[anigbrowl]

Personal safety is an extension of not fitting it - it's hard to read the cues about who or what might be a threat to you as opposed to a mere annoyance. Of course one is unlikely* to face a physical threat in the workplace equivalent to heading to a dive bar surrounded by broken bottles, but your career risk is just an abstraction of the corporal risk and can be just as stressful.

* as a man anyway.

I've also experienced a great deal of both and I disagree with your read. It's easy to think up non-racial examples as well; someone who's gay in a frat-themed work environment, or a middle-class guy ending up at a bar populated by Hell's Angels or suchlike. The differences with race and gender, obviously, are that it's almost impossible to obscure those facts about yourself so you can't even fake that you fit in.

[sliverstorm]

Come now, I've spent plenty of time as the only white person in sight, and it never felt anywhere near as uncomfortable as walking by druggies, needles out, late at night. Or going through the empty NYC subways at 4AM. Or the guy who pulled a knife on me.

Social anxiety is real, but do you really find the fear of imminent injury/death no more terrifying than social harm?

[issa]

The point is that there is this ridiculous misconception that everyone in "bad" neighborhoods is constantly being shot at. I just said go to one of those neighborhoods and do something like shop at a gas station or nightclub. I didn't say a thing about knives, druggies, or anything of the sort.

[anigbrowl]

Fear of bodily harm is certainly far more acute, but it's also concentrated in time, even though it may be encountered regularly or frequently. While social anxiety is more of a chronic issue, I think it can be just as stressful in the aggregate - I did choose the word 'stressful' deliberately above.