Stanzi made this as a skit basically: https://youtube.com/shorts/9MdYx9vFnYU
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NGL, this comment under the video is 🔥!
It's less dangerous to be lost in the woods with no help at all than it is to be in a club with a man upset you'd choose the bear.
Bears generally avoid people. They're naturally afraid of humans, which makes them pretty safe. Things are different when bears become familiar and comfortable around people, or discover that humans are a source of food. Then they get close to people which makes them much more of a threat.
By contrast, strange men are not naturally afraid of people, and most have learned that humans are a source of food. That makes strange men far more dangerous. Pick the bear every time.
also I want to see a bear
I've seen them. Black, grizzly and polar.
They're gorgeous animals, but ... I prefer seeing them from a distance, thank you very much. 😜
I've only seen in zoos :(
I've been reading manga on a site that allows comments after each chapter and holy shit @ the comments any time a female character is in a role even slightly villainous, or even if there's a possibility she might be interested in anyone other than the male protagonist. Comments calling for rape, torture, murder... It even happens in romance genre mangas, where the stakes should only be as high as "will they get together and navigate their issues?"
It's no wonder women choose the bear because with some men, they are one misunderstanding away from the man who supposedly loves them wondering if he "needs" to get extremely violent with them. And somehow they convince themselves that "love" is involved.
"I've never been sexually assaulted by a bear" tends to shut this BS down pretty fast in my experience.
Tragic but valid point. Plus more women are killed by men than bears....
Still choosing the bear! But I think the point of this comic might be lost in the exaggeration...
I’d choose the bear, cus they avoid humans, and with certain types of bears, you can make yourself look bigger than them to scare them away (don’t think you can do that with a man)
He specifically says "strange" man.
I don't know that I'd pick that over the wild animals of the forest even as a guy.
In the middle of a forest, the only other humans I'd feel 100% safe running into are ones I already know.
It is truly amazing to me how few people understand even the elementary aspects of risk management.
A known danger is easier to manage than an unknown one.
Bears are dangerous, but largely predictable. They usually don't go after humans at all (and indeed usually go the other direction). And if they seem angry, there's simple things you can do (it rhymes with "back away slowly" because identical rhymes are still rhymes) that will defuse the situation almost immediately.
Men are for the most part decent human beings. Most men you meet will not be monsters. The problem is that there's really no way to distinguish the monsters from the decent men until it's way too late. And extricating yourself from an interaction with a strange man in the forest is not as straightforward as it is for a bear. Backing away slowly might work, or it might trigger that silicon chip inside their brain and slip it to "overload" and make them get angry that you don't trust them. And the penalty for making a bad choice is serious bodily harm as the good outcome. There are worse ones after that.
So just from straightforward risk assessment it's better to meet a bear in the woods than a strange man. Because a bear is more predictable and easier to manage.
Yep, in North America, that works with black bears, generally.
Not brown/grizzly/kodiak bears though, as drawn in the comic.
They'll just maul you to death.
...
If you are in forests, in areas you're generally likely to encounter any kind of bear in the wild:
With black bears, if they are not with cubs...
...you puff yourself up and shout at them to indimidate them, assuming they are approaching you, and you can scare them off.
If they do attack, the general recommendation is to fight back. Aim for the eyes and snout, and usually they'll retreat.
With brown bears, if they are not with cubs...
...you can wave your hands and talk a normal volume to indicate you are a human and not their common prey... and often they will stand up on their hind legs to scan for, and identify you, and then just avoid you...
... but sometimes they won't, and they will now aggro on you. Brown/kodiak/grizzlies are generally much more aggressive than black bears, and are more likely to attack you.
Also, don't scream shout or shriek at them, thats more likely to make them think you are prey, or that you are trying to intimidate them, which will anger them.
If they do attack you, the advice is play dead.
If you fight back, without some seriously powerful firearms, you'll die.
Even if you do shoot them multiple times with high powered rounds, sometimes, even often, they'll still kill you.
The advice is to play dead, because more people who've been in such an attack encounter who've played dead have survived than those that fought.
Its not guaranteed to work, just better odds.
If you encounter any kind of bear, and they are with their cubs, GTFO as fast and as quietly as you can, without breaking into a sprint, and always keeping your eyes on them.
Any kind of bear is much more likely to be much more aggressive when with their cubs.
...
Also I have found that screaming at, and making aggressive postures and gestures toward men does in fact scare a good number off them off.
Broken up a few bar fights and gotten some guys roofying drinks out of bars that way.
...
Everyone in this thread treating brown and black bears as equivalent, largely predictable threats... does not actually know enough about bears to know how to predict their behavior.
It's fun watching how many people aren't reading the rules before they comment.
Rule #1 isn't all that unclear.
Sorry for all the trolling everyone, and massive thanks to admins who've been protecting us you're amazing 👏
I really am very sorry for posting this at some level. I thought it was a good take on the thought experiment (further enhanced by some pretty nifty artwork). But really, just mentioning the meme is enough to get all the CHUDs out of the sewers and into the comments and I should have known better.
No victim blaming in our group ZDL! It's not your fault at all , it's not 1% your fault.
Men's responses to the "man or bear" question perfectly illustrate the point of the question but they just. Don't. Understand. That.
It's not necessarily that a woman is answering the question "man or bear?", it's that everyone in the conversation when she does so can answer "do you respect me or what I have to say at all?" and the answer from men is often a resounding "no!" A bear would just accept someone's answer as her answer and leave it at that.
The real beliefs I think a lot of the people responding secretly hold:
This bear in particular is maybe not much better than a dude. He's gettin a little handsy.
Edit: Oh this is not 196, ignore. But everyone please keep in mind this community does not allow participation by men.
Also, I will still ban misogyny.
this community does not allow participation by men.
Also, I will still ban misogyny.
...
My thing with the man and bear has always come down to motivations. If a bear rapes me, it's because it's horny. If a bear mauls me, it's because it's scared or defending its territory. If a bear eats me, it's because it's hungry. Dominance and cruelty will not come into it. The bear will not keep me alive in its basement.
The other thing is that bears don't lie. You might not understand their language, but they absolutely will not act like they're friendly and safe only to lure you or groom you. If it wants to kill you, it'll just do it without any fucked-up mind games.
I haven't posted here before because I'm never sure how to feel about gendered spaces, but this particular issue is one of those ones where I can't help but identify as a woman. I think it's probably all the trauma. :D
Those are really good points. I particularly like what you said about lying, a bear won't lie, deceive and gaslight people afterwards to discredit you.
God, having recently gone through this, you have no idea how reassuring it is to read stuff like this; it helps reaffirm that it wasn't my fault and that it's relatively common for predators to be good at convincing people of their side.
(Also, she taught me that even women suck. Really fucking cool. Possibly the only time where I've questioned someone's gender due to the fact that being around her started to feel like I was around a wolf in sheep's clothing)
They really are, they work like a magician convincing everyone that up is down and black is white. It's so subtle and effective
I really like this comic and sadly it's true. I know nothing about bears and I'm physically disabled so I'm gonna pick the man. I can talk to him, and I know a bit about men but the bear I'm fucked.
Really cute art style here, I love the pooh-bear thing at the end. It's the man that asks for the honey, heh.
I feel like this thought experiment is a shiri's scissor. My take on this is that the worst humans are more dangerous than a wild bear. Here's the quantitative version: what percentile of dangerousness in man would you pick over the bear? For me, I would switch from man to bear at the 90% percentile -- I think the 10% worst men are a riskier proposition than the bear.
Point is you don't know whether the man is a good one or not when you bump into him.