[...] Feminists, it seemed to Ivan, were campaigning for a world in which men, far from being equal citizens, in fact had to give up their seats on public transport whenever any random woman decided to get pregnant, which happened constantly. That really was his view, at the time, which his brother had never been shy about denouncing and describing as ‘fascist’ and so on. Later, in college, Ivan came to feel more like: okay, whatever. I’m not that tired, and I guess if the woman is so tired, she can sit down. It’s not one hundred percent fair, since it’s not as if I made her pregnant, or have ever had the opportunity to do that with literally any woman, but whatever, I’m not going to make a big point out of it. And on the one occasion during his college years when this hypothetical situation arose in reality, he did give up his seat, but not with any great feeling of camaraderie; rather, with a slight feeling of awkwardness and irritation still. Now, today, or actually no, yesterday afternoon, he smiled at the pregnant woman on the tram with a very genuine smile, and she looked up at him with eyes of gratitude, saying: Thank you. Ivan perceived in himself at that moment a completely different attitude towards the whole situation. He no longer felt annoyed or imposed on; rather he was filled with kindly and even tender feelings towards the woman who was pregnant. These feelings seemed, when he thought about it, to be connected with recent developments in his own life: his new understanding of relations between women and men. How certain things can happen, resulting in such situations, even unintentionally, which is something he has always understood on a literal level, but now understands with personal sympathy and compassion for all involved. This particular weakness of women, in regards to their desire for men, strikes him as beautiful, moving, worthy of deep respect and deference. [...]