It shouldn’t have to be a “fucking hint”, it should just be a politely worded no. Now, sure, perhaps that “No” could wait until the 2nd advance, assuming he doesn’t get the “fucking hint”- because *guys do not get fucking hints or body language. * I had to take a week long class on interrogation techniques before I had the slightest clue about body language- something women are apparently born with.
So stop with the “fucking hints” and use your words.
I was reading this thread last night, and then quite coincidentally, watched Office Christmas Party. Hilarious movie…but it made me feel a little dirty every time I laughed.
Do you think Hollywood will stop making movies like that…or stars will quit being involved?
And “listen, I’m not interested” or even “get off me!” But so long as there are people who think that a woman saying “no” is playing it coy, there isn’t that much of an advantage in actually vocalizing the response. I can’t speak for other people’s experiences, but mine is that someone who’s jerk enough to warrant a “get off me!” is always jerk enough to go on (what they don’t always have is the reflexes to stop you from running away). I say “someone” because those experiences include one where the assaulter was a woman (I was assaulted by women twice, but the second one was a rentacop in a US airport; being at the time an immigrant, I didn’t yell and give her an elbow).
How about stopping with the fucking harassment and teaching men not to fucking harass? Why is it the woman’s fault?
How about we as a society stop teaching women to be subservient and that we have to always be polite, to the point where we feel uncomfortable speaking out, but then someone says we should’ve “used our words”?? Back off.
This brings to mind a video I watched in which some douchebro PUA went to Japan and started shoving women’s faces into his crotch. I’m not joking. He just grabbed them by the hair and shoved their face into his crotch, apropos of nothing. There were other videos of him hitting on the women, who were complete strangers to him, walking up to women in grocery stores, hugging them aggressively and so on and so forth. The look on the women’s faces, and their body language, demonstrated something along the lines of omg what the fuck is happening right now?
But if women in the US are socialized to be nice and agreeable, it’s worse in Japan by several orders of magnitude. Being surrounded by large men and grabbed by one of these large men did not incline them to use their words. It inclined them to smile nervously through the confusion and horror and hope it would be over soon.
The comments section of this video was filled with men (probably men specifically devotees of the PUA philosophy, hardly a representative sample) saying that it’s total bullshit to call this sexual assault because the women weren’t actively resisting.
I found this response utterly horrifying. Women feeling unable to speak up in these situations are hardly a good thing, but they happen for many completely rational reasons on the woman’s part and in many cases because the most common physioneurological response to a threat is to do nothing. The fact is that we’ve created a culture where women are likely to be sexually assaulted, where any given woman in a harrassment situation has a pretty high chance of previous experience with sexual assault, with speaking up, with saying no, and finding those responses either did nothing to protect her or escalated the situation. So we create this culture, then we deny that the culture exists and urge women to ‘‘use their words’’ and thus blame them for their own harassment or assault.
It’s inherently unfair and demonstrates a startling lack of empathy. Why are we so disconnected as a culture that we can’t even take women at their word when they say this is their reality, and it’s not okay?
Seriously, you ask when harassment is going to stop after a country just elected a serial molester as pres., and is about to send a child molester to the senate from Alabama?
Yeah, we are leading the world, no doubt, in this race.
Because simply asking a woman out is not harassment. I was replying to Spice Weasel and the topic our our discussion was men asking women out.
And Spice Weasel was saying for us guys to “it’s when they don’t take a fucking hint that it rises to the level of harassment.”
Read for comprehension before kneejerking.
Let’s dial it back a bit, folks. If you’re going to disagree, do it civilly. Thanks.
Fair dinkum, sorry.
People can learn to read body language. Women are not born with it. A lot of us learn because of potential threats.
And the definition of harassment that was given was persistent advances.
There are men on these boards who will tell you that a woman’s ‘‘no’’ often means ‘‘yes.’’
Sometimes in this society, I feel like I’m talking, but no sound is coming out of my mouth.
Yup. The proposal seems to be, “Women should resist their culturally-taught tendency to not make waves, and should make waves in response to assault.” It seems far more reasonable to say, “Men should resist their culturally-taught tendency to ignore body language, and should pay attention so they avoid committing assault.” My proposal is the one that prevents assault :).
FWIW I really wish sex ed in schools spent a fair bit of time focusing on ways to flirt and make passes that DON’T risk committing assault. I think some guys are naturally talented at doing this, but not all guys are, and the guys that aren’t are just as horny as the guys that are, and some of them, too many of them, and willing to risk assault in order to try to get some action.
Teaching this won’t eliminate assault, but I think it’ll cut down on it.
Persistent *unwelcome *advances. And how is a guy supposed to know that his first advance is unwelcome? Well, **Spice Weasel ** claims men are supposed to get "fucking clues’ because women in the 21st century cant say “no”.
I suspect we’re talking about wildly different situations and it’s causing some disconnect.
The kind of stuff like the Japan video I described is what I’m talking about. Men grabbing women they don’t know and assuming it’s okay because she doesn’t resist. On a smaller scale, following women around, ignoring both verbal and nonverbal signals of disinterest, thinking that because a woman endures your conversation at a bar and doesn’t tell you to die in a fire, that means she wants you to grab her ass. That is what I’m talking about.
If someone comes up and offers you a drink, of course, you say no thank you if you aren’t interested. (I assume. I don’t hang out in bars.) If a woman says ‘‘no thank you’’ and the guy persists, that’s where the creepy label comes in. And that’s what I mean by not taking a fucking hint. Ms. Lily Allen even wrote a lighthearted song addressing this conundrum, which covers the harassment of both genders. (YouTube link - Can’t Knock 'Em Out) She’s describing people with no concept of physical space who ignore repeated attempts to evade them.
I’ve never seen a woman refer to a guy as creepy since high school, but in those cases it was usually older men staring at them or following them. I’ve never seen a situation where a guy asked a girl out and he was labeled creepy because she wasn’t interested. I’ve never seen anyone say, ‘‘That guy just asked me out and I don’t like him, ergo, harassment.’’ That would be a pretty ridiculous conclusion. For it to rise to the level of harassment it has to be clear it’s unwanted and it has to be repeated.
The problem is, I think it’s pretty obvious that being grabbed by the hair and having your face shoved into the crotch of a stranger is ‘‘unwanted.’’ But others seem to think anything’s fair game until she says ‘‘no.’’ Even if she’s too confused or afraid or overwhelmed to do anything. The disconnect is they seem to fail to understand what that feels like and how the body psychologically prepares itself for a threat and how easy it is to shut down in response to a perceived threat, particularly if you have a history of rape or sexual assault, particularly if you’ve ever been in a situation like that before that escalated with violence or further assault.
Do you see the distinction I’m trying to make?
I wasnt in any way talking about things like “grabbed by the hair and having your face shoved into the crotch of a stranger”. I was talking about a man asking a woman out. A normal thing.
Nor are we we talking about that. Here is the conversation:
"Quote:
Originally Posted by Smudge
If a woman does not like a man, the man is considered to be creepy/harassing/abusing the woman if he makes a move."
Spice Weasel
"I*'ve heard many men declare this as unassailable fact, but I have never in my life heard a woman make this claim. It’s when they don’t take a fucking hint that it rises to the level of harassment. Signs of disinterest include, and are not limited to, one-word, perfunctory responses, lack of eye contact, moving away from the person expressing interest, stiffness in neck and shoulders. These should not be ignored, and if you’re seriously thinking about playing grab-ass they are honking red flags. In a perfect world in which women aren’t socialized to try to make everyone happy all the time, the woman would say, ‘‘Thanks, I’m not interested,’’ but that’s not happening right now as often as it should. "*
So, we were talking about a man making a move, ie asking her out. You claimed- it is right there- that a man needs to be able to discern a “fucking hint” otherwise it is harassment.
Those are your exact words.
So, dont go changing this to “grabbing by the hair and crotch shoving”- that wasnt our topic. It was a man asking a woman out and your claim that if the man isnt able to discern a “fucking clue” that is harassment. That was your claim. It’s right there. Do you retract that claim?
Oh for fuck’s sake. Now, this may seem surprising in light of the approximately 3124 threads on the topic, but there are other human and interpersonal interactions than merely sexual ones. Infact, it might be correct that the vast majority of such interactions are not and are never sexual in nature.
Humans also often find that theirs and others verbal statements are not always in consonance with their present inclinations. And said discrepancy means that they may be amenable to altering said inclinations if prodded.
Every child learns which of Mum’s No means that she might change her mind if sufficient pleadings are made and which No means NO.
At work after a while, you know when your bosses are enthusiastic about a work proposal and when he or she has only given a half-hearted acquiescence. You can plan your future actions that way, in the latter case you know that if there is some trouble, the boss might change her mind quickly, in the former you have confidence that boss will be willing to ride out any storm.
Very few times in human interactions are responses and opinions set in stone and unchangeable.
WHich is why “No means No” is a stupid meme.
Now of if the advice is " in a sexual interaction, especially with a new person, you should exercise caution since you might misinterpret signals, with adverse results for yourself. So accept a negative at its face. Seek clarification if you don’t get an unambiguous statement of assent/refusal ", thats a good advice.
Lets just turn this around. How many times do women complain that they displayed “obvious” interest in a man and he was “oblivious”. Often with a statement about how men are such simple creatures. Of course, the possibility exists
i) That the interest was not obvious at all
ii) That he did see the interest and ignored it.
I get it.
No, I had a totally different scenario in my head than you did, shaped by my own experience. I read my own experience into your words. Sorry.
Let me clarify.
If a man asks a woman out, and she doesn’t like him, and she says no, he is not creepy.
If a man asks a woman out, and she doesn’t like him, she should tell him she is not interested.
If a man asks the same woman out again, not having received a clear verbal response, he is not committing harrassment. It is a failure of communication on a woman’s part.
If she says no and he persists, it’s harrassment.
Again, I’ve never seen a woman claim, after a failure to communicate her disinterest, that a man was either harassing her or creepy – except in the following type of scenario.
The kind of scenario I had in my head, which I’ve experienced, is being followed home by a drunk guy while the woman is alone, and the guy keeps making overtures. She can say ‘‘no,’’ but there’s a good likelihood it will escalate the situation, so the most prudent thing to do is to be pleasant and neutral until you can get somewhere safe. The guy might not actually mean any harm, or have any clue that his behavior can be perceived as threatening, which is when I think it’s important to be able to read body language, or, as I put it, take a fucking hint.
If some socially awkward guy does that to a woman and she later says, ‘‘This creepy dude was following me home last night and harassing me,’’ it’s on the clueless guy, not on her.
That’s what I mean by it being hard to view these situations in a vacuum. It’s an emotional subject and everything I’ve experienced gets poured into it. I try hard to be objective to the extent that I can, but there are certain facts about my life that will always shape the way I look at these issues. Which is how I can think I’m responding to what you’re saying but be responding to something else in my own head. That’s not your fault, but it’s not really mine, either.
In high school I thought some girls were too quick to label socially awkward guys as ‘‘creepy,’’ so I guess, in retrospect, it happens. Personally, I think many socially awkward guys are hot and I find it kind of intriguing.
Sure. I’m talking about situations where people are initiating sexual context and men on this board have stated that women they are trying to have sex with say ‘‘no’’ when they often mean ‘‘yes.’’ I can’t possibly see how that could lead to anything good. I’m not claiming most men have said that. Most men are fucking fantastic. But the attitude that ‘‘no’’ indicates a challenge to try harder certainly exists, here and elsewhere.
There are definitely women who play those games, saying one thing when they want another, which undermines the credibilty and believabilty of women who say ‘‘no’’ and mean it. I don’t understand why men don’t call women on that bullshit more often. She says no? Okay, she doesn’t get laid, then her behavior is not reinforced. I’m not one for mind games. Likewise for everyday shit, not just sex. Just say what you fucking mean, it leads to a lot more peace/satisfaction/happiness all around. I’ve always been upfront about that stuff with my partners.
The only times I haven’t been able to say what I want is when I was terrified. That’s just the nature of fear.
Speaking as a poster.
At this point, it’s hard to imagine this discussion resulting in any positive outcome. I was participating in good faith because it’s an issue close to my heart and I want to make it better. The goal was to facilitate empathy for women going through this and to explain how we bring our histories with us into every situation, whether we want to or not. I participate a lot in these threads and as an advocate, I’m not likely to stop. But I will never intentionally attempt to create an adversarial environment on this subject, because that is counterproductive to my goal. Heated discussions are the absolute last thing I want.
I don’t think this has to be an adversarial exchange. It’s not a Battle of the Sexes issue for me, it’s a human one. I want everyone to be safe in the world. But in the cases where we are discussing this subject, and things turn heated, whether I am directly involved or not, I think it’s just best for me to step out.
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I thought you’d been doing quite well.