I’m on vacation right now so excuse me if this feels rushed but I wanted to touch on a few things when it comes to the man vs. bear trend a couple years back. Some of the advocates here are going to groan and say “why are we talking about this” while the feminist guest might do the same and ignore this post altogether. Just hear me out on this one because there’s a lot of things about this topic that even you guys missed. I’ll try my best to exclude the points already made which include things like proximity of the bears (bears being blocked from civilization) for example. There are other points to make that lead me to believe this trend was just a poor attempt at talking about women’s safety. Here are some of those points that I think the feminists miss when they speak about this trend (some of these points are also made by OTHER FEMINISTS as well). I’m gonna try my best to say new things here.

1.) It starts in the house

There was a feminist I had seen online make a YouTube clip of her own issues with the “man vs. bear” trend. I wish I could link it but I unfortunately don’t have it saved. The clip itself didn’t have many views so it’ll be hard to find it again. Anyways, in her video she stated how the trend seems to blatantly forget the very statistic that other feminists pushed when speaking about female victimization. The fact that a lot of victims knew their assailants. The fact that you’re more likely be attacked by your spouse than by a random goon two seconds always from seeing the bat signal and fleeing the scene. We make memes about dads using fists and moms flinging sandals but seem to forget that the assailant likely already lives in the next room.

However, since that doesn’t exactly fit the narrative, it’s openly forgotten for the sake of clout. Here’s a (not-so-fun) fact: you’re chances of being killed by a family member increase greatly when you win the lotto.

2.) Lack of research

Do yourself a favor and take note every time someone mentions a bear that was in presence of a human and did nothing. It’s likely going to be a black bear. Black bears are the only bear species where you can actually scare them off when you’re by yourself. Any other bear and you’re fucked. Another thing to note is to not run when your see one since that can potentially trigger their predatory instincts. For example: take clips like this and compare them to clips like this. One clip involves a woman actually running but the creepy guy seems to keep his distance. The other clip literally tells you not to run when dealing with certain types of bears. In a self defense course, the responsible advice is to tell the students not to fight but run. A park ranger will tell you to do the opposite since these things on average have the speed of an NFL linebacker on gear. You’re not outrunning them and climbing a tree is the worst thing you can do. Please don’t do it. I’m not saying what these women go through isn’t scary but…you get the idea.

You’re also not supposed to feed the bears either or the park rangers will have to get involved. It typically doesn’t end well for the bear. I’m sure you have the brain power to guess why. I saw too many women (yes, specifically women) talking about how they aren’t scared and actually feed the bears all the time. Here’s the thing though, we already tell people not to feed the squirrels, ducks, monkeys,etc., and they are feeding bears. Make it make sense.

3.) Self defense

If it’s black, fight back. If it’s brown, lie down. If it’s white, say good night. That’s the self defense advice you’re dealing with here when it comes to bears. With humans (in this case men) what’s the first thing we tell children when dealing with a kidnapper? Bite. There was one story of a woman who was attacked that ended up biting into the guy so hard that he bled out and died. Unless you’re a Baki Hamna character, you’re never doing that to a bear. We even tell people to hit a guy in the groin to fend off the attacker. That’s not happening with a bear.

You see when it comes to other men, I still have a fighting chance. Yes, this does include when they are armed too. Even old veterans have successfully taken down robbers in the last. There’s numerous stories like these. If my sister gets attacked by a man, we have self defense courses for that. We don’t have courses akin to those for bears.

4.) The fork in the road

Let’s say in this hypothetical there’s two trails. One has a bear and the other has a man. In a real life scenario the woman is going to go to the trail with the man and simply not make eye contact. If she has working brain cells and a conscience, she’d warn the man about the bear next door. I ride my bike on trails and see it all the time. Again, something doesn’t smell right here.

Let’s go intersectional. As a black man from Chicago, I’ve heard all types of horror stories. I’ve had a roommate who was jumped on Cottage Grove, another who lived in D.C. and witnessed multiple shootings, and another who knew a Librarian who had been murdered. I myself have tried to defend myself at 5yo and got beat up, seen a man who had been shot when I was 7yo; a man being chased by a car at 15yo, almost mugged at 19yo, threatened by a coworker and my mom at 20yo, ran into a (possibly racist) cop, witnessed a a woman being harassed on the Red Line and was the only one besides another woman who tried to intervene as well as seeing two younger women threaten a man for his cig and prescription meds (he apparently had just left the state correctional center). I’ve been slammed against a fence; punched in the stomach, uppercutted, put in a chokehold, threatened with a baseball bat, slapped, the works. I’ve seen a lot. I wasn’t even a bad kid either (not past preschool at least).

So what’s the point? My point is that there are people who actually live in the hood who have seen worse. This whole “bear” idea doesn’t apply in the ghetto. People who live in areas with a high crime rate are not going to react to a bear the same way they would to another melanated person. I hate to get all racial with you guys but it has to be said. Remember that clip of those white people feeding that black bear at the picnic table I showed earlier? Yeah…black and brown people are not doing that. White people are waaaay too comfortable around animals and it shows. Hence why so many of them get attacked by them in the first place. One older gentleman was literally just attacked by a moose because some other guy startled it. Then you have the white women who say “if it was a bear, I’d feel more comfortable.” Of course you would. Was there ever any doubt?

Another thing to point out is that a lot of white feminists (regardless of gender) had something to add when it came to the man vs bear trend. I didn’t see a whole lot of black people but they were indeed there. It actually makes even less sense with us black people since we like to make fun of white people who are too comfortable with the wild life. None of this is computing here. A black woman runs into a bear she’s running away and posting a story about it online. A black woman runs into another black man she’s simply not giving him any attention. No story to put online there and yet certain leftist black folk are acting like this fictional scenario would work the way they see it just to fit this ignorant feminists narrative. I don’t think they realize how much white feminism is influencing their input on these topics but it sounds feminist enough to them I guess.

5.) The Good Samaritan

Numerous dudes decided to make a bunch of memes online depicting a woman being mauled by a bear and the men doing nothing to help. One of these memes was rebuked by a woman in this picture below. But wait a second, I thought men were too dangerous? So why does it matter what a man thinks? He’s dangerous. Why would you expect a man to help if he is more likely to kill you? Just make a bear whistle or something and ask another bear to help. Okay, I’m being an ass now but you get the idea. How is it that when the topic of the bear comes up, men are to be feared but when a woman is being harassed, men ain’t shit for not interfering? Again, something doesn’t gel here.

You can’t have your cake and eat it too. Pick one for crying out loud. If men are dangerous then expecting them to help you in a dire situation let alone ask you out is risky business is it not? Don’t expect this from them if that’s the case. If these people were consistent then they’d hold their ground and double down on it. At least it runs with the logic. Now all of a sudden they are confirming how dangerous they are for leaving you alone in a hypothetical meme. This makes no sense. If you’ve already forgotten what I’ve mentioned about my past earlier, I’ve already stated that I’ve helped women in the past. I don’t agree with this meme but the meme seems to coexist within the confines of the trend. Now all of a sudden it doesn’t. Don’t expect a potentially dangerous species to help you if this is to be taken seriously.

6.) Rape Victims

“Men don’t know there are fates worse than death.” We’ve all heard about this but this is actually what solidified my understanding of the trend. The trend is about reliving trauma. These women would rather get eaten alive than to be violated again. In that case, I can sort of understand what they’re going for here. There are indeed certain things I’d rather die over than to witness or experience. I get that. Even the film Obsession kind of delves into this idea of choosing to die over constant torture.

However there are two issues here. The first being that they’ve obviously never been mauled by a bear. There’s a line in the film Tenet that I try to remember everyday.

“We all believe we’d run into the burning building, but until we feel that heat, we can never know.”

They (hopefully) will never know. Again, there’s a reason we keep clear of these animals. It’s for safety. No other reason than that.

The other issue is actually why I made this post to begin with. What does this say about women who want to endure life after being victimized. Imagine for a moment a woman who is trying to have a normal life and all over the internet feminists of all sorts are saying they’d rather die than to be raped again. I don’t know. Maybe I’m being abhorrently obtuse but this feels…off to me. It reminds me of that episode of the Boondocks where this character Luna kills herself after her friend said if she were in her shoes, she’d…well…kill herself. Again, idk. All of this feels weird if you ask me.

At the end of the day, if this wasn’t to be taken literally…then why was it used as a serious talking point in the first place? What do you think?