Wow. Truly unbelievable. I have never thought of a handshake as insulting, imposing, offensive or aggressive, let alone sexually threatening or a precursor to rape. Christ, now it’s going to be in the back of my mind when I meet a woman somewhere whether I should shake hands or not. Apparently, it might be offensive either way I go! Either I shake hands and am perceived as a rapist, or I don’t offer my hand and I look like I’m not treating her as an equal. The world is truly filled with all kinds, including many who choose to be offended by nearly anything.
Now, my wife doesn’t really like to shake hands, but that’s because she’s a germaphobe. But that gets awkward, too, like with Howie Mandell who just fist bumps everyone or keeps his hands in his pockets.
We have a vendor our company deals with who, for religious reasons, does not shake hands with women. To be honest, I felt slighted, not respected, that he would shake the hands of some of my coworkers, yet refuse mine. Funny how perspectives differ.
As far as men looking at me… I suppose I was in that middle ground of just attractive or interesting enough to sometimes get looks, but not so smoking hot that it was any kind of regular occurrence. Now that I am over fifty and as someone else on this board said, have hit the age of invisibility, frankly, I miss that attention.
My brother, who is in his fifties started working out. He is nice looking, and is now quite fit. He complains to me about the attention he gets from other men at the gym, and occasionally on the street, and how uncomfortable it makes him feel. I try to be sympathetic, but mostly I just tell him “welcome to the life of a pretty girl.”
I’d still stick with the old fashioned custom to wait for a lady to extend her hand first. It can be just a split second. In this case a suspect (as traditional customs generally are to western RightThinkers, western customs at least) custom actually seem to satisfy the extreme post-modern anti-traditional female view as well. It’s not the only case where the old code of being a gentleman is compatible with PC.
But in a western* white collar business setting AFAIK a woman who doesn’t offer her hand on introduction is going to be viewed as odd. Although, that’s her issue to work out for herself. And less so if it’s known she belongs to some culture/sub-culture with strong tradition against women shaking hands with men.
In a more social setting I think it’s going to be less of an issue either way.
*IME in global business the tendency will be to adopt Western norms in office settings, but not always or completely, and you have to treat awkward situations with good will and humor, not make them into problems.
Sorry, I’ll drop it. And I think I’ve already answered about how I feel when a man looks at my body with admiration, so I’m probably done here. Except, i guess I’ll say again that I bet it matters a lot how often the woman attracts admiring looks.
It’s been years and years since any man has found me even remotely attractive.
If a man looked at me for a little longer than usual, I’d assume he wanted something (something non-sexual) from me. Maybe he’s going to ask me for money, my signature on a petition, my attention while he tries to convert me, or whatever…
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I’d be happy to give those guys the time of day. But the scenario you’ve described never happens. And if, by some weird chance, it actually did, I’d probably be really slow on the uptake.
My immediate thoughts would be, “He’s talking with me for much longer than he has to. Wait–is he interested in me? Oh, there’s no way that could be true. If I flirt, he’s going to be repulsed. How do I respond, so that I’m friendly, without being alienating?”
My response (or non-response) might come across as rejection, especially if the guy was already expecting a negative reaction from me. But anything involving my “standards” (whatever they might be), or anything about how desperate the guy may or may not be, wouldn’t even come to mind.
Not sure if this is the right thread for a “how you doin?” or not. I do notice that there are two different ways (at least) to parse your username; very clever.
How about if, in a situation where offering a handshake were to be expected I said to you upon introduction, “I’m sorry, but I don’t shake hands with women as some of them construe that as rapey and I’m not prepared to make myself the victim of their prejudices. I’m explaining so that you take no offense from my refusal”
Some people make it sound as if a woman cannot go to the grocery store without being catcalled by men several times.
I’ve lived in the United States for over 16 years. I’ve resided (ranging from one month to several years) in places such as Buffalo, Indianapolis, Dallas, Houston, Austin, northern Virginia, and southern California.
Why is it that I have not yet witnessed instances of such catcalling? If it were as frequent as described, surely I would have witnessed an incident of it? Is it something that happens only in new York City?
I’m revising what I started as a warning down to a note in this instance since you self-reported, but you (and every other poster) are responsible for reading the entire thread before posting. Don’t let this happen again.
And any further infractions of the sort in this thread by anyone will incur warnings.
Yes, but on the basis of probability, if catcalling were as frequent as is claimed, I think it more likely than not that I would have encountered an instance of it by now.
There are tens of millions of women in the United States. Now supposed they are catcalled once a day. That’s several billion catcalls in a year. Now I’ve lived in the US for over 16 years, so there would have been tens of billions of instances of catcalls while I was in the US. Tens of billions of instances of catcalls and I somehow never witnessed one as it happened?
It’s very likely you did, but never noticed – it was in the background, or you thought it was a friendly interaction, or you weren’t paying attention, or something like that.
Ok, I just wanted to know your perspective, where you were coming from. In answer to your post, there’s a couple of things.
First of all, men don’t really notice, or they don’t think of the same things as catcalling. I wouldn’t even call it catcalling. Catcalling to me is “hey baby! nice tits!”
I haven’t gotten that very much, though I have had men screaming at me from cars. I never lived in a large city, though, and it happens more there than smaller towns.
I have gotten hit on nearly everywhere I’ve gone, no matter what I’m wearing. Like other women have said, I’m older now so I don’t get it. But it ranges from looks, to being asked on a date, to touching without permission, to lewd comments.
The thing that maybe men don’t get, is it’s not loud or attention-getting. And men know how to escape quickly. A man grabbed my friend’s ass once as we were going through a set of double doors. We were going in, he was going out. Now we could have chased him and caused a scene, but we just let it go 99% of the time. That was entering a busy hotel with about 40 people in the lobby. I doubt anyone noticed. No one said a thing, anyway.
So maybe you can start with your definition of catcalling? Because I think you and I are thinking of different things. But if you think it hasn’t happened just because you haven’t seen it…well, then I must disagree highly.
Here’s another one I thought of that just happened two years back. I was at a work event, where the employees of the organization from NY were together. We went bowling after. One of the men got really drunk. He started following my coworker around, hitting on her, teasing her, flirting with her, even touching her a little (just arms and back). She is married and I know she doesn’t want the attention. He is also married and never behaved like this sober.
I and other women noticed the behavior quickly, and did what we could to interpose ourselves between him and her. He would step around us to talk to her. It was, frankly, gross. She is about 20 years younger than him, and as I said, a work colleague.
Later on we were all discussing the situation and it transpired none of the men had noticed anything amiss. Nothing! That never fails to shock me…and they have daughters! It happened right amongst them, right in their midst, right in front of them, and no one professed to have seen a thing.
So? Do they ignore it? Do they think it’s just friendly interaction? Do they forget? Do they just not see it? I don’t know. But it’s not the first time and won’t be the last.
