Dr. Pamela Gurley-Respect Her Choice

Show Transcript

Dr. Pamela Gurley: Respect Her Choice

[00:00:00] Bob Gatty: Hey guys, it's a common experience for a woman to look a man in the eye and tell him no. Regardless of her reason,. No should be a simple word that carries little weight beyond the moment. Unfortunately, for too many women, simply saying no can put them at risk of verbal abuse, online harassment, even physical violence.

[00:00:27] Our guest today, Dr. Pamela Gurley, says such toxic behavior needs to stop. Why do some men react negatively to rejection and why is it important to call out this toxic behavior. Dr. Gurley's with us today to explain. So stay with us. 

[00:00:47] We're thrilled to have Dr. Gurley as a contributing writer to our Lean to the Left blog site, something that evolved after she appeared as a guest on this podcast last year. She's a content strategy expert, international speaker, and world renowned, bestselling author who understands the power of words. As the founder and CEO of Clark and Hill Enterprise, I am Dr. Gurley, and founder president of the Brown Girl and Brown Boy Literacy Foundation, she's on a mission to empower, grow, transform and motivate others.. Gurley also is the author of the popular multilingual Brown Girl and Brown Boy children's book series. She's a retired U. S. Army veteran and holds a B. A. in Psychology, a Master's in Health Service Administration, and a Doctorate in Management. So Dr. Pam Gurley, thanks for joining us today on the Lean to the Left podcast. 

[00:01:51] Dr. Pamela Gurley: Thank you for having me back again. I feel like a correspondent almost. 

[00:01:56] Bob Gatty: You are. You're really a go to person for me, and I do appreciate it.

[00:02:00] And I love the blogs you write for Lean to the Left, and I hope you guys, if you haven't seen them, she does them roughly once a month. We don't have a real deadline. She just does them when she can, but generally it's about once a month and they're always really good. So check them out. Now Dr. Pam talk to me a little bit about this issue of rejection and the reasons why some men take it so damn badly.

[00:02:29] Dr. Pamela Gurley: You know this question. I feel like it's somewhat difficult because I'm not a man. I feel like sometimes I'm speculating because I don't want every man to feel like I'm speaking to him, but I do feel like from experience and personal knowledge. I feel like men take rejection from women so badly because it triggers like deep stated fear that they're not good enough or that they failed in some kind of way.

[00:02:56] I think also it can be so intense that it overshadows. If you already have low self esteem or psychological issues, I feel like rejection can excerbate those things. And so I think we have to look at that as one of the defining factors of why men become aggressive or demeaning when women say no.

[00:03:19] Bob Gatty: Have you had experience yourself where this has happened? 

[00:03:23] Dr. Pamela Gurley: Yes, and I would like to say I was that I've never been stalked, but I actually have and not even from, and it was a military senior enlisted person. And I remember I would never forget it because he called my phone and I didn't even give him my phone number, and he was saying I'm driving around looking for your house.

[00:03:43] And I'm thinking this is insane. So I called another colleague of mine and I did at the time I was a family advocacy program educator. So one of the things that I did education on was domestic violence and whatnot. So I was very, and I worked closely with law enforcement, so it wasn't unfamiliar to his behavior.

[00:04:01] Him being military, cause I worked in a military community. Okay, but I thought it was just very unusual. So when I called, I'm thinking to myself, this is crazy. So then she came over, but I also let him know because at that time I was armed. I lived in Georgia. It's very easy to get weapons.

[00:04:17] You didn't really need a license. And so I let him know you pull up to my house. Here's what's going to happen. But he didn't know where I live and he just said he was driving around. So I think that, that experience alone, let it, let me know that there's men out there that take, no as a way to just say, Oh, she's not that serious.

[00:04:40] Or maybe if I continue to be persistent, that's not flattery. So yeah. But I did notify law enforcement and I notified his chain of command. 

[00:04:50] Bob Gatty: You were not in the military at that time. It was this guy that was in the military. 

[00:04:55] Dr. Pamela Gurley: Yes, he was the first sergeant in the military. 

[00:04:57] Bob Gatty: Yeah, and you were working in a military community, you said.

[00:05:02] Yes. That's how he got to know you, is that it? 

[00:05:06] Dr. Pamela Gurley: Yes, I did a lot of training for military out at their units, and so I was meeting a lot of people and that's just the norm. But that one was oddly the only experience that I had that had to escalate that bad. Normally I think they know I'm not interested and most men will just leave.

[00:05:26] Okay. 

[00:05:28] Bob Gatty: So talk to me a little bit about the issue of ego and entitlement. Is that what's behind all of this? Or is it when you say no to them, is it considered a threat to their masculinity? What the hell is it? 

[00:05:44] Dr. Pamela Gurley: You know what? I don't know. That's even more of a tough question to ask. I would say this, though.

[00:05:48] I think some experts suggest that societal expectation around masculinity and manhood play a role. And then also, societal norms have long perpetrated the idea that men should pursue women, and then historically men have harbored in my opinion. Not all here again, I'm saying that they harbor a misogynistic thought that they should have what they want.

[00:06:13] And no matter what, that's what it is. And especially in, if you are in a relationship with someone, because stalking is not just for people that you don't know, and you try to depart that relationship and a man say, no, you're only mine. No one else can have you. And you can't move on because he's stalking your every move.

[00:06:30] That's still a part of it. Although that's considered and crossed over into domestic violence. But that's still stalking where that thought in their mind should say if nobody can't have you, I only can and it can sometimes feel like a personal attack on his masculinity. I don't know if I would throw ego in there.

[00:06:50] Because ego is one thing, and then going further to actually stalk is something totally different, in my opinion, when we talk about psychological breakdowns when in terms of personality. If that makes sense. 

[00:07:04] Bob Gatty: Yeah, I don't know. It struck me that probably ego does have something to do with this. I've never been in this kind of a situation, quite frankly, but I can see where, if let's say the guy is a big shot football star, right?

[00:07:22] And you're in college and this guy. This guy is trying to put the moves on you and you tell him, no, I'm not interested, but he's a big shot. Say he's a quarterback on the football team. He's not used to being told no. He's got an ego. He's got a, he's got a infatuated opinion of himself.

[00:07:43] Don't you think this is part of what goes on sometimes? 

[00:07:46] Dr. Pamela Gurley: The reason why I say that ego comes out of it, ego is one thing like saying, yeah, I can get her, I can get her, I can get her, but you're crossing over to other personality disorders. When you start getting possessive, when you are obsessive in that nature, that's you're coming out of just something, someone that's being egotistical saying that I can have every woman because every man that has a inflated, I'll say inflated ego because of money or expensive things that they have.

[00:08:14] That's not, you can feed that, but you can't, you wouldn't want to feed someone who is egotistical and then he's narcissistic or he's obsessive or he has possessive and control issues. So I feel like ego was on a very low end where you start talking about stalking, you start going several layers up.

[00:08:37] Bob Gatty: Yeah you you point out in a blog, you wrote for the lean to the left blog site. And some men do turn into stalkers and you just mentioned stalkers a minute ago. How should women handle this? I know what you did. You, you told the guy, get the hell away from me.

[00:08:55] And you got in touch with his superiors because he was in the military, but in, in a non military situation, what should women do if they're being stalked by some dude like that?

[00:09:06] You should call the cops or what? 

[00:09:08] Dr. Pamela Gurley: Immediately you'd like to, but if you doesn't, if you don't have any proof, then it's he can say no, it's not, I'm not stalking her or anything else like that. So I was recording everything, any emails, any text messages, phone calls, any, anytime he pops up where you're at and we're in a day and age where we can carry phones.

[00:09:29] If you're lucky to get multiple recordings of somebody, Advancing or pursuing you and have proof. It's a lot easier to go and say, this person has been stalking me. I have this laundry list of stuff. I, and unfortunately, sometimes that's too late. Some, a lot of instances, things are reactive versus proactive when it comes to stalking, because they don't, they're not believed the first time without that evidence.

[00:09:55] And unfortunately. We have seen in the news and all of these other things. And like I said, at when I worked for the military, I was a domestic violence family advocacy program educator. So a lot of stuff comes across. Sometimes it's too late, sometimes stalking, and a woman has tried to report it, but there was no evidence.

[00:10:15] And next thing you know, the only way we're hearing about it and that she was stalked is after he's taken her life or caused injury. 

[00:10:22] Bob Gatty: Now, are there situations where, without recorded evidence, like you're just describing, where the cops tend to just not believe the woman, tend to side with the man, with the perpetrator in these cases?

[00:10:41] Dr. Pamela Gurley: Oh, yeah. I think when you talk about police officers, and I don't know if you've seen the video that's circulating about the police officer in Seattle, who was making a mockery out of a a 26 year old woman being hit by another a police officer, and he said she's only 26 years old like basically pair out $11, 000, she has no value. It's exactly what he said she has no value. He was recorded on his vest. Is that the kind of police officer that you would feel comfortable going to? Yeah, so when you have police officers that already look down to, especially she was a minority, minority women, and not assigning her any value, it doesn't make me feel like you're gonna believe me if I come to you with no evidence or I call you out to my residence and I really don't have any proof. You're not going to believe me. And if if somebody who was talking to his boss on the phone is making a mockery out of a woman's death, what do you think that they're going to say about me? And I'm over here saying that I'm being stalked. 

[00:11:48] Bob Gatty: Yeah. So your advice to women would be what record these conversations, 

[00:11:55] Dr. Pamela Gurley: get all the evidence that you can, the other thing is we have to not mistake flattery for stalking.

[00:12:04] You can't be flattered because somebody is constantly calling constantly texting, especially if you don't really want it or you're ignoring it or you're not responding and they're getting aggressive. That's a sign that this is not flattering anymore. And these are things that you should be taking snapshots of not just deleting it oh I'm going to delete it because I don't want to see it.

[00:12:24] No, you just take a snapshot before you delete it because there's timestamps. And make sure when you take a screenshot that there's time stamps on the actual text messaging, or if you are looking at Facebook messages or any kind of social media messaging that goes on behind the scenes, make sure that there's time stamps, because those are going to matter and give a timeline of what of all the incidents.

[00:12:50] And if you never say no, sometimes you are leading this person on. So at least one of those chats, you should say I don't want to talk, please do not call me anymore, or of something of the sort, because sometimes there is power in no, and there's no power in silence. 

[00:13:07] Bob Gatty: Yeah, that's a good point.

[00:13:09] Do you believe that should women, record a video of of incidents where somebody is trying to do this? 

[00:13:20] Dr. Pamela Gurley: Absolutely. Yeah. Absolutely. Give what you can that you feel is going to support your claim. Yeah, showing up empty handed and just with somebody saying this person is stalking me, right?

[00:13:35] Because this person can go and say, I've never been to her house. I've never did this. And if they're not looking into it, and they have to have a cause to look into 

[00:13:42] Bob Gatty: it. 

[00:13:43] Yeah. What needs to happen, Pam, to ease this kind of situation, reduce the risk for women? And the next part of that question is, how can men be held accountable for this kind of behavior?

[00:13:56] Dr. Pamela Gurley: Oh, that's like a million dollar question because stalking is still so prevalent out there. And it's posing a lot of significant risk for women, not just physically, but mentally. And I'm talking physical because they're lacking sleep or they're scared or anything else it's going to affect their mental health.

[00:14:15] And I feel like there's no magic wand to eliminate that behavior. But I do think that intervention can mitigate some of the negative impacts that they have. And what I mean by that is like raising awareness for the seriousness of stalking. Like one of the things that I just said, be in the chat and say no, because silence sometimes does not work.

[00:14:36] Or silence does not say no. Silence does not mean no to somebody in their head who is dead set on being in a relationship with you. I also feel like, the legal system needs to take it more serious. And believe victims when they say it to at least look into it enough or this is where evidence comes in.

[00:14:56] I think also increasing penalties and fines for for men who are stalkers can serve as a stronger deterrent because if somebody just say, hey, I'm going to give you a restraining order, sometimes that's not enough. I think if you get hit hard as a first offense because there is evidence To support that claim, then there should be a little more penalties than just a restraining order.

[00:15:20] But I think also women should feel empowered to take self defense and safety courses. And that's going to protect them, like myself I had a weapon in my home, I felt like if I'm, if I have to use it, by all means I will I've trained with law enforcement. By all means, I will I'm a very precisional shooter.

[00:15:38] But I think we also have to look at what constitutes as stalking because, online harassment can also, spill over to stalking. And I think that there should be legal laws and penalties against that as well.

[00:15:54] Bob Gatty: Do you believe that this kind of behavior varies according to race? I'm talking about the stalkers, and I'm also talking about the women, whether women of color are more susceptible to this sort of issue than perhaps white women.

[00:16:13] Dr. Pamela Gurley: I think people falsely believe that stalking is more prevalent in one race more than the other, but really, there is no evidence to support that. Not that I've ever seen. I think that when people say it's universal and it's a universal problem when it comes to stalking that and it's going to affect everybody, races, genders.

[00:16:34] It doesn't matter your socio economic background. If you're going to be stalked, you're going to be stalked. But, so let me be honest here because you know how I when I'm blogging I am super transparent with how I feel. I do think that stalking behaviors are not the biggest issues as much as protection of the victim, like what you was talking about with the women.

[00:16:58] Women are just as vulnerable, but yet they're the least protected in my opinion, because we're not in that privileged class. And what I mean by that is privileged versus proactive versus non privileged equals reactive. So I feel like in 90 percent of the cases of stalking, if you are a privileged white woman, they're going to be more proactive with you than they would be with someone like me, a black woman.

[00:17:26] Really? That's how I feel. Yeah, it's because it's not who we're protecting is the behaviors that's it's affecting us. And then, like the woman that got hit with a brick for saying no, that was the first time encounter you can't prevent that. But I have seen and have worked with in an environment where Privilege class was even with rape was treated different than black women that there's not as much value assigned to black women to do something about, and often it's reactive.

[00:18:01] Then somebody is going to jail, then there's something being done, then there's a, a restraining order given, but a white woman can go in there with no evidence and get a restraining order. No problem, and I have seen it. I have seen it happen. Okay.

[00:18:17] Bob Gatty: All right. Yes. Do you have anything else on this topic that you would like to add before we move on a little bit?

[00:18:24] Dr. Pamela Gurley: I only thing I would add is that every woman needs to be empowered to protect herself no matter what race, color, socioeconomic background. I think that we need to get out of this space of feeling like we can't say no immediately if there's no interest. Be able to just say no with assertiveness and pray that he doesn't take it the wrong way because I have been in places where I've been all kinds of names because I would not give my phone number or because I wasn't interested.

[00:18:55] And even if I say I'm in a relationship. Some men don't care, but I was, I'm very stern about how I feel on things. And so I'm assertive enough to speak or at least walk away before things escalate. If it doesn't feel right to you move just, and that's one of the things that I will caution, move to a more safer place.

[00:19:15] And then by all means, don't just walk out of someplace. If you don't feel safe because something just happened.

[00:19:21] Bob Gatty: Where did you get the courage to do all this? 

[00:19:25] Dr. Pamela Gurley: Oh, I'm mean as hell. So I'm not that 

[00:19:28] Bob Gatty: you're what 

[00:19:29] Dr. Pamela Gurley: mean as hell as hell. So I'm not the kind of person that but I think I had to grow up protecting myself.

[00:19:37] I think for me. My dad, I know I'm a daddy's girl. So my dad knew he raised a fighter. So I've always been able to take care of myself in that sense. But not every woman has. And I think other hand for me was, , I'm trying to think like in my 20s. I never really put myself, I try to put myself in those situations and unfortunately I was in my 20s when that situation happened with the first sergeant, but I'm also prior service.

[00:20:02] I, I, you've had, I've had training and, my background has allowed me to be more, more vocal. And my life experience has been more vocal to advocate for myself. And so now I can speak more clearly to say, look here are other ways that you can do things because professionally is one thing, but when it happens to you personally, are you going to react the same?

[00:20:24] And thankfully in a lot of my instances, I reacted the same. It has to protect myself. 

[00:20:30] Bob Gatty: Okay. You have a lot of you have a lot of stuff going on in your life and in your business. What are some of the new projects that you've got going on, 

[00:20:39] Dr. Pamela Gurley: Pam? Oh my gosh. So my biggest project, the wedding planning, I don't recommend it.

[00:20:44] Yeah, I got engaged at Christmas last year. Oh, planning your own wedding. Planning my own wedding. And I tell you it's hard. I highly, I don't recommend it. Although if my first three months I had my whole wedding planned because I knew I would be busy, but outside of that professionally, I'm speaking at Blogicon this weekend in Ohio.

[00:21:05] And then next week I'll be doing book signings at the Congressional Black Caucus for a couple of days. And then I'm off to Where am I doing in October? I think I have a TEDx panel that I'm hosting October 14th in Fayetteville, North Carolina. On November 9th, I have an author event for, that's a fundraiser for my Brown Girl Brown Boy Literacy Foundation called An Evening with Authors, Cocktails, Conversations, and Connections.

[00:21:30] And then also mid November, I'm speaking in Orlando at the National Conference on Student Leadership, it's busy the next few weeks, but I'm looking forward to slowing down after Thanksgiving. 

[00:21:41] Bob Gatty: I don't know why you're sitting around doing nothing. That's why I don't understand. 

[00:21:47] Dr. Pamela Gurley: I know. I've got to get off my butt sometimes, do some work.

[00:21:51] Bob Gatty: Okay. That sounds really great. How is the Children's Series going? 

[00:21:57] Dr. Pamela Gurley: It is going great. I just released a bonus book in the series on September 3rd called Brown Girl and Brown Boy Africa Adventures where I've traveled to Africa a couple of times and I decided, let me let children in from a viewpoint of mine to show them that all of the beautifulness that is in I did Johannesburg.

[00:22:18] South Africa, but I wanted to highlight that it's more than just land and animals and all of that, that there's tall buildings and it can look parts of it look like New York City. And I wanted to give them something different that they don't typically see in school books or on television when they're showing and depicting parts of Africa.

[00:22:37] Bob Gatty: That sounds interesting. Okay. And the foundation, the Brown Girl Brown Boy Foundation. What are you doing? 

[00:22:46] Dr. Pamela Gurley: Oh, so much. So I created that which was a spin from my books and my book signings. I used to do a kids red carpet book tour and literacy festival. This was the third year next year I'll start the fourth year, and I wanted more from it I wanted to be able to do more average social advocacy for literacy.

[00:23:05] And that not just reading and writing but the holistic view of literacy, and which is what I do at my tours, but instead of doing it one time a year I wanted to establish programs that will allow me to, highlight in individualized times like you know just doing either real estate classes for youth learning young because there's a lot of young entrepreneurs to writing labs to teach children how to become young published authors or write for magazines or.

[00:23:33] Have opportunities to speak for in journalism and but there's a multitude of programs that I have that are tied to literacy and I wanted a foundation to be able to take more on what I was already doing. So I launched it January one and then move my kids red carpet underneath that and added a lot more outreach.

[00:23:54] For me to be able to do. Do 

[00:23:56] Bob Gatty: you have help doing all this stuff?

[00:23:59] Dr. Pamela Gurley: I do. Thankfully, the nonprofit has become, very easy. I got we were certified as a 501 in July for 2023. So that made it very nice to be able to now get more grants, raise more funds because, having a tax write off people look for.

[00:24:16] But I think that having a board and having help, I have someone who's an acting director for outreach and acquisition. So he's been a huge help. And then of course the board is a huge help. Looking at staffing next year with establishing a full fledged literacy center, probably around 2025.

[00:24:35] Bob Gatty: That's really exciting, Pam. I'm really proud of you. Thank you. Yeah. Hey, listen, thanks for coming on and doing this. I appreciate it. Got anything else you'd like to add? 

[00:24:45] Dr. Pamela Gurley: No, just, support the things that I'm doing. Follow me. I'm a lot of fun, we have fun at all the events and the one in Atlanta that's coming up on November 9th is a really fun one where there'll be DJs. There'll be food. I have a comedian that's coming out and I plan to do this in a couple of other cities as well. 

[00:25:04] Bob Gatty: Okay, great. Yes. So last question that I guess is where can people find your books? I presume on Amazon to where else? Oh, 

[00:25:13] Dr. Pamela Gurley: they're everywhere. Amazon, Walmart.

[00:25:15] They're in some libraries, some bookstores target you, you type it in and and they're pretty much everywhere. Good for you. All right. I've stopped counting the locations of them because they're international. I've sold in Australia, parts of Africa, Singapore, so they're worldwide.

[00:25:32] They're in daycare centers personally signed ones in different places in Africa and I know you know the DeBeers the diamond people. So they when I was in South Africa and I was in Botswana, and they have a daycare I had books left there for their daycare center as well. Terrific. 

[00:25:51] Bob Gatty: Okay. Pam, thanks so much.

[00:25:53] And I look forward to seeing your next blog for Lean to the Left. 

[00:25:58] Dr. Pamela Gurley: Thank you so much for having me once again.