Summary
Berlin lawmaker Antje Kapek of the Green Party proposed introducing women-only carriages on the city’s underground trains to enhance safety, inspired by a similar approach in Tokyo.
Kapek cited rising nighttime attacks on women and crowded evening conditions as reasons for the measure, which is still a proposal without legislative backing.
Her suggestion follows a recent rape case on the Berlin metro. The city’s BVG transport authority expressed doubts, arguing current safety measures, including 250 security staff and emergency contact points, are sufficient.
I never understand why someone would feel offended by something like this. I doubt many people are riding public transit to make new friends. Most seem to want to be ignored there.
I’m of bear-like physique and I assume to a lone woman on a train car that has no clue who I am, potentially intimidating. Likely, I’d expect neither of us would pay each other much mind. If she decided to get up and move to an empty car, it probably still wouldn’t dawn on me right away why she moved, as I’m minding my own business. If I did realize, why should I be offended though? If anything, it’s a good strategic move on her part. She’s not there to get to know me, and she’s darned well not there to potentially get to know me in a negative way, no matter how slim the chance of that could be.
Should they require separate cars? Of course not. But I don’t see how it could be seen as ant-man. If your first thought is to be seriously angry at someone for not trusting a stranger, to me, that pretty much proves them right.
I’m mostly just sad when that happens. People do tend to consider me intimidating, but only very rarely scary, just as a roller-coaster might be intimidating but it’s not going to jump at you and strap you in so there’s no reason to fear it. On the contrary, I do tend to make people feel safe. Which then leads me to believe that those few people who actually are scared by my presence have completely fucked threat radars.
Then, OTOH, if you’re suppressing any urges to jump at people and strapping them in and looping them around yep people are going to notice that. You might not actually be doing it, ever, but the possibility is there and you’re going to be perceived differently, suppressed aggression is still visible in body language and at least their subconscious is going to pick up on it. People are going to be scared, at least a bit on edge, even if their threat radars aren’t fucked.
Nah they’re angry at themselves for not being at peace with themselves and projecting outwards, just as pretty much everyone else. SNAFU.
It is unfortunate. I try and be mindful around new people to look visibly happy, or at least not in a bad mood. But I can’t fault anyone for playing it safe. Especially since being harassed isn’t something you can undo or something anyone should have to build a tolerance for. They may have also been in a previous incident that we don’t know about.
If they’re overreacting or not isn’t really a strangers’ business. We start to venture into egocentrism to think their behaviors have anything to do with us. It’s just a live and let live thing. There’s plenty of people over been nice to, and they still never liked me for one reason or another, but it’s no biggie.
If it was a repeated thing, like they saw you every day and actively avoided you, that’s a somewhat different story, but some person we only see once, it’s not worth the mental energy to worry about it to me.