I returned to my university dormitory building late one night after the worst kind of frat party. I’m sure you can picture it: the roaring crowds playing beer pong in the basement. The sloppy grinding on a sticky, alcohol saturated dance floor. Shots, drinking beer through a funnel, all the rest. These parties are all the same:
What starts as a 50/50 ratio of men to women quickly swings out of balance. The women leave. The men stay because the only reason they came to this horrible party in the first place was to find a woman.
Eventually, any pretense of a party has ended: It just turns into a huddled mass of men surrounding the few remaining females. These guys will make their plays. Maybe they’ll just stand around and hope, by mere proximity, one of these ladies will notice him.
But then, as the women look up and see themselves surrounded by sharks, the unraveling begins. As these unfortunate remaining few try to escape, the guys get desperate.
“How about a shot?”
“How about another game of beer pong?”
“What if I stand in front of you and wave my arms?”
But now, all females are heading towards the door. Catastrophe! A whole night wasted!
I’ve seen men crying and punching walls because the girl they were after left with his friend. I’ve seen men sneakily following women back to their dormitories, holding onto hope until the very last moment. Until they disappear behind their keycard gated entryway.
I was returning home this particular evening with a group of guys. We were that unlucky huddled group of men described in the previous section, and we all lived on the ninth floor of this ancient dormitory building. Approaching the elevator we saw that the door was already open.
Inside was a lone woman. She wore a tight blue dress with heels, probably coming home from her own version of a terrible frat party. She saw us approaching, several intoxicated men, and so she leaned forward and started pressing the door close button.
This was taken as a challenge.
One of us ran towards the elevator, trying to catch it before it closed. She saw him coming and desperately pounded the button, forgetting all pretense. But my friend won the race, managing to place his hand through the sensor and prevent it from closing.
“What the fuck?!” He asked her with righteous indignation. She didn’t say anything. Instead, she slid sideways past him and hurried to the stairwell.
“Nice try!” he shouted at her as she fled.
I haven’t really written in many redeeming qualities for our male characters, so let’s try to be fair. It’s hard to describe what it feels like to have testosterone coursing through your veins. Leaking out of your ears. To have a brain flooded with hormones.
In my teens and even into my very early twenties, if an attractive woman interacted with me in even the most insignificant way, my mind would become overwhelmed with a kaleidoscope of pornographic imagery. If a woman sat in front of me in class, then class was over for me. I would be spending the next hour picturing her naked. I know, that’s creepy. It’s not like I was doing it on purpose.
If a woman touched me, even absentmindedly. If her hair brushed against me, or if she put a hand on my shoulder. I would have a visceral reaction. My heart would visibly pound through my shirt. My mouth would dry out. I wouldn’t be able to breathe. There was no way I was going to be able to form sentences, let alone hold any sort of conversation.
Women had immense power over my physiology. Is it any wonder that it took me so long to form a comfortable relationship with the female side of humanity?
I did occasionally manage to secure a relationship with one of these strange creatures. But then a different class of powerful emotions took over: jealousy and insecurity.
The way I saw it, women did not understand the power they had over the men they interacted with. They could not empathize with our overpowering desire for them. And so, when they complained about some creepy interaction they had with a man… I just sort of let it slide.
“I’m sure it was annoying, but try to have some fucking sympathy. It’s involuntary.”
Of course, I had no idea what it actually felt like to be on the receiving end of all this male desire. That is, until an experience I had in my mid-twenties.
We used to get drunk.
Stupid drunk. Drunk like, we just burnt all of our kitchen furniture in the backyard, drunk. We were combative, restless young men and life was monotony.
With the assistance of alcohol and marijuana, even the most milquetoast evening can become Joseph Campbell’s version of “the Heroes Journey.” Emotions are more intense. Bland moments are blurred out by the booze and only the vibrant ones survive. For that reason, this particular experience has become imprinted onto my bones.
I had a friend in Chicago. Call him Frank. I visited Frank several times a year, especially before I met my wife.
Frank was huge into comic books. Each year, he would build some elaborate costume and wear it to Comic-Con. He was incredibly creative and his basement apartment was loaded with costumes and contraptions: A juggernaut outfit made with football gear. A high spec nerf gun wired with a laser. A Captain America Shield fashioned out of beer cans. He was a special sort of guy.
One weekend, I happened to visit Frank during Gay Pride Fest. The Parade was that Saturday. The weather was bright and pleasant; warm, but without the sweltering compression of mid-western humidity. It just so happened that Frank lived near the parade route. He had concocted an amusing plan: We would dress up as gay as possible, utilizing his unique cache of props and costumes, and attempt to march in the parade.
Laughing at the stories we would eventually be able to tell, we started pulling all of Frank’s costumes out of storage. We adapted them to our needs. Ultimately, I ended up wearing a pair of Frank’s ex-girlfriends jeans, cut off mid-thigh. I arranged my genitals so that they were as conspicuous as possible. I was shirtless. The final piece was a large robot head, fashioned out of tinfoil, topped with a gaudy purple “pimp hat.”
I practiced twerking in the mirror while Frank dressed himself: A Spartan helmet made out of a Natural Light box, an unbuttoned pink shirt, and bedazzled skinny jeans. Next, we drank Gin out of a plastic bottle, steeling ourselves for the subterfuge that would soon be required of us. We filled a flask, smoked a joint, and rolled a few more. Then we made our way to the parade.
It turns out that our preparation was unnecessary. Sneaking into the parade was easy. We just walked onto the route. Nobody cared.
The next hour was a blast. We were the center of attention for a huge crowd of adoring fans. People threw beers to us which we drank graciously. I “hot-boxed” my robot helmet, filling it with dense smoke until it poured from the eyes and the mouth, a crowd favorite. At one point, I was invited to dance on a float by a shirtless woman wearing pasties. She thought I was gay, so there was no need for any precautions when dancing with me. She grabbed my ass, I grabbed hers.
It was great. I was protected from female scrutiny by a big gay force field. Without any sexual pretense, there would be no need for an awkward de-escalation later on. A gay guy wasn’t going to be following her home that evening.
However, as the parade route started winding to a close the onlookers became drunker and considerably more aggressive. A group of men beckoned me over to the side of the route. I had been interacting with onlookers all afternoon so I figured they were just going to high five me or give me a beer or something.
The man said, “You wanna see how we shake hands in Ohio?”
“Sure!”
He aggressively grabbed my testicles, shouted, “O- HIYOOO!”, and then proceeded to put his mouth on my nipple. He got a few tongue twirls in before I managed to wrestle my balls out of his hand and squirm away.
WHAT.
THE.
FUCK.
My buzz was momentarily frozen into sobriety. I’ve been in fights before. I’ve had unwanted sexual encounters. But I had never had a violent, unwanted sexual encounter.
I mean, it might sound funny when I describe it. To an outside observer, it probably seemed like a non-event. But I was incredibly disturbed.
I felt stupid like I fell for a trick. My lower belly hurt from the referred pain of my twisted balls. I wouldn’t have been comfortable with the tongue thing even if a woman had done it. This was an entirely new experience.
Friends, I had just been sexually harassed. Prior to this moment, I had considered sexual harassment to be a mundane sort of thing. I pictured a 1960’s businessman in a pinstriped vest playfully patting his secretary’s ass. Or I pictured construction workers whistling at some lady walking down the street. I stored that information in some mundane corner of my mind. It wasn’t something I was concerned about. But now, a new neural pathway was being carved into my brain, imprinting itself onto my psyche.
The phrase sexual harassment now had an experiential reference point.
I continued down the parade route, trying to process this experience. I kept recalling his warm, wet, wriggly tongue swirling around my nipple. Each time I had to shut the idea out of my mind. I took a substantial pull from what remained of my flask.
During the commotion, I had lost my friend. He wandered off into the crowd. I called his phone. It went directly to voicemail. Probably it was dead. My friend is the type of drunk who blacks out easily. Unfortunately, after he blacks out, his body remains active. He gets up to all sorts of adventures, usually coming back to consciousness mid-party. I’m not trying to knock his form of recreation, but it was fairly inconvenient if you had to rely on him.
The parade was over now. End of the line. The floats were all driving away, back to their garages.
I was alone in Chicago wearing a tiny pair of cutoff jean shorts, no shirt, and a big, conspicuous robot helmet topped with a purple hat. Blending into the crowd was not an option. My life as a generic-looking white guy had not prepared me for the challenges of being the center of attention.
I felt vulnerable, deeply regretting my choice of wardrobe. What was fun just 20 minutes ago was now a major liability. I looked like the caricature of an enthusiastic gay man. I stood out like a glittery unicorn.
I drew attention. It was interesting how easily I could tell when some guy was checking me out, even if he thought he was being discreet about it. It was instinctual. I could feel it.
I wonder if the women I’ve ogled over the years could feel my eyes on them the same way I felt the eyes of these men? I became conscious of how I was walking. I tried to look as “masculine” as possible. Not an easy task considering my outfit.
There were hundreds of men on the street. Most of them didn’t bother me. They were fine.
But 1% of them were assholes. And that 1% shaded my experience of the other 99%. As I made the walk of shame down the streets of Chicago, I got catcalled. I was whistled at. One bold gentleman slapped my ass as I walked by. I started thinking, “Wow, these dudes are thirsty as fuck.”
In reality, my outfit was just acting as a magnet for the 1% of hyper-aggressive gay men with no boundaries. Perhaps this might explain why some women become categorized as man-haters. They’ve just dealt with too many assholes.
Not every interaction was abusive. Some people were downright charming. One guy came up to me and said,
“I just wanted to tell you that your robot outfit is AMAZING!”
“Oh, thanks!” I said.
He was a stout little blonde guy with rosy cheeks, flushed from alcohol. He wore a small sleeveless white shirt, which emphasized his rotund belly, and tight capri-style pants. He was very flamboyant, and I’ll just put it that way. Let’s call him Lloyd, since he reminded me of the character Lloyd from Entourage.
“Did you see my friend? He had a cardboard helmet with a pink shirt,” I asked.
Lloyd had no idea who I was talking about, but he bummed me a cigarette, so it wasn’t a complete loss. I followed Lloyd and his friends to a nearby bar. As we walked, Lloyd laid down some game. He flirted while I desperately tried to balance politeness with an urgent need to inform him that I was not gay. Lloyd was a nice guy, he was just barking up the wrong tree.
The problem was it seemed presumptuous of me to just shut him down completely by telling him I was straight. Maybe he was just being friendly. I spent most of the conversation struggling with this dilemma of where to draw the line between being nice and leading him on. This is probably a very familiar scenario for most women.
There was a string of bars a couple blocks over from the parade route and I took the first opportunity to duck away from Lloyd into one of those bars. Sorry, Lloyd.
Inside the bar were lots of scantily clad people in ridiculous outfits. I fit right in. A lot of people recognized me from the parade, so I started asking around if any of them had seen my friend. It was a long shot and, of course, nobody had. I heard a woman yelling to me from across the bar,
“Oh my God, the robot guy! Robot guy, come here!”
It was a chubby brunette in a black blouse standing at the bar looking excited to see me. Her friends, far soberer than she was, must have been irritated with her because as soon as I showed up, they all bailed. Terrible friends.
“Hey, did you see the guy I was marching with? Cardboard helmet, pink shirt?”
“No! Want a shot?”
“Sure.”
Her name was Bella and I think she was my biggest fan. She heaped praise on my outfit: She especially enjoyed the smoke pouring out of the eyes and mouth of the robot helmet and thought that I had somehow fashioned a device to do that. She thought it was hilarious when I told her that I was just smoking weed under the helmet.
She was very handsy with me, but after a severely homoerotic afternoon, I relished the idea of a heterosexual interaction. Bella and I claimed some territory at the bar and chatted for a while. Well, she chatted. I stood there and listened, trying unsuccessfully to join the conversation. I can’t quite remember what we were talking about.
All I remember is watching her mouth move and seeing her hand slapping the bar top every time she finished a point. This seemed to irritate the bartender. At one point she slapped her hand on my bare chest and said,
“Oh my God, you’re so WARM!”
She dramatically pressed both hands against my chest, but lost her balance in the process. She toppled off of her stool and into me. We both went tumbling backwards onto the floor, spilling several drinks and making enough noise to momentarily draw the attention of everybody at the bar. The bartender, who at this point was done with the wildly gesticulating brunette sitting at the corner of her bar, motioned to the doorman. He told us, in a stern way, that we were done and it was time to go.
Bella and I continued talking outside. My friend still wasn’t answering calls and Bella was the only person I had to talk to. I figured, if all else failed, maybe I could just sleep at her apartment. At the very least, I could use her as a shield from gay male attention. I put my arm around her and acted like she was my girlfriend. In reality, I probably just looked like her gay best friend.
A man named Tim joined our conversation. Tim was in his 40s. Unlike the rest of the revelers, he looked completely sober. He was wearing a black button-down and blue jeans, totally out of place given our surroundings. I told Tim what was happening with me. About how my friend and I sneaked into the parade, but now I couldn’t find my friend and I was locked out of his apartment without a change of clothes. Tim thought this was hilarious, which it was.
“Come on guys, let’s grab a drink at my place. I can at least give Jake a t-shirt.”
I weighed my options and concluded that Tim seemed safe. He invited both Bella and me, so he probably wasn’t a rapist. He seemed like a nice guy, and I was desperate for clothes.
We followed him to his apartment, which fortunately was only a short walk away. It was a classy, organized looking place with lots of plants, leather furniture, and an orange cat named Henry. Tim opened a bottle of wine and we all sat and chatted for a while. I remember my back was sticking to the leather couch, but I didn’t want to seem rude by asking for a shirt right away. We chatted for almost an hour. The wine made Tim loose. Turns out, he was gay, which wasn’t really that surprising considering where we met. He also clearly had a crush on me.
As Tim continued to loosen up, he became bolder and more direct with his flirtation towards me. His gaze would linger. He would “absentmindedly” reach out and place a hand on my thigh. Each time, his hand would steadily move closer and closer to my crotch. I was uncomfortable and wanted to leave.
I stood up and made my way to the door.
“I gotta get out of here, guys.”
Bella also stood up.
“Yeah, I should probably go, too.”
Tim tried to salvage the rapidly deteriorating situation,
“Aw, come on guys. Jake, don’t you still need a shirt?”
For a second I wondered, “Is this motherfucker trying to bribe me with clothes?” It sure seemed that way. I considered my options and decided to bail immediately, even if that meant leaving Bella behind. But Tim was already revved up. He stood between me and the door, desperately trying to convince us to stay.
“Wait, how about one more drink?”
Was I going to have to fight this guy? What if I lost…would he rape me?
“I also have board games.”
Scenarios worked their way through my imagination. Me and Bella stood motionless and frowning. Fortunately, now that all of the humor had drained from the room, Tim gave up. He stepped out of the way and motioned us towards the door with a disappointed wave of his hand.
I took the steps several at a time, racing past Bella down the stairwell before bursting out of the building onto the sidewalk outside. The sun had already set. I was still half-naked and alone. I wavered on the sidewalk for a second. Should I wait for Bella? I decided against it and hurried away from the apartment before she came out.
I made my way back to the string of bars from earlier. I was half hoping I would see my friend there, but of course, he was not. Still no answer on his phone. I had to pee, so I went inside of one of the bars that I hadn’t already been kicked out of and headed to the bathroom.
This particular bathroom was arranged as two stalls in the middle of the wall with a urinal on either side. The urinal was down a long narrow passageway, one side was the wall and the other side was the bathroom stall. I relieved myself. When I turned around there was a large man in a flannel shirt and a cowboy hat blocking my way out.
“Hi there.”
He smiled coyly and then started walking towards me. I backed into the urinal.
“Whoa whoa, hold up.”
I held my hands up, feeling the cold rush of panic. After narrowly escaping Tim’s apartment, I was once again being cornered by what I presumed to be a desperately horny man. This one was a stereotypical corn-fed good ol’ boy, albeit a gay one. He stood head and shoulders taller than me, sporting an extra 60 pounds of flab covered muscles. He continued smiling at me with no idea how intimidating he appeared.
He didn’t make any sudden moves. I asked him politely to move, and he did. I’m only telling you about this otherwise insignificant event because of that very first moment of fear. Having a large man look at me with desire, and knowing that if he decided to act on that… I would probably have a bad time of it.
As a guy, this was an unfamiliar situation. I had been in fights before, but those didn’t end in sexual assault if I lost. What if Tim was the same size as this guy? Would he have let me leave? It is very unlikely that anybody was going to rape me. But the possibility was there, in the back of my mind.
I thought back to that moment in the elevator. When that woman repeatedly pressed the door close button. At the time, I thought she was just being a rude bitch.
But now I had lived her perspective. She saw several grown men approaching her, all of us seemed just as big compared to her as this guy was to me. She knew that, most likely, we had nothing but good intentions. But fear is instinctual, and it manifests of its own accord. She decided that there was no fucking way she was going to be stuck in an elevator with several intoxicated grown men, so she tried to shut the door on us. When that didn’t work, she ran away.
I completely understood that reaction. I understood a lot after that day. I had been sexually harassed, I had been on the receiving end of an awkward nice guy’s flirtation. I had men touch me against my will. I had felt the pang of fear as I was cornered in the bathroom by somebody way bigger than me. I felt things that women have probably been feeling since the dawn of humanity. For the first time in my life, I knew what it was like to be the target of male sexual appetite. I did not enjoy it.
Not every interaction I had that day was aggressive, rude, or upsetting. But any positive interactions have faded from memory while these few bad ones remain. I usually tell this story as a sort of ridiculous joke.
What I don’t mention is how it has changed the way I interact with women.
If I’m at the gym, I’m not stealing glances at any woman’s ass, no matter how tight her yoga pants are. I really want to, but I know how it feels to be stared at and I know how conspicuous it is. So I don’t.
I know how sexual harassment feels. I remember how disgusted and indignant I felt as the OHIO guy grabbed my balls and tongue twirled my nipple. I take it seriously now.
I know how challenging it can be to determine where to draw the line between being polite and leading somebody on.
I know the insecure feeling of being in a situation where you’re not entirely sure if you could fight your way out of it.
I sometimes wonder what sort of perspective I would have on life if, instead of just one day, this was every day. Maybe I’m a feminist now.
Anyway, I eventually found my friend. He drunkenly followed some people to their house party. He played about 4 hours of beer pong before coming out of his drunken stupor and realizing that his phone was dead. He called me back and I met up with him at his house. We played Mario Kart.
End of story.
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A version of this previously published on jakeok.com
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