What Are You Afraid Of?

WisCon is a science fiction convention, but since it’s also a feminist convention, the panels cover more than books and movies. This year the programming committee let me talk about self defense.

Because I’ve done presentations before on the non-fighting ways people can protect themselves — top of the list: paying attention — I focused this talk on fear. Fear is a powerful means of social control; if people are afraid, they will limit their activities on their own.

And people are often afraid o...