this happens in a public park.
first time this happens to me afaik. I was just stretching with black leggings and a t-shirt. I noticed him 100 yards away walking around but always looking at me. Upon making eye contact he would look away but as soon as I turned to stretching, he’d look at me.
He started slowly approaching me and at one point stood at like 15 yards from me, but still separated by a fence. At that point I decided to cut my work out short and left avoiding eye contact.
I consider myself lucky because he didn’t follow me.
What scared me the most is he was bigger and taller than me.
If this ever happened to you, how did you react? How do I react next time this happens?
At first I was like there’s nothing wrong with looking, but it went beyond looking. Does the park have cameras? If not, consider bringing one or two but actually take the time to make them functional to a cloud dvr of some kind. Then place them in super obvious places by you.
It sucks to need to do extra things but it’s better to be safe regardless.
If you’re alone and/or feeling potentially unsafe, you did the right thing no question. Prevent the situation from escalating, get away, leave him to his daily routine of making people feel uncomfortable.
If you have a greater audience and you’re in a safer setting, you could consider calling him out. Make eye contact, flip him off, make him know he is not being appreciated. That could be a learning moment, but it could also be the moment when he starts giving you extra attention as you have acknowledged his existence and/or hurt his ego. So it could go both ways and should never be attempted without bystanders.
In a setting where you’re in a mixed gender group, make a male friend aware of the situation and ask them if they could go tell the creep that they’re making you uncomfortable. Men are sadly more likely to believe that their behaviour is creepy when it’s coming from other men, in my experience.
Raising awareness of the issue in general is good, and judging by the comment section here so far there’s not all that much of it around. So that’s also something. I think this is really a question that should go out to men more than to women - what should we do when we observe men making women feel uncomfortable? How can we react in a constructive manner?
If it’s typically sunny where you yoga, wear a mirror ball bodysuit. Anyone that stares will get an eye full of glorious sunbeams.
Alternatively, get a big, well-trained dog. The kind that will orbit you closely without a leash.
If I were a woman this is what I’d do. Great, loyal animal, that will give you peace of mind knowing they’ll keep the creeps away.
I’ll just add, next time, find a group of women and attach yourself to them as soon as you feel unsafe. If this was a predator you are just doing him a favor by isolating yourself and leaving a public area. You want to be sure you are decreasing your anonymity, not increasing it.
“Take a picture; it will last longer!”
You’re giving permission to expand his spank bank that way. Not recommended.
Do you typically get permission before privately enjoying a photo of an attractive person?
I’m not a weird creeper so that question is a non sequitur.
Weird creeper or not, why does it matter if anyone has that kind of permission?
Username checks out.
I know this isn’t an awesome answer, but safety is more important than standing your feminist ground sometimes: either go to another yoga class or bring a friend. It sux to rearrange your life because of some weirdo, but less than being attacked. Also, consider keeping mace or a whistle on you in case there is a confrontation.
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Fart loudly? Idk.
So this answer might come off the wrong way. I wanna start by saying that the reality sucks, and I’m sorry it’s that way and we should all work to better it. That having been said…
A conventionally attractive woman in yoga pants doing yoga in public will catch eyes like a man wearing a speedo at a water park. It’s stupid, it sucks, but it is what it is. The best way to avoid it is unfortunately to not do it. Especially if that gawking is feeling like more than gawking, and you’re concerned for your safety.
Strong disagree on the whole giving up part.
Looking over briefly and not as subtly as one would maybe have hoped is normal behaviour. Coming up and staring is not.
Sadly, if there was an easy solution to this problem we would all have been well aware of it by now. But giving the world up to the creeps is not the right way to go - they will keep going at it forever, shrinking in women’s freedoms little by little until there’s nothing left and women won’t be allowed to leave the fucking house without a man any more. We’ve seen it happen, anyone who thinks America is any better should take a second look at it.
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Lots of people giving advice here, but I’m not seeing the most important advice being emphasized.
Always trust your gut. Listen to that uneasy feeling and act on it.
We developed this intuition over millennia for a reason. Your subconscious will pick up on cues even if you consciously aren’t catching it.
The Gift of Fear by Gavin de Becker is a book about exactly this. It’s definitely worth a read, and his methods have been used by countless celebrities & public figures to assess threats.
You got me, this is what I’m referencing.
If the topic of books comes up in conversation with random people I always recommend it if that’s the only book they read in their lifetime
Listen to that uneasy feeling and act on it.
Unless it’s about some other group of people than men.
Yes that moral imbalance also striked me when reading this. When grandma has a gut feeling towards brown people and talks about that, she’d be called a bigot here. But when it’s about men, the highest upvoted advice is to listen to the feeling of fear in your gut…
If people only listened to their gut all people from a different culture which similar but not same body language as well as people with a disability would be even more estranged than today.
What does your gut tell you about the guy in line at the tell who keeps his hand in his pockets and fiddling with something who then seem to panic a bit when someone tries to look him in the eyes? Is it a robber or an autistic person who don’t want to show his hand due to having a stim toy and have learned to not stim in public view?
I don’t know what gender you are, but you’ve just triggered my spidey-gut.
I don’t disagree with the advice to trust your gut, so I can’t blame you for doing the same thing.
I’m getting sexist racist homophobic anti trans vibes here. Should I trust my gut?
If what I’m saying even remotely resembles something your caricature of the “other” might say, then the only logical conclusion, of course, is that I must be exactly like them.
I’ll take that as a yes.
Oh no! A random person on the internet thinks I’m something I’m not. How can I ever recover from this.
Pulling out your gun and shooting the brown skinned dude going for a jog is a little bit different than packing it in and resolving to do yoga another day
Shout loudly: “Get lost pervert!”
This works better when there are lots of people around.
Give em a toot n’ wink 😉
But in all seriousness, if there were other women around then call that shit out. If its just you stay safe and call a friend/pretend that they’re meeting you.
Throw a fake blood capsule in your mouth and flash a big grin.
That, or flash the piece.
/S
I’m sorry that happened.
You did the right thing: you kept an eye on your environment, and you had an exit plan.
I highly recommend this channel. But this video in particular is topical.
Excrete explosive diarrhoea on the spot, and film it and put it on a prank channel on youtube.
