This story from London shows a video monitoring clip of a male jogger pushing a female pedestrian causing her to fall and almost hit by a passing bus. The news stories all implied that pushing her into the path of the bus was deliberate and apparently the male jogger has been charged with causing grievous bodily harm, interesting given that the female pedestrian did not suffer any such harm. The video evidence suggested the push was deliberate and the jogger deserves to be prosecuted and, if correct, punished for assault. However, an MRA view of the video noted some gender issues.

The video shows the jogger running clearly on his side of the footpath and passing a male pedestrian who is walking appropriately on the left side of the footpath giving the jogger room to pass. It’s likely that the male pedestrian saw the jogger approaching and moved over a bit to give him room. In contrast, the female pedestrian keeps walking right in the middle of the footpath, in the path of the jogger who would have had to move aside to squeeze past her, possibly requiring him to break his stride to reduce the risk of injuring himself on the wall. The incident appeared to be an example of female self-entitlement. A man should be chivalrous and move aside for a woman and women shouldn’t be expected to show any consideration towards males. The same attitude appeared to underly the false allegations made by has-been actress Souad Faress at Waterloo Station last year. Any man should move aside for a woman, and if he doesn’t then he deserves to have his life ruined.

It seemed likely that the jogger’s push was his nonverbal way of saying “get out of the way and show some consideration”. The jogger would not have known the bus was coming from behind him and he didn’t consider the risks of his push. The incident highlighted the foolishness and unacceptability of expressing one’s feelings through violence, and the risk of causing serious injury or death even when unintended. However, the media portrayal of the incident included no attempt to consider the male jogger’s perspective fairly.

Then there was today yet another story about bad men attempting to abduct children on the way to or from school. Children have been reporting that strangers in cars pulled up beside them, tried to get them into the car, and chased them when they refused. These accounts appear to have been accepted as gospel by the school and authorities, with newsletters going out warning parents and special lessons provided about stranger danger. However, we would bet money that some of these stories are fanciful and others are highly embellished, in an atmosphere of male demonization and great supportive attention given to any child who has been marked by a male devil. Any male ‘approaching’ children now seems automatically to be considered offensive and with bad intent. Isn’t that a sad indictment of our society’s attitudes towards men? If a woman approaches a child it’s assumed she has innocent reasons. but public reaction and media coverage portray any attempt by a male to communicate with a child as tantamount to rape.