My Experience With Gender Roles (In Parking Lot Street Fights)

Where I grew up, if you weren’t the alpha male, you had to at least pretend that you were in contention for the title. This posed a great problem for me, as I’m anything but. When alpha males dive headlong into drunken street fights, I prefer to be the omega. I’ll hide, swear to god. The worst beatings I’ve seen occurred after one alpha male took another alpha male’s girlfriend. In the parlance of my neighborhood, “Shit got mad serious.” I’ve seen rivalries over girls span years and, as we all grew older in age if not mind, even decades, which were full of traditional one-on-one fisticuffs and the modern twenty-on-one Philly beatdown. Indeed, shit gets mad serious.

I’ve largely avoided such confrontations. As I’m a terrific liar, I’ve been able to pretend to be a total alpha male without actually becoming one, especially when it came to fighting over so-and-so’s ex-girlfriend. (I’m also talented at making friends with large, violent men; having 300-pound criminals in your corner often helps to deter ruffians.) However I have, on occasion, had to defend myself, and considering my small stature I’m proud to say that I did okay as long as the other guy wasn’t too much bigger than me. Yet I must admit that I’ve been backed down, quite thoroughly, on two non-consecutive instances. By lesbians.

Mind you, I’m not an idiot. I’m well aware that the idea of a skull-cracking “butch” lesbian is mostly an ugly stereotype. In reality, a lesbian doesn’t have to be a “butch” to crack a skull. My skull, to be specific.

One night at the bar, I met a very sexy female. I was excited because this girl was bisexual. Her bisexuality combined with my alcohol-and-opiate-fueled intoxication left me so excited at the prospect of banging a bisexual girl (with the idea that I might, just might, have been able to get another girl to join us) that I totally forgot that the bisexual girl’s ex-girlfriend was at the bar.

The ex wasn’t large, and wasn’t “butch”. She was actually a very nice girl and, at least back then, I could say that we were friends. The ex left the bar, unaware that I was courting the bisexual girl. The bisexual and I flirted for an hour before she asked me to drive her home. What I didn’t realize was that this particular bar apparently had a clandestine syndicate of like-minded lesbians. I knew there were other lesbians at this bar (I considered myself friends with these girls, too) but I wasn’t aware of how loyal they were to the ex. I also wasn’t aware that they were totally into streetfights, just as much as any drunken Irish 22-year-old male in my neighborhood.

As I drove the bisexual home, we stopped for a pack of cigarettes. I didn’t notice that a car had followed us. Initially, I thought it was a coincidence that all of the lesbians I knew from the bar had also stopped for cigarettes, and I had no idea that I was in dire straits until I saw the ex emerge from the car…with a baseball bat.

Needless to say, I didn’t get laid that night. Luckily I’m not breathing out of a tube right now. But only for the grace of God, and all that crap. Shit almost got mad serious, but I cut my losses, figured that I almost banged a really hot bisexual, and scurried away like a mouse through a crack in a wall. Later, the ex apologized to me, and I accepted that apology. As I said, the ex was a very nice girl, and I continue to believe that today, as long as she’s not wielding a Louisville. Also, I’ll never approach any girl that has anything to do with her, no matter how attractive, as I value my health and continued existence more than sex.

Months later I met another girl. She was a teacher. I was amazed that I even got her number, let alone began dating her, since she wasn’t from my neighborhood. Mind you, my neighborhood is almost like a closed universe, a little pocket of civilization uniquely or own, where large men with mile-long rap sheets have no qualms about getting drunk and singing karaoke on Saturday nights. I rarely leave my neighborhood even today, and I don’t see much reason to do so, as so many of us neighborhood guys do. Yet this teacher broad was from a different universe, a far and alien neighborhood that was an unthinkable ten-minute drive from my own. Her friends had done no jail time, nor had any of them been threatened by baseball bat-wielding lesbians.

I showed this teacher broad off to all my friends. They were amazed that I had found a normal chick, one who hadn’t been raised on street corners as we had. Her friends were strange; they all had college degrees. Yet then I met the teacher broad’s closest friend, a hulking menace with fire hydrants for forearms, a woman with the build and girth of an offensive lineman. The menace seemed to like me at first, as long as the teacher broad was around. Then (and I still haven’t been able to purge this nightmare from my psyche) we had some alone time at the bar, while the teacher broad was off making a phone call.

The menace recounted her childhood. I discovered that unlike the rest of the teacher broad’s friends, the menace was born and raised in my neighborhood. At first I thought this was great; the menace was best friend’s with my teacher broad, so I figured I’d score some points by being a neighborhood guy. But the menace didn’t care. As she slugged two shots of Jack, she turned to me with a look that I can only describe as embodying everything that’s dark and evil in the world, and said, “Watch your step, or shit’ll get mad serious.”

Indeed.

Later, while lying in my bed watching a movie, I asked the teacher broad if she realized that the menace had a crush on her. Teacher broad said, “Yeah, I know. She tried to finger bang me once.” Suddenly I found myself profoundly jealous. Mind you, I’ve dated girls who, while not self-proclaimed bisexuals, have had drunken flings with their girlfriends. This was different. I didn’t care that the menace was female. The alpha male came out of me, even when teacher broad explained that once she told the menace that she didn’t dig chicks, the menace promptly stopped the attempted fingerbombing.

I won’t get into details about what happened after, as I still fear for my well being, but I confronted the menace, quite drunkenly, and almost had my neck broken. My relationship with the teacher broad ended a month or so later (she really hated that I wrote for Lib Porn).

Out of these two encounters, I’ve come to realize something about gender, sexuality, and gender roles. I believe that gender and sexuality are very important aspects of our humanity and society, and we should work to better understand our gender and sexuality, and that of others. However, these roles, and our preconceived notions of them, are pretty fuckin’ meaningless in a street fight. I no longer think about the possibility of “shit getting mad serious” around a pack of alpha males. I now think about that possibility around a pack of alpha persons.