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Comment by sneak | Hacker News Reader

I suppose it's because I've encountered a lot of people who say many of the things that you do that attack anyone male, regardless of their role in the oppression of women.

In fact, you are offering non-oppressive behavior of others, and your negative emotional reaction thereto, in the midst of a litany of examples of you being oppressed. It reads as an accusation— aimed at the wrong group.

Why do people drinking heavily make you feel unsafe?

What is your ideal resolution to such a circumstance wherein you are made to feel unsafe because others are drinking heavily?

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My feelings about drunk people at conferences parties varies depending on a lot of factors. Am I there alone or am I there with friends? Do I know some of the people in attendance or am I isolated? Is it in a dark or well-lit location? How easy is it for me to leave? How drunk are people getting? What's the ratio of men to women in attendance? etc. etc.

As these questions hint, my feelings vary on how safe I evaluate the situation to be for myself. I'm not likely to have a fun if I feel unsafe. Why do I evaluate a situation as unsafe sometimes? It's because alcohol lowers inhibitions and can lead to people saying and doing things they might not otherwise. When I'm in a space with people I know, people I can trust to be cool and reasonable even after a few drinks, I feel safe and I can have a drink or two.

In other occasions, I don't feel safe. I can't see the future, and I don't know how strangers will behave when drunk. History tells me that sometimes they'll act badly and sometimes they won't. It's not fun for me to gamble on a hope bad things won't happen this time, so I tend to skip parties with drinking on these occasions.

TLDR: Sometimes drunk people do stupid things. I don't like gambling that this won't be one of them.

Men, take notice: I bet most of these factors are things you've rarely considered when thinking about your safety when going to a bar.

Actually, I have, but not rooted in fear of sexual assault. Of the six bullet points listed, I've considered all of them for varying reasons. Five of them at once on more than one occasion. You bet your ass I have.

I think, even as much as it'd undermine your clever preaching to men here, you'd find that most men consider the venue, who's going to be in it, and escape plans before ordering the first shot.

Sort of like walking down the street on your phone, being oblivious to your surroundings is a ticket to problems.

Anyone who carries concealed on a regular basis thinks about things like this all the time.

Carrying a firearm makes you think ten steps ahead to avoid dangerous situations, because suddenly, any dangerous situation you may find yourself in is now a dangerous situation with a gun involved.

I've skipped going places when I was carrying (places that I would have gone to, unafraid, unarmed) because of the _potential_ that I would find myself in danger and have to do something I didn't want to do.

At the risk of derailing this thread, why the hell do you carry, then? If you don't want to have to fire your weapon, what the hell did you buy it for?

This rubs the wrong way when most people that carry concealed tell me "I do it to protect myself". Well, no shit, Sherlock, that means you're going to have to discharge the weapon if you're in danger. And a sufficiently likely conclusion involves someone getting the drop on you and/or taking your weapon, anyway.

> Well, no shit, Sherlock, that means you're going to have to discharge the weapon if you're in danger.

Some of us are sufficiently averse to being forced to kill people that we will go to great lengths to avoid potential danger.

If the gender bias you're implying is accurate it's probably more from arrogance than any other factor.

Despite my privilege, I have studied the real numbers both from the literature as well as having personal experiences regarding the safety (or, much more accurately, the often total lack thereof) of women in western society.

Still, this strikes me as an unreasonable level of fear in response to common social situations.

Yes, rape culture is real. Yes, drunk people are more dangerous, on average, than sober people.

No, this does not mean you should start skipping events where people are drinking because some of them might hurt you.

Just because our western culture is generally terrible doesn't mean that you should go around living in fear. The moment you start equating the median drunk stranger with "someone I should avoid being around", you have crossed the line into pathology, in my opinion.

Most women I've been close to, including multiple partners, have expressed that they have a decision-making process similar to this. Regardless of your assessment of paranoia, it is the actual experience of many women in the States today.

This is all easy for you to say considering the privilege you mention. These things are academic to you. They are a real lived experience for some of us.

Also, I'm not terrified of drinking events at conferences. It's not like it's this super-fun thing I'm so sad I'm missing because I've got this unreasonable fear. They're things I skip sometimes because it's more fun to go do something else than risk dealing with bullshit (or on rare occasions actual risk).

> Yes, rape culture is real. Yes, drunk people are more dangerous, on average, than sober people. > No, this does not mean you should start skipping events where people are drinking because some of them might hurt you.

This isn't really your judgement call to make on behalf of somebody else, is it?

I'm a fairly big guy with some martial arts training, so when it comes to being around a bunch of people who are inebriated, I assess the level of risk to me as being pretty low. If I were a woman, and someone who's less physically imposing than almost everyone at the party, my assessed level of risk would doubtless be higher. Too, if I've been raped or subjected to other sexual violence previously -- as a significant number of women have -- I can't imagine my risk tolerance being very high at all.

I'm a white male, 5'11" I often feel unsafe when riding in a subway car alone at night.

before I get hellbanned: I'm trying to make a very real point, sometimes the only solution is to avoid such a situation. short of learning karate and packing a gun I just have to avoid the subway at night.

I'd like to note that I too feel unsafe around heavy drinking, people do stupid things and I wanna meet my grandkids, so I will often not go out with people who I think will get crazy.

I agree though that in general women have to be a lot more careful about their company, and this is true of all cultures and circles. I remember being very surprised in high school when my mother would make me go out to pick up my sister (born a year apart) who was at a friend's house only 3 blocks away at night, when I used to walk twice that (and this wasn't a particularly "bad" neighborhood).

I would guess it has to do with both the way enough people have behaved in the past while drinking heavily, as well as the nearly unassailable excuse of "I didn't mean it, I was just a little tipsy."

Note that at a conference, even at the after hours events, you're still at a professional event, surrounded by peers and colleagues, not friends.

That said, I certainly enjoy partaking, just not heavily when in that environment.

What Julie is doing is not attacking your way of, but rather showing her point of view on various things that occur within the tech community that has stood in her way.

That being said, when people are drinking heavily they are more likely to act in an irrational manner. This could lead to situations that would, in fact, be unsafe.

> What Julie is doing is not attacking your way of, but rather showing her point of view on various things that occur within the tech community that has stood in her way.

People drinking didn't stand in her way. It's a convenient scapegoat, and I'm sure her feelings of fear were legitimate, but drinking at a conference is not, in any perspective, oppressive behavior.

Just because some people who drink also rape and/or assault, does not mean that "people drinking" creates an unsafe environment.

By that logic (some people who perpetuate sexism also make sexualized jokes), it would be inappropriate to make jokes about dongles at a conference.

> Why do people drinking heavily make you feel unsafe?

I'm a guy and I've learned through personal experience that being around drunks is the least safe situation I'm ever likely to find myself in. (excluding the obvious exceptions: driving in traffic is of course the least safe situation any of us deals with ordinarily)

Belligerent drunks are worrisome enough even to a person who is fully capable of defending himself and they tend to show up when you're dealing with a group of strangers that could be described as "drinking heavily." When the small but finite risks of dealing with a big group of "heavily drinking" people are usually compensated for with noisy, difficult conversation... why bother? Avoiding the whole thing isn't "pathology" as you described elsewhere, it's closer to common sense.

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