squid

夜の繁華街は、このようなことが横行しています。きっと世界共通のことなのでしょう。さて、The Guardianの記者のブログでは、そのことにまつわる話と意見が載せられています。赤字のsquidを御覧ください。もちろんイカの意味で使われているのではありません。これは、squid boyを意味し、「女性の気持ちに気づくことのできない、社会的な常識が欠落した男性」を指します(記事では、squid, squid boy, slime-creature, ladsなどと表現されています)。

Urban Dictionaryにおける定義を見てみますと、次のようにあります；

A term for any socially inept bastard who fails to recognize when a girl wants on his cock.
http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=Squid%20Boy
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/aug/23/women-stand-up-street-harassment

Let women stand up to harassment from squids on the street
In the end it backfires when well-meaning male companions step in to protect women from unwanted sexual advances

It's late o'clock on Saturday night. Dan, Chris and I have torn ourselves away from a sweaty Brick Lane party in east London and are loping towards the bus stop. We pass a group of three young men, and as we do, one of them extends a tentacle, slithering it over my arse. I say nothing until we're at a safe distance, then I tell the lads what happened. Chris is angry. He turns around and asks which one's the squid. I don't know, I didn't look, it's late, I'm tired, I really couldn't be bothered dealing with any aggro. Chris apologises if he's being paternalistic – it's up to me whether or not to do anything, of course. They're my friends and they're being protective, and protectiveness comes from a good place. I know, because, although it's not immediately obvious, I am being protective, too.

Here's Saturday's plot synopsis from my maternalistic perspective: three dodgy men are walking around east London late on a weekend. One of them wants a fight. He sees two men and a woman approach. What's a good way to set about getting his jollies? Exactly. And I'm not going to see my friends lose some teeth just because some slime-creature touched my bum.

Although protection of the opposite sex in public spaces is often taken to be a male prerogative, women often try to protect men from violence through quiet acceptance of harassment. If I'd been on my own last Saturday, I'd most likely have turned around and hollered horrors at squid-boy until his ink ran dry. By the time I'd finished telling fish-features how stinky he was, he'd have been begging for Oldboy to put him out of his misery. I'm confident behaving like this on my own because, while I'm likely to be groped in public (not even thick leg hair and Dunlop sandals can put some men off), it's a significant boon of femaledom that I'm pretty unlikely to be beaten up.