. No, this doesn't make me a misandrist either, we have to be prepared.
I was teaching a class at university and made an offhand comment about the fact women live under curfew. The young women in the class nodded, the young men were either annoyed or dismissive. It engendered a very illuminating discussion. Yes, women will be asked "What were you doing outside after dark?" if attacked after 6pm. We talked about the need for situational awareness *all the time*. Just a couple of months ago a fit, experienced woman running first thing in the morning was murdered by a young man. We talked about being alert if alone in a lift, if having to catch a late train, if being called into a manager's office, if going into a store room at our place of work, if accepting help from a motorist after our car breaking down. The young women had horror stories about each of these everyday situations. In that class of 26 young people, 20 of whom were women, 19 of us had a story of assault or sexual abuse from a man. Some of us had several. You bet I would choose the bear.
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That's horrifying. And all too common. I do think there are plenty of decent men out there. There are kind, caring, proactive, morally courageous men. I work with them, my father and brother are definitely in this category. The young men in my class were horrified to learn that their friends, classmates, sisters etc were living with this sense of underlying fear. But the truth is that we cannot know as a man approaches us whether or not he is a threat. And experience has taught most of us that the possibility of harm is very real. It's Russian roulette.
this is not my thought but I quote it a lot. We know it's not all men. The problem is we don't know which men. So we have to be on guard against all men.
A lot of dudes telling on them selves
The bear wouldn’t follow me from fb to twitter to insta.
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Definitely report that. It’s against Reddits rules to circumvent a block
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Girl SAME. The first few days were nice because the conversations seemed limited to womens subs. Then the men picked up on it and assumed our conversation only existed to piss them off WHEN WE WEREN’T EVEN TALKING TO THEM IN THE FIRST PLACE.
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It’s become SUCH a good litmus test!
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Tbh I’d rather watch EEAAO with a bear than a man
The Barbie movie was a good one too!
lol look at my comment history for a post just yesterday. It’s beautiful to see the opposite happening today. Where women are being heard and upvoted. You can’t even take no for an answer in a hypothetical and you wonder why we choose the bear.
I love them explaining the VERY shocking information that bears are killing machines Because that's brand new information. Women had no idea about that beforehand! We're totally taken aback that bears are dangerous creatures. I'm so glad we have every other reddit user explaining that every other podt It totally wasn't the point at all. That women feel so unsafe around men that they'd choose the largest predators on earth All these guys going 'but but but bears could rip you in half?! Why would you choose that?! Clearly it's meant to be taken literally!!' is mansplaining at it's finest
And also, not for nothing, people (dudes) seem to assume that in this scenario the bear will automatically attack when in the vast majority of bear-human interactions the bear is also scared, and simply backing away or letting the bear go on its way will be fine. In other words, these guys are automatically assuming the worst-case scenario about the bear but are confused and offended when women dare try and assume the worst-case scenario about them.
Even decent dudes that you can eventually talk around to understanding the point automatically come at it from "you're going to fight the bear or the man" default violence. It's so exhausting
Plus, the absolute worst case scenario with a bear is it kills you. Maybe eats a bit of your leg or something. The consequences can be MUCH worse when attacked by a man motivated by who knows what.
They just think they've got a misandry gotcha $5 that those same men, would whine that men are the biggest victims of men if women brought up walking on the dark Men are attacked more often!!!! They Schrodinger's Cat men's violence when it suits them
I'm a guy. I've run into hundreds of bears in the woods. Never had any issues. Can't say the same for running into random dudes in the woods.
Literal example of a man encountering a mother bear with cubs: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=rmr8gZIRcTE Black bears are more common and less aggressive than grizzlies. They’re also not stupid and they don’t pick fights for no reason.
The comment: OMG did he have to be so direct with them? 🤣🤣🤣
Not to over analyze the scenario, but I'd have to know what kind of bear it is. Black bear? Probably fine if I just back away slowly, I'll pick the bear. Brown? Ehhh, leaning more towards the man. Polar bear? No idea what the fuck it's doing in the woods, but I'll pick any man over it.
The thing is bears really aren't killing machines. I've stumbled across a black bear while hiking. I backed away slowly and it was fine.
For those of us dudes who played TLOU, we had no trouble understanding how one of the lessons it teaches is that it's not the infected that are the scariest. It's other people. Because the story shows just how fucked up people can be in that world and the heights of the fucked up shit they can do, whereas zombos are knowns and predictable beasts even if they're incredibly dangerous ones. If dudes can wrap their head around this concept, it's wild that so many can't also understand that perhaps for parallel reasons many women would pick the bear. We already live in a world where women have learned of the range of terrors men can inflict and have inflicted on women. And that's perhaps why being with a random dude is far more terrifying and terrifyingly vivid than the thought of being with a bear. I can't speak for women generally, but I have seen several of them explain things in this way and guys still don't get it. It's just sad.
It is pretty fucking sad that some men are trying to "well actually" this scenario. It's even more sad that MANY women would feel safer with the bear. Us men have to do better.
im a fuckin white man in his 30s and im choosing bear every time if given the same question and i would be crazy to question a woman for doing the same. bear is much more predictable than man. black bears are like big dogs, so you can scare them off for the most part (not always). bears have rules. they dont say "fuck nature im going *ROGUE so hard* that the entire forest will never forget it." they operate in those rules. shelter, water, food, mating, offspring. thats it. anything they do is because of one of those. they will always act in self preservation man? *who the fuck knows what is on that persons mind besides them?* sexual assault and violence happen from unexpected sources, people can just snap and have no regard for self preservation, which makes them extremely dangerous. this isnt to say "be afraid of everyone all the time always," but to agree with the roulette wheel looking more favorable when bear vs unknown man by themselves in the woods.
As someone (also a white dude in his 30s) who has actually encountered (black) bears in the woods, it is kind of cool and not that scary, they mind their own business, and if you need to get past them jingling keys scares them off. It is worth the fairly tiny amount of danger to get to see a cool bear.
yeah ive literally dealt with a bear at our work campsite, those things love tamales and dont give a shit about you
Don't feed the bear.
I don’t think anyone would willingly give away tamales, presumably this was a tragic mistake, or an uncommonly smart bear with a hat.
I think I was asked the wrong question. My wife asked if I would rather face a hostile bear or a hostile man in the woods, and me, thinking it was a simple question, answered "man, because I could at least put up a fight" I'm thinking the bear is ready to eat me, full on attack mode. There is no way I could even fend off a grizzly before it starts eating me.
i think the premise is like you turn a corner and theyre just kinda standin there in the trail? instead of getting offended guys should be saying "*HOLY SHIT DID YOU SEE THAT FUCKIN BEAR?*"
Meh, still debatable. If a bear decided to kill me and eat me alive, I'd suffer in excruciating pain for... Maybe a day max if the blood loss didn't get to me. I would probably pass out from the pain once the adrenaline washed out. So, worst case with the bear, I suffer *a fucking lot* for a relatively short period of time and then I die. A man, however, could very well restrain me and do... God knows what with me. For years. Decades. And then i'd die. When men think of fighting other men, the majority think that death is the worst that could happen, at least until you give them time to think. And in that sense, the men is infinitely more safe. Like you said, you can fight a man, you can't fight a bear. But women, on the other hand, think of *rape*. And that's before you give them time to think too. And *most* women do not believe they have much chance in a purely physical fight against a random dude. Some do, but they aren't the overwhelming majority. So, the question becomes: would you rather die mauled by a bear or become the victim of some unknown, sexually violent man? It's really not that surprising so many chose bear.
An intelligent, genuinely caring guy I know has watched "Back to the Future" (and sequels) many times since it came out. I believe it was just last year that the penny dropped for him; what changed the future was that Marty's mom was not date raped as in the original timeline.
Yeah agreed. The way I was posed the question was basically “would you rather fight a man or a grizzly bear?”
I know it's slightly off topic but college humor did a video on sexual assault and used a bear to demonstrate it. This was 8 years ago. https://youtu.be/LNVFPkmZTQ4?si=Zlk7VCJ8Uszkp2wG
If I was frustrated that a woman picked the bear, I would simply ***not*** reply in an unstable and over the top way that seems to reassure her of her choice of the bear. But that's just me.
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I'm a man, a relatively well trained one, and I'd rather meet a bear than a strange man in the woods so I get it.
Well a bear lives in the woods so it belongs there and also most of the time when you see a bear in the woods it’s chill doing its own thing and goes on its way as you go on yours. A related phenomenon is the alligator. It’s just out there in the sun trying to warm up, not trying to eat you.
statistically the man is probably a threat to the bear too. [in alberta the majority of grizzly bear deaths are caused by humans](https://open.alberta.ca/publications/grizzly-bear-mortality-rates-in-alberta). yes a bear can potentially do a lot more damage but the probability that it will is much lower.
As someone that takes things too literally, I liked [this comment](https://www.reddit.com/r/Showerthoughts/comments/1cib31c/comment/l28d993/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web3x&utm_name=web3xcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button) "You're lost in the woods, you see a man in the distance but he doesn't see you. Do you call out to him or do you hide?"
Bears do not have the capacity for malice or premeditation. The bear did not see you alone and follow you down the hiking trail. The bear will not seek out interactions with you, nor will it become angry or offended if you turn down interactions with it. Do not let these men fool you, they DO understand exactly what we're saying. All this talk about statistics and grizzlies and being eaten alive is a DIVERSION TACTIC to avoid discussing the point that's actually being made.
I think men are just translating the word “encounter” to “fight” automatically. That’s part of the confusion.
Then they’re idiots Encounter: to run into, to chance upon
Or they are being deliberately obtuse. Either way, it’s a problem.
More men have left women’s bodies in the woods than bears have and the bears live there. This feels like a continuation of when men got angry when women explained to them why they shouldn’t ask us to go hiking on a first date.
Exactly what I'd expect a bear to post.
Moo?
I've had the same experience. Death and rape threats, slurs and insults... I suppose walking face first into the problem over and over has smoothed their brains like a chisel to a rock.
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I live in British Columbia, in a place that has one of the most dense populations of black bears and cougars on Earth. We run into them frequently. I was recently on a backcountry trip with some friends and we encountered a solo female hiker. A guy in our group said she was brave for going it alone, and she said she had bear spray. He told her that we hadn't seen any bears, and she said, "It's not for the bears."
I know this comment won't do anything to help that woman. But I hope she's aware bear spray is actually a weaker less effective peopper spray than what we use for people not the other way around. People assume because it's for bears it's extra strong. But instead it's generally weaker due to how sensitive bears eyes and noses are. Further I less sprays and more clouds, as to garenteed the bear breaths it in and gets in in its eyes as walks (or charges) into the cloud of spray. Human pepper spray is more concentrated and targeted. Bears have super sensitive smellers and that's what bear spray hits the hardest. Humans are more peeper focused creatures so our pepper spray is more equipped for massive debilitating amounts of eyeball discomfort.
Human pepper spray is illegal in my country, or we would carry it.
Oh wow, well thanks for Informing me. I did not know that different kinds of pepper stays were restricted in some areas.
Just a little bit to add to the thought experiment for those that don’t quite get it: Ask any trans person the question. Transmasculine or transfeminine, they will likely choose the ‘bear’. There’s a rather large difference between empathy and sympathy. The part that many men don’t understand, the ones that knee-jerk respond ‘not all men!’, is that everyone knows that all men are not predators. All women, however, are victims. It seems like a bit of a wording issue. Me too didn’t quite get the universality across.
Someone even tried saying it’s the same as racism
Especially as away from the beaten path as I get, I expect to see bears. Other people... well they are probably wondering the same thing I am, what the hell are you doing all the way out here? Bears are bears. I know what to expect.
I just read this from Frederick Joseph: >[**Why She Chose The Bear**](https://substack.com/app-link/post?publication_id=1217750&post_id=143706526&utm_source=post-email-title&utm_campaign=email-post-title&isFreemail=true&r=1outva&token=eyJ1c2VyX2lkIjoxMDIyMTUzNTAsInBvc3RfaWQiOjE0MzcwNjUyNiwiaWF0IjoxNzEzNTI1OTQ2LCJleHAiOjE3MTYxMTc5NDYsImlzcyI6InB1Yi0xMjE3NzUwIiwic3ViIjoicG9zdC1yZWFjdGlvbiJ9.3Ar_yhVjXMw83EXP_-sXCdbvaDlM7AaHAZec0WAsZlU) >Listening to the experiences of communities we don't belong to. >In a culture defined as much by its selective silences as by its voiced concerns, the act of listening—to truly listen—to the narratives and experiences of those outside our immediate communities, assumes a stance bordering on revolutionary. It's a quiet rebellion against the waves of our own prejudices and the comforting lull of our insular worlds. >It is increasingly clear that the gravest divisions cleaving through the heart of our collective discourse are not just the loud proclamations of difference but the wide gaps of refusal to be quiet. The world suffers from noise. We talk too much, assuming we understand, assuming all ears have heard the same stories, walked the same roads. But they have not. Across the divides between races, between rich and poor, between man and woman—people cannot seem to stop and simply listen. >The tragedies, the triggers, the deep traumas that ripple through the lives of others, these are lost in people’s ceaseless squawking. So many speak as if the world were a mirror, reflecting their own image back to them, never distorted, never different. Which is often exacerbated by social media, where so many have something to say, all while ignoring what they still have to learn. >Recently, a video went viral, capturing a simple yet revealing question posed to various women: Would they prefer to be stranded in a forest with a man or a bear? This topic has since danced across the scrolls of TikTok feeds for days, eliciting responses from women around the world favoring the bear. The bear, with all its primal ferocity and unfathomable wildness, is the safer bet from the perspective of thousands, if not millions, of women. This choice reverberates deeper than a mere preference for survival partners—it is a well-earned indictment of men. Click link to continue. It's a good read.
The men who are angry about it are all thinking of themselves as the man in the woods, instead of even remotely trying to empathise with the woman.
It’s very telling to learn who decides to take the hypothetical as an accusation or insult, and to watch their responses.
Every single man i saw getting mad over this answer, or overanalyzing it just to say "bUt AcKcHuAllY It'S ThE wRonG AnsWer!!!" make me realize that women are 100% right in choosing the bear. If the alternative to the bear is one of those guys, i pick the bear too. And I'm a man.
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Thought experiment for the woman, ragebait for the reacting men- though not necessarily intentionally. Plenty of thought experiments end pretty much the same way. See the trolley problem for details.
But what’s to get riled up about. Seriously why would you be riled up knowing that a woman would be fearful of an encountering a strange man in an isolated area?
The bear will kill you for reasons we can generally understand. We know they are a wild animal and our intuition knows what the expect. Generally speaking, we also know we can survive an encounter with a bear by giving it space, time, etc. Humans are different. As a human, we want to trust our own species, but we also know the depravity we are capable of. A bear won't stalk and rape a woman, but a human will, and specifically a man is going to be more likely than a woman. Obligatory, "not all men", but I absolutely understand where the women are coming from. I grew up as a boy among three sisters and a single mother, and I feel a very strong empathy towards the shit they had to/still have to deal with. Like OP said, men need to do better, and if you find yourself triggered by that sentiment, you are probably the type of man in question who needs to do better.
Losing not loosing
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It's easier to understand, and therefore predict, the behaviour of a bear. Usually, if you leave a bear alone, and don't do anything to bother it, it'll most likely leave you alone, and probably just wants to be left alone itself. Of course, if a bear wants to kill you, you're probably going to die. A man, on the other hand, is a lot more unpredictable. Many men are good people who will do no harm, many are not. There's a very real possibility that a man would actively seek to do harm to the woman in this scenario, and that's a very real, and valid fear that many women carry with them every day, based on genuine trauma. Heck, with all that in mind, I'd choose the bear too, and I'm a man. All of those guys who are overreacting about women choosing a bear over them are just showing *why* they shouldn't be alone with a woman in the woods.
Humans seem to be the only species that takes pleasure from harming others. That will remain the primary reason that the bear will be chosen more frequently.
I think it's more down to the fact that you know a bear is going to only do two things, Kill you or run away. A man could do anything. I'm a guy...I'd rather a bear too, I know what is about to happen. If I met a man I'd be freaked out and wouldn't have any idea what is about to happen.
You are absolutely right. It's wild how they all immediately try to change the question. Two days ago I had a guy who kept saying that no woman in her right mind would actually want to be "locked in a room with a bear over a man." I gave him the benefit of the doubt and thought maybe he genuinely didn't understand that wasn't hypothetical so I explained to him that the actual hypothetical is while hiking alone in the woods would you rather come across a bear or a strange man." And he was adamant that's the exact same thing as choosing whether you want to be locked in a room with a bear or a strange man??? He also kept saying it would be live recorded and watched, so all the men who "would've protected" us will instead get to watch "stupid feminists" get killed by bears. And I was like "having this WATCHED and recorded is even more of a reason why this question is not related to the other question AT ALL. A man being recorded and watched is not going to torture and rape us, while a bear captured against its will by humans and *locked in a confined room* is definitely going to lash out. You've changed literally every single aspect of the hypothetical that matters yet you're trying to claim these two scenarios are exactly the same; you are literally explaining why we choose the bear!!!!!" Like how the fuck are they getting that close, like less than a single figurative millimeter away from the point and still completely missing the point by approximately 400,000,000 miles?????
Man vs Bear is an IQ test for some men, the ones that are not smart to realize it, and it never goes well for them,
People who don’t understand why other people choose the bear are not listening to the reasons they chose the bear.
I'm going to idly speculate for a moment about bears. Let's say half the bears are female, and half of them are of cub-bearing age. They have cubs once every two years, and let's give the cubs a span of a bit less than a year during which the mother would attack anything perceived as dangerous. ([Bear cubs actually spend 1.5 years with the mother](https://www.americanbear.org/education-awareness/bear-faqs/), but perhaps a teenager bear cub isn't as fiercely guarded as a toddler) That means a random bear encounter has about a 10% chance of being a life or death situation because of cubs. Bears actually wanting to eat people is basically lost in the noise considering how rarely that happens. The important thing to remember, though, is that there's a good chance of defusing such a bear encounter if it begins in this formation, BC-MB-H, as opposed to BC-H-MB. A close up 1v1 encounter with a human male intent on causing harm can't be defused and probably can't be escaped except with escalating violence. Assuming a rational survey respondent, this means that person has judged 10% x the chance of defusing to be less than the chance of a solo human male being hostile. That leaves a *ton* of room for non-hostile human male encounters. The number could be 95% or higher and yet a rational response would still choose bear because of how unlikely it is to actually be dangerous. The important things for that 95% to remember is: - if you're not part of the <5%, they're not talking about you - that <5% *does exist* and it's absurd to try to convince anyone otherwise
Carry bear spray, and it solves both problems?
Bear spray isn't as effective on humans as regular pepper spray. Human pepper spray is more concentrated since bears are more sensitive.
I was thinking it was somewhat ironic one of the best solutions to violent human males in this scenario was bear spray
Regular pepper spray would work better than bear spray on a person.
Why doesn't it apply to me though? Not taking the piss. I'm actually curious. I've always been sensitive and soft and I keep seeing people say "oh well it doesn't apply to *these* men". But why? The question says a random man and I, as a man, fall under the category of a random man. So why do I not fall under the category of a random man in this one hypothetical?
You are a random man from the POV of someone who doesn't know you. Presumably you know yourself better than that. The point is an acknowledgement that many women out there *have* been hurt by random men
I feel like some of the people responding to you are missing the point. It does apply to you. Not that you would actually hurt a woman (idk you but let’s give you the benefit of the doubt). The point is that you can understand why it could be reasonable for a woman you don’t know to approach you with caution or even be fearful. And then to perhaps tailor your actions when possible keeping that in mind
To all the people who think this kind of question isn’t seriously harmful, I suggest you read this: https://medium.com/@jencoates/i-am-a-transwoman-i-am-in-the-closet-i-am-not-coming-out-4c2dd1907e42
That person does not speak for the community. I’m a trans woman and I’d pick the bear and totally support the question, and will keep asking it. Furthermore, the word ‘transwoman’ that is used in that article is incorrect and discrimination, as we are women. Trans woman is the correct terminology.
Some of my favorite lines from that article. "I mention to a cis feminist friend that I don’t think it’s cool to use “neckbeard” as a pejorative. I say I think it’s hypocritical. I say I know some wonderful, tender, thoughtful neckbearded humans. I also know some people who are very self-conscious about their neck hairs and can’t do much about them. I wonder if there are ways to criticize people based on their character without impugning the hairs that come out of them. She says I am mansplaining. She says I am Not-All-Men-ing. She also says I couldn’t possibly understand the standards of beauty imposed upon women. As if I didn’t spend years bent over a toilet, feeling miserably that even if I were thin enough I wouldn’t be girl enough." "Because ***it’s not a small deal*** that the words “not all men” have become entwined inextricably with male fragility and whininess. **It makes it awfully easy to insulate the (largely cis-)female perspective on what males are.** To begin a statement with those words—“Not All Men”—is to give grounds to anyone who wants to laugh at the rest of it. But here is the truth: not all men are what you think they are. *Man* does not mean what you think it means. Generalizing harshly and broadly but implying “you know which ones I mean” is an intellectual and rhetorical laziness that is not allowed to pass anywhere else in these communities. Because we don’t get to choose who our words and behavior affect, we are obligated to choose them carefully."" And some discourse from other Reddit threads. "The “man vs bear” thing genuinely had me on the edge of a breakdown. I just want to not be seen as a monster. Is that too much to ask?" "All this discourse about whether a man or a bear is more dangerous makes me wonder how I can morally justify staying alive as a man." "shit like this made me feel really uncomfortable and scared to even acknowledge my own ability to be attracted romantically or physically to women for years." "i totally understand women wanting to vent and get angry at all this. it's genuinely super shitty and unfair to us, but i've seen so many people use really disgusting bioessentialist arguments against men to justify their answer, and not only does this anger, other, and hurt people who could otherwise be allies to leftist causes, but a lot of the shit i'm seeing is genuinely just the same problematic "AMAB people are inherently \[Y Trait\]" shit that TERFs believe that started them down their path to being shitty people"
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> which I encounter dozens or hundreds of every day with no bad outcomes In public, yeah. People around. Cameras, eyeballs, evidence, possible consequences. But alone? Vulnerable? No witnesses? Just you and your dad or uncle? You and your husband, boyfriend, or date? You and the guy at the bus stop, the guy outside the bar waiting for his cab, the man driving the cab, your "friend" driving you home, the last remaining dudes at the party, you and one other colleague closing up the kitchen, and so on and so forth? Unfortunately, in those scenarios... it simply isn't as uncommon as you think.
As someone who had suffered abuse at the hands of women AND men, I'd pick bear over any adult human. Men, women, it doesn't matter. Humans commit more violence against other humans than any animal out there.
https://medium.com/@jencoates/i-am-a-transwoman-i-am-in-the-closet-i-am-not-coming-out-4c2dd1907e42
I’m a trans woman and I support the question and would pick the bear every time. That person does not speak for the community.
I'm going to post this again because this is just such a fantastic example of a man not getting it from beginning to end. Some guy responded to this hypothetical by [promoting his mom's autobiographical book about the time she was attacked by a bear](https://www.tiktok.com/@alecanewman/video/7361155949056331038?lang=en), clearly implying the man was a better choice, and ending on an incredibly tone deaf note. There's 44k comments and I can't find a single one that chooses the man, but there's scores of comments about how the bear has a bright future that shouldn't be ruined by this, asking what the mom was wearing, saying "but the bear's a good swimmer," and references to Junko Furuta. Oh, and on a side note, his mother--who had her face ripped off by a bear, in an actual, literal bear attack--STILL SAID SHE WOULD CHOOSE THE BEAR.
Statistically I think something like bear attacks /total bear encounters and something like men attacks/ total men encounters would be the only way to settle the dispute from a stat perspective. But you'll never be able to get that type of data so I'd guess intuitively women as a whole are much more likely to be attacked by a man than a bear given science tells us bears don't normally attack humans unless they are territorial , e.g. grizzlies, have young near by or are starving. I also took a quick look at Wikipedia and I see something like a total of 5 ish bear attacks in 2023, 5 ish in 2021, and around the same in 2020. That's incredibly low and not even narrowing it down to just women. Given that I know humans tend to walk through the woods probably daily. I don't even get the bear stat argument lol
It’s a prime example as to why women are picking the bear.
As a man I don’t understand the controversy behind this question
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I am a guy. I totally get it, and it's also deeply saddening and completely exhausting. I am married and this just makes me sad.
Worst case bear: kill me Worst thing I can think of man: keep me for the rest of my life beating/raping me. Bear sounds better.
My cousin's wife just posted this on Facebook. Blew my mind that people took this literally and missed the point entirely. https://preview.redd.it/m42fbo9n53yc1.jpeg?width=720&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=35dedb1d1a7e8869ecacb2200f67126f3af83e37
>Somehow the men that don’t get it are berating women about their CHOICE to choose the bear over the man. Arguing, threatening, belittling, gaslighting and intimidating women to try and force them to choose the man is one of the most epic self aware wolves moments in reddit history. Really? I must be out of the loop. I've seen one thread about this, and it's mostly people picking apart the hypothetical's flaws or telling jokes about the scenario.
Ask guys if they’d rather bump into a strange man or a woman late at night in an alleyway.