“Not being assertive enough to ask someone politely to move over the crisis facing feminism today.”
“If these feminists want their voices heard then for the love of Madokami use that voice to tell the other person to move. It’s not that hard.”
Manslation: If I actually had an incredibly rare medical condition that caused me serious discomfort unless I sat with my legs at such a wide angle as to impinge on the woman sitting next to me, I could ask for permission before doing it. Because just speaking up is not that hard, right? I’m certainly not taking advantage of the way women are expected to avoid confrontation, or of the very real threat to women of being harassed, beaten, raped, or murdered that they have to mentally weigh every time they confront a man.
Keeping our legs apart its way more comfortable due to our hip bones and shit being different than that of women, making it less pleasant for us to put them straight closed together. Very few times people are actually gonna be taking up a large amount of space on public transport for no reason.
It seems you missed the billion or so fucking memos about this, so I’ll fill you in: Not one single stranger riding the bus with you gives 2 fucks about your comfort. I certainly don’t, and I don’t expect you to care about mine, but I do expect you to respect that every person has the same right to public space that you do, and you do not have the right to take up more than you need. When you are in public sometimes you must deal with some discomfort for the sake of courtesy to your fellow passengers, especially in crowded situations, which aren’t pleasant for anyone. Most of us accept and deal with this quietly as an expected part of adult (human) life. Funnily enough, it’s only been men I’ve seen who have insisted that their testicular comfort should come before other peoples’ equal rights to public space.
As I’ve said elsewhere, nobody’s asking you to superglue your thighs together; hip or shoulder width apart is fine. I swear to god, cis men hear “don’t splay your legs as wide as possible” and think I’m telling them they need to cut their junk off. And no, it’s not “very few times”; I and other commenters on our manspreading posts see this on a daily basis on crowded public transit.
Oh, and about your fatphobic tag “tbh fat people are a larger problem on public transport”, fat people are not a “problem,” thanks. We have a right to ride buses, trains, and planes without people like you acting like it’s an issue. Just like everyone else, we are allowed to take up the space we need, but not more than we need.
I see this at least twice a week on the subway (2/3 train)– guys sitting with their legs apart at ~100-110 degree angles.
