I dare not offer my train seat to a woman

After a pregnant writer lambasted selfish men ...

Recently, I was sitting on a crowded train when I spotted a woman standing further down the carriage. In her 40s, she looked as if she was wilting in the heat. I did what I thought was the decent thing and offered her my seat.

Given that commuter trains tend to be silent, all eyes turned to me. So when she turned me down, with barely a smile of acknowledgment, it was mortifying.

In Femail magazine a couple of weeks ago, natasha Pearlman, who is eight months pregnant, wrote about how shocked she had been by the lack of consideration now given to pregnant women by men in Britain, especially on public transport.

A man had been rude to her for walking too slowly and holding him up as she made her way through a london tube station, and he wasn’t the least bit remorseful either when she confronted him over it.

She also recounted a recent experiment carried out by a blogger who wore a fake pregnancy bump to test how many people would offer her a seat. not many was the conclusion.

natasha’s piece sparked a fierce online debate as to whether a pregnant woman should expect a man to offer her his seat, or indeed any special consideration. Many felt strongly that chivalry was now dead and men were simply more rude and selfish these days.

But I can explain why many men no longer stand for women and will feel defensive if they are taken to task over it. It’s the fact that so often when we do offer women any sort of assistance, we are treated as if we have given them a patronising pat on the head, insulted them or — worse still — are planning to assault them.

Being treated like a predator, or as if I have emerged from the Dark Ages, means I am increasingly wary about offering help to women, and I am far from alone.

Recently I was passing through Waterloo station in london when I spotted a young woman in her 20s, with a pram, about to head down some steps.

I know how difficult it can be manoeuvring a buggy on public transport. I once nearly lost my daughter and her pushchair in a perilously large gap between a train and the platform. So I caught up with the woman and suggested I carry her pram downstairs. Maybe it was my age (57), or the fact that I materialised from nowhere that alarmed her. Or maybe she thought I was suggesting she was weak and feeble.

Suffice to say, my offer to help induced a horrified expression. I was only trying to help but she made me feel like a creep.

Recently, a female friend complained that two men had failed to help her when she fell as she got off a tube train. But if we are repeatedly made to feel like a nuisance, how can women be surprised if we don’t do the right thing when it’s really needed?

AccORDInG

to natasha, if men don’t offer a seat to a pregnant woman they are rude and selfish. yet as I know, most of the time, offering a seat or help results in embarrassment.

While I have given up a seat to a grateful expectant mother, I’ve also had a heavily pregnant woman insist on lifting heavy boxes, even after I volunteered to do it for her. later I heard her lamenting about having to carry things.

It’s almost as if women don’t want help, but they still do want men to feel bad.

to me it was just old-fashioned good manners of the sort instilled into me by my father. Perhaps that makes me a rare breed these days, but 50 years ago this behaviour was the norm and I don’t think I should be treated as a pariah for continuing the courtesy.

It also neatly illustrates how men are damned if they do offer, and damned if they don’t. Women don’t want our help — until they do — and somehow men are expected to be mind-readers.

What I’ve also noticed is that women will gladly accept help from other women and, as often happens, give each other that knowing look that means ‘ we’re in this together’ and ‘ men will never understand’.

you’d assume surely they can’t expect to have it both ways. except that seems to be the case. Who can blame us for being brusque if we are accused of being rude and insensitive, when our attempts to be helpful and thoughtful go unacknowledged?