AUGUST 14 — I’ve long been a proponent for better public transport so I joined a Facebook group where I thought I would find like-minded Malaysians.
While I did get important updates on rail announcements, I also had to deal with the species I call “Men upset that the MRT Women’s Coach exists”.
They appear like clockwork at least once a month, complaining about seeing women in the non-women’s only coaches while leaving the women’s coaches empty.
Then they will say that until RapidKL increases the frequency and availability of coaches, the coaches must be removed and someone even ran a poll to see what people thought about the coaches.
It’s like every month just seeing the coaches fills them with rage when they should really be making sure they don’t miss their stop.
In the poll, many chose the option that the coaches be scrapped as “everyone pays the same” and “no special treatment”.
I had to restrain myself from making my usual snarky comments.
What amazes me the most is the fact that women’s coaches exist because of men, but the ones complaining about them are also men.
Of course men won’t complain because the average man doesn’t have to worry if a strange woman is following them too closely on an unlit path after dark.
Of course men won’t know what it’s like to be crushed in a crowd on a train and feel a strange hand touching you without permission.
Of course men won’t experience what I did, waiting for a bus, then hearing the loud noises of a man unmistakably masturbating on a platform right above me.
According to the latest statistics from the Penang Women Centre for Change, a woman is raped approximately every 35 minutes and that’s just rape, not even counting molest, men exposing themselves or harassment.
Is it so wrong that women would like just one safe space in a place that has been proven to be dangerous for women, in a way it’s not dangerous for men?
You would think that the need for a separate train coach would be some wakeup call for men to think about gender-based violence.
Instead men are whining that they too need a men’s coach because if women want equality, then men deserve their own special coaches too so it’s “fair”.
Before the “not all men” start chiming in, again, I repeat, a woman is raped nearly every 35 minutes and it’s obvious it’s not just one man, now is it?
There are enough men being menaces that women’s coaches unfortunately have to exist so that should reflect on men and the pervasiveness of gender-based violence.
Telling women to just stay home so they can avoid men entirely is ridiculous because in that vein, don’t we lock people up for being a danger to society?
If we go that route wouldn’t that mean preemptively locking up most men until they can demonstrate they’re not perverts?
Women’s coaches are needed, so my advice to men: suck it up and maybe tell other men to keep their hands to themselves.
* This is the personal opinion of the columnist.
