Tuesday 29 January 2008

A Woman's Right



A woman has the right to walk away.

A woman has the right to turn round and say no.

No man has the right to stop her.

A woman has the right to say 'Don't contact me again'.

And a man must leave it at that. He must get over it.
He has no right to continue to hound her.

He has no right to try and destroy her, simply because she wanted to walk away from him.
He has no right to make her frightened of leaving by holding over her the fact he knows things about her past which could harm her reputation.

He has no right to make insinuations about her and follow round after her making her life a misery.

He must accept that people move on. That not all things are meant to be.
If he ever truly cared, he would understand. He would let her go and wish her well.

Some birds are not meant to be caged.

A woman may find comfort in spending time with a man and say things they later regret. She may find her life changes and now she no longer needs him, or wants him in her life. A bright future beckons, in which he has no part.

A man must accept that. He has no right to be bitter and spiteful about it.

And he would certainly have no right to destroy that future, simply because she chose not to spend it with him.

And there are men out there who do not see these points. There are men out there who are so blinded by what they think is love, they do not really get love.
Love means wanting what is best for the other person EVEN WHEN, what is best, is the other person never hearing from them again.

And a man who understands love, would not be bitter about that.

There are men who will not let a woman go. And we all understand that sometimes, a woman dare not tell a man she wants to go, because she is frightened of what he will do.
And she knows that the man will not let her go, because he cannot see that the situation they are in is destructive, that the two of them are poison to eachother.

She knows that he will assume there is someone else, his pride will refuse to accept that she has no hidden lover, that she just wants out. She cannot take it any more. She cannot take the pressure, the strain, the jealousy, the constant apprehension of how the other party is going to react.

She just wants to wake up one day and him not be there in her life.

We accept all that. We understand that women can feel intimidated by the man they are trapped with, that they dare not speak out.

And should she go, he will cry to the world that she is a whore, a manipulator, a liar, a deceiver.

He will follow her, lie about her to her friends. He will not accept her choice, she will pay for jilting him.

And we do not accept as an excuse for his behaviour that she broke his heart. We do not accept the fact that he is still in love with her as an excuse for his hounding of her.
Let her go, we say. Grow up, be a man.

Anything less is unacceptable.

'But I want answers' he cries. 'I want closure.'
But she doesn't want to talk to you, we say. We can understand why she just cannot face it.

She dreads every second she hears his voice, fears every e-mail from him.

And if we looked further and saw that the man was many years older than her, that she had only recently come out of a terrifying ordeal when they first met, and that really, she had been confused about her feelings in the first place, then we'd certainly say;

'Let her go. You were there at a certain time in her life. But she is not for you and you are not for her. It was an illusion you both got trapped in.'

And a man who truly loved her would understand. Broken hearted as he was, he would realise that her wounds were starting to heal, and now he must let her fly. He would sigh and remember her, maybe with a slight pang in his heart as he remembered the false dream he had of them growing old together, but then he would see her in a new light, a bird with a broken wing whom he nursed back to flight.

He would maybe watch her from afar and smile.

He certainly wouldn't want to draw back his sling and shoot her out of flight.

Such a man, would not have nursed her because he loved her, he would have nursed her simply to cage her.

A woman always the right to say 'Please leave me be. Let us now lead separate lives. I'd like you out of mine.'

And no matter much it might break a man's heart, he must just leave it that. He must make no attempt to contact her again. Once she asked for contact to end, it is up to her to decide whether or not to re-ignite it. He must retreat to the sidelines and accept her choice.

And it is not his business to follow her round, watching her relations with other men.
She has moved on, so must he.

We know all these things are true.

Now read the post again, but reverse the gender roles.

Men have rights too.

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

Fair enough too!

Anonymous said...

I have done all those things you say a man should do when a relationship is over, even though it was a 17 year long marriage.. can I have a badge please?

Anonymous said...

True. It cut both ways.

Anonymous said...

Your last sentence was going to be my comment, Crushed!

Anonymous said...

As with Welshcakes.

I've always been good at 'letting go'. I fail to see why people don't get 'letting go' - failure to do so is theft of a kind... possibly the worst kind because it is theft of time and life.

On the other hand - people hurt. They hurt so badly. If only they understood that there is little to be afraid of in 'letting go' and much to be made in dignity and self-respect. It hurts less in the long run too.

Anonymous said...

Betty- I think so. But apparently, we're not allowed to say 'Don't call me.'

Mutley- Mutley, the satisfaction that you behaved perfectly correctly, should be enough :)

Jams- Yes, it should do. To some it doesn't.
Some people still think a man who changes his mind is an emotional abuser.

Welshcakes- :) The last sentence was maybe obvious from the first...
At least,it was in my head all the way through.

E-K- I think unfortunately, women do think they have a right to behave badly when things don't go their way. It is one of the few negatives of feminism.

The only girl I everv loved walked into my room at Uni, I walked up to het to kiss her and she said 'I think we should stop seing eachother.'
I asked why. She said 'Leave it.' and walked out.

Sure , I got angry. I was 19. I went and threw a load of glasses at the kitchen wall, went on a drinking spree, went for a swim in the sea, behaved like a tit for three days.

But that was being a tit, and I was 19.

Sometimes, you don't want to drag things out 'I've discovered over time, I find your personality unbearavle', isn't something like to hear. But very often, that's the truth.

And you're right, the sooner you move on, the better. at the end of the day, these things are just not that important.

The world contains 6 billion people, to get upset by one person asking not to hear from you again, is no big deal.

Anonymous said...

It is true about all people. I hope things still aren't so messy for you.