I'm Afraid of Men.

by Vivek Shraya

I’m afraid of men because it was men who taught me to hate and eventually destroy my femininity. I’m afraid of men because it was men who taught me to fear the extraordinary parts of myself.

As important as it is to make these incidents visible by reporting them, sensationalizing and digesting these stories is also a form of social control, a reminder that I need to be afraid and to try to be as invisible as possible.

Despite the authority I have as a teacher, I’m embarrassed any time a cluster of male students laughs in my classroom, fearing that I might be their joke.

Being a girl has required me to retrain myself to think of depending on others or asking for assistance not as weakness or even as pathetic, but rather as a necessity.

My fear of men is a fuel that both protects my body, as a survival instinct, and erodes it, from overuse.

How do I love a body that was never fully my own?

I’M AFRAID OF MEN not because of any singular encounter with a man. I’m afraid of men because of the cumulative damage caused by the everyday experiences I’ve recounted here, and by those untold, and by those I continue to face.

This praise highlights another problem with the idea of the “good man”—the bar is ultimately a low one, and men are heralded every day for engaging in basic acts of domestic labour like washing dishes.

And so, I’m also afraid of women. I’m afraid of women who’ve either emboldened or defended the men who have harmed me, or have watched in silence.