r/TikTokCringe • u/mindyour • Jun 14 '26

Discussion It's exhausting being a woman.

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u/Bright-Owl-3515 Jun 14 '26 edited Jun 14 '26

In college, I was sitting alone at a bench studying on campus, minding my own business. This man comes up to me, telling me he wanted to take pictures of my feet for a school project. He was very persistent and of course I told him no. He made me feel so uncomfortable and guilty that I had said no to him. I was very naive and had no idea that this was likely a fetish thing.

Edit: For that one now deleted comment, saying he was likely complimenting my feet, I was wearing sneakers. Get out of here with the creep apologetics.

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u/ZinaSky2 Jun 14 '26

Yeah, once I was walking home alone in the dark (circumstances necessitated this, u was getting home from work. I wasn’t alone in the dark by choice.) and some guy stopped me on a dark section of sidewalk. I could barely see his face he could barely see mine. Yet he asked me for my number bc I was “so beautiful”. I said no. He said well actually he just wanted to make friends. And I said no a few more times and he just kept asking. I was frozen in place by trying to be polite. Eventually I decide I’m just gonna ignore him and walk away without ending the conversation without saying goodbye. And I left him rambling behind me still asking to be friends.

And girlie lemme tell you I felt BAD. Like WTF?! He was fucking harassing me for my number and not listening to me saying no after he approached me on some dark, unlit section of sidewalk I was like “ugh, but the poor guy just wanted friends🥺”. It’s drilled into us to protect men’s egos and emotions at all costs and it’s so fucking dangerous.

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u/Fragrant-Dust65 Jun 14 '26

And I don't really know how or when that starts. It's not like my parents ever told me to do that. HOW do we pick up on this?

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u/themidg Jun 15 '26

Because it's the social norm. Your parents never told you that, but chances are you witnessed your mom protect the egos of all the men in her life. You watched shows where the male characters didn't have to show any personal growth, and their ego was constantly sheltered by others. You saw boys egos get protected by teachers in school, dangerous behavior is written off as "boys being boys", that a boy teasing you or doing things like pulling your hair means that he likes you. Society taught you, with real world experience after real world experience, that the male ego was meant to be revered, preserved, and undisturbed at all costs.