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CULTURES
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Theological Reflection From the beginning, God created both male and female in the likeness of God (Genesis 1.27) and in Christ we are all made fellow heirs of the promises of God, in whom “there is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male nor female, for you are all one ….” (Galatians 3.28) I was reminded of a commitment with which I returned from the group’s fact-finding trip to AIDROM in Romania. Having been moved by the input from two of the men in the group as to what it meant for them being men and involved in this study, I came away aware that I needed to work on (and it will require effort and concentration) the tendency to react at times when I am, say, in a tube train on my own apart from one other passenger – male, or walking home at night alone apart from one other person – male. From where does the automatic assumption come that here is a potential rapist in disguise? I decided that in future I should try imagining that this person was either of these two group members and if so what they would be thinking/feeling in the same situation. I was reminded of this recently when walking down the shortest route from my house to town on a cold day – a route that is not generally recommended for women in the dark, and has one bit where it would be easy to be jumped. Though having said that, there have been no reports of incidents on that path for years! The first man who passed coming in the opposite direction was Asian and singing happily to himself the similar chants we sometimes hear from the mosques. “Oh, religious, he’s alright then” I stereotyped, and on I walked. The next encounter was with a man, white, unshaven, with a hoodie over his baseball cap. Initial reaction quite different from the first but remembering the learning from Romania, I attempted half a smile at him. He stopped and hesitantly said ‘be careful, down there’ and we ascertained that he meant it was slippery so I thanked him and continued – with additional care. If I hadn’t smiled and/or he hadn’t spoken, I might well have needed a visit to A&E with a broken leg, as the path was badly icy. Was he as afraid of the possible effect of his speaking to me? Was he perhaps also aware of the assumptions that might be made? But a positive encounter to confirm my commitment to trying to avoid my fearful assumptions. I still won’t take unnecessary risks – but suspect there aren’t as many risky men out there as my fears might have me believe. And where does all this fear come from? I worked for years in a project where we assumed everyone was worthy of our respect and care (until proven otherwise), rather than starting with negative expectations. So I worked with all sorts of people – some aggressive due to the way they had been treated by society and other agencies, but even the one who threatened to wrap a computer round my head had his friend leap to my defence and calm him down. There were others unpredictable due to substance misuse issues and we assisted sex offenders to find accommodation away from schools, etc etc etc without my ever feeling much in the way of fear. So why is it different when I am on my own? Why should the risks be any greater? All illogical – and part of a whole cultural set of norms that need to change around this whole question of attitudes to each other and power relationships between men and women.
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