Staring Turns The Stared At Into An Object

Simon King

Something catches your eye and you look. Everybody does it. It’s not an action that requires a lot of time.Looking is a quick thing. You see something, you recognise it, and then you decide if you’re going to interact with it or go on to looking at something else.

Everybody looks, it’s natural. It’s part of what makes going outside and walking around fun.

You’re walking down the street and you see a person. Male or female, it’s someone you find attractive. You look at them, that’s how you know whether you find them attractive or not.

Enough books, poems and songs have been written about looking at someone and finding them attractive, but what are you going to do once you’ve seen them?

Are you going to walk over and start up a conversation, are you going to move onto looking at something else, or are you going to stare?

Because staring isn’t looking. It’s longer, It’s creepy, it’s invasive. Staring cancels out any interaction between two people.

There’s not going to be any dialogue where staring is involved, just one person standing while the other watches. It turns the stared at into an object. There’s no exchange.

There’s a great video here (link to http://mustbol.in/video-blog/caught)  about staring. It’s funny but it’s also true. Nothing makes you feel more self-conscious of unwelcome staring than receiving an unwelcome stare yourself. It makes you feel like a thing, like a coin on the ground, like a sign in a shop.

Nobody wants that. So the next time you’ve already looked at someone and you feel like staring, how about you make the decision to start up a conversation or go off and look at something else instead?

Do you agree with the blog post? Or maybe not? Must Bol is an interactive space and we will love to hear from you in the comments section...