When our friend came over the other day, she said some neighbor’s adult son came up to her and said he’d tried to yell at the girl who drove the yellow car that she had a flat tire and she ignored him.  He seemed miffed at this fact.

Guys, I’m going to tell you a secret.

4/5 of the time a guy yells at me on the street, it’s to share his opinions about my breasts — or, really, any part of my body — or to share his strangely forward thoughts about what he’d like to do with/to me.  The other 1/5 of the time is mostly men mocking me when I ride my bike.  Especially going up a hill. It’s awesome, I tell you.

So yes, if you yell out in hopes of helping a woman, she’s probably going to ignore you because her assumption is going to be that you’re harassing her. I’m sorry this is the world we live in, but it is, and all nice guys have to pay the penalty for the precedent their brethren have set for them.

That’s my PSA for nice guys today. No yelling, and if you have to approach a woman on the street (to help her/ask for help/etc.) be really conscious of the fact that most interactions that start with an unknown guy approaching a girl on the street aren’t great for the girl. Regardless, don’t be offended if she ignores you because now you know better.

(Last week’s example of exceptionally egregious stranger asshole behavior: guy crossing at Lake Street staring at Megan when we biked home and making jerking off motions.)

Megan says I should make another PSA where you should band together and yell at ad people to stop portraying you as incompetent in advertisements. The incompetent man-child is a weird trope. It sucks for guys and it sucks for women because they’re just the eternal mom. Ick.