Right at the outset, I’ll say that I don’t know the answer to this. I absolutely believe the women who are telling their stories of sexual harrassment, violence, abuse, and even rape at work, school, and in other situations.
However…
I can understand both men and women being wary of the simplest informal conversation these days–especially the men, who don’t know when a remark or gesture might lead to accusations of sexual misconduct, which, even if groundless, will stay in people’s memories for a long time.
I go to a private studio for body work with a teacher. She told me today that she has a couple of classes of two to three men each (men and women often sign up with a buddy because it’s cheaper to split the cost of a session). She said the atmosphere is totally different these days. There’s tension in the air and a reserve that has not been present before. It’s like the men are afraid to be the least bit friendly… and she is, too.
I don’t know what the answer is. Women have been mistreated and abused–no question. But not all friendly or even flirtatious contact between grown men and grown women should be a threat to either.
And if businesses start hiring men in preference to women to avoid the whole harrassment issue, this will amount to exactly the opposite of the intention of the movement in the first place.
As usual, if this is the wrong forum, please move the discussion elsewhere. Thank you.
ThelmaLou I wish I had something better to add than just “I agree, and it’s a damn shame too”
I’ve heard it said that this is the start of a dialogue between men and women, as you alluded to, and perhaps it is, perhaps this is just the uncomfortable silence that sometimes happens at the start of such exchanges as each party mentally shifts onto a new, uncomfortable topic and marshals their thoughts. I hope so anyway, and I hope it works out in a positive way that benefits both women and men.
The road of progress is, unfortunately, not a continual climb towards perfection. All in all, I think this “period of adjustment” we are going through is going to be net good as harassment seems to have been (and probably still is) rampant. Men need to get their act together on this. As a member of that gender, I am disgusted by how much misogynistic behavior is out there. Hopefully there are enough good guys to minimize some of the inevitable backsliding.
Just going from the OP, this seems like an unreasonable fear. They don’t have to sit next to each other on the plane, and they don’t have to share the same hotel room, and I can’t think of a reason why they would need to be alone together during the entire trip.
That said, I empathize. Just ask any guy how comfortable they would feel having lunch in a park alone, surrounded by children who are not their own.
It’s such a mess. This is a conversation that needs to be had. These women’s stories need to be told. But I’m afraid all of this doesn’t happen with at least some collateral damage.
“Just behave decently towards everyone.” That sounds simple. What if a guy thinks he IS behaving decently when he asks a personal question or expresses something that the woman takes to be a violation? In addition to men actually crossing the line and committing acts of harassment and abuse, there are women who are taking offense when a man does something that used to be okay and now is fraught with peril.
The article quoted above isn’t about people behaving decently toward each other–it’s about the new definitions of “decent,” and the trouble that may follow if both behave in a way that each considers “decent,” but their definitions of “decent” aren’t identical.
I’ve traveled with men on business and sitting together on the plane was a good time to discuss/plan what we were headed to–in fact it might have been the ONLY time to do that.
This is exactly the kind of fallout I’m talking about. Everyone is under suspicion and gets tarred with the same brush.
I present the case of Andrea Ramsey, formerly a Democratic candidate for Congress. She had one complaint against her. After a federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission investigation was unable to find evidence of the claimed sexual harassment, her former employee sued the company. The company settled. Ramsey wasn’t sued so she didn’t get a choice on whether to even take it to court.
One allegation, no substantiating evidence, a financial incentive for the person making the complaint, no chance to defend herself and it ended her campaign. Women that are in positions of power are at risk in the current environment, too.
The thing is, I believe there’s total agreement on both sides regarding what is clearly unacceptable behavior, i.e., “grabbing a woman’s pussy,” openly saying, “go to bed with me or you’re fired,” the literal casting couch, etc.
And there’s likely complete agreement on what is completely acceptable behavior, i.e, saying Good Morning, shaking hands (especially if the woman extends her hand first), the male boss saying, “That was excellent work, Miss Jones,” etc.
The problem is in the VAST area in between those two extremes. Can a male boss touch a female subordinate on the arm? the shoulder? Can two peers of the opposite sex hug if they’ve worked together for years and one has experienced a death in the family? Can a man or woman say to a member of the opposite sex, “Nice suit,” or even, “Wow, new car? Really nice!” This is where the peril lies. And absolutely true: 90% of male-female interactions will be no problem and will not lead to any problems.
But to cite the excellent example given above, think about any single man spending any time in the vicinity of a children’s playground. All it would take is for one person to make an accusation and that guy’s life could be messed up for years or forever.
The point of the article is that people are on guard now. And it is a mess for sure.
Alertness and awareness of the situation aren’t necessarily bad things. You can view the incidents described in the article as men trying to protect themselves by not being in situations where they could be accused of offensive behavior, or you can view them as men genuinely trying not to give offense.
There was also this part:
I’m not a firefighter, but from the description it sounds like that sort of teasing is a sign of acceptance. If women view it as exclusionary, that’s going to be a problem.
Not a very welcoming and inclusive approach to the situation.
And I dislike the term “mansplaining” on its face. Please don’t find an annoying behavior and give it a name that tars a whole gender, okay?
Not addressing that request to you, Chi, just putting it out there in a general sense.
I think we’re all going to have to do some work. Not just men and not just women. And we all need to listen - once again, not just men and not just women. We’ve got two ears and one mouth, we should be listening twice as much!
I recently found myself in a situation where a male peer (a peer but more senior in tenure) introduced an idea to a panel that was very, very much my idea (I’m a lady). He was lauded for the idea. Not heaps of praise but “ah yes that’s a very good idea, we’ll implement it.” I didn’t say a thing in front of the panel but afterwards I pulled him aside and said “what you did could be seen as a very sexist thing and I don’t want to start off on this foot in our time together, so please be cognizant of this in the future.” He of course freaked out and wondered why I would accuse him of being sexist. I said I didn’t accuse him, I said he did a very sexist thing that I’ve had to watch out for my whole life (I work in tech). We went back and forth and while I stood my ground on my assertion that I was merely asking him to “check yourself before you wreck yourself”, secretly I realized that I probably did go too far leading with “sexism.” Really he was just doing a rude thing regardless of gender. But this was two weeks ago, and it was the first time I’d worked with him and this panel and this happened right out of the gate. I had a total case of the “OH SEE, OF COURSE!!” reaction.
So, I need to do better and so does he. He did correct himself this week to the panel, regarding my idea, and then I made a self-depricating joke and thanked him for at least making sure it came up. Only 102 more meetings to go.
The revolution is gonna be ugly, but hopefully we can all come out the other side as much better humans.
Just curious: what if you had called him out on taking credit for your idea without bringing in the sexist element? Not suggesting you should have–just wondering. Would that have seemed dishonest or unjust to you?
To the OP. Yeah, and so?
A choice has been made. It will have consequences. Consequences not necessarily in everyone’s control. Or to their liking. Welcome to real life. The “child and men”, example you gave? A society level choice. The current senario? The same. Maybe it leads to greater gender segregation at work. Maybe it leads to an end of two person opposite sex teams for jobs.
I find little patience for men feeling, ‘every innocent interaction is now fraught with peril!’ You cannot be serious!
This conversation begins with the hard, straight up FACT, that women’s lives ARE continuous guantlets of ‘innocent interactions’ being actually fraught, with ACTUAL freaking peril.
Not, they could lose their job, or good standing ‘peril’, but you could lose your life peril!
Men seeing the extent of it as fatiguing, need to consider how fatiguing it is to live it, in my opinion.
Women need not soften the blow for the men who find the view disturbing, when truth comes to light. Men should be shocked and disturbed, by what they see, to my mind.
So did you have a different way for women to stop being sexually harassed and assaulted in the work environment? Is it a choice between a) putting up with sexual harassment in return for being allowed to participate fully in the jobs that they are in, or b) stop putting up with sexual harassment with the proviso that they will be siloed into places that make it safe for men?
There are no easy answers here, but suggesting that women should have to put up with either of those choices doesn’t really advance things. Men aren’t going to give up the power easily, and I don’t expect it will be an easy path to greater equality. There will be a few women who make charges against men for the wrong reasons, and that will tend to set things back more than it should. There will be a hell of a lot more men who will still (try to) take advantage of women, and lots of people will shrug (like you seem to be doing) and say “well, whattaya gonna do?”
FWIW I think attitudes like this will cause more harms than goods.
There is serious harassment rampant. Attention needs to be continued to be placed especially on protecting the relatively powerless, such as lower SES women in auto plants, in the hospitality industry, working on farms, those who really need that job … That attention is not furthered by a “period of adjustment” in which those men who have always meant to do right are placed on notice that any miscommunication is both completely theirs to own and automatically evidence of their being a misogynistic bad dude; that attention is taken away instead.
And yeah that “good guy” comment. There is miscommunication that is not serious harassment and some of it is the fault of males. And some is the fault of systems and processes in which “good guys” and “good women” currently function. Oh for sure there are the monsters out there, too many of them, but most of the daily problems are not of the monsters but the result of structures that none of us designed but all of us share responsibility for. It is good guys and good women who are of good intent. Dividing your world into the “good guys” (of whom of course you are one) and the “bad dudes” in black hats no doubt (who of course you cannot be, but easy to label others as) is a simplistic formula that PREVENTS self-reflection and that avoids the hard work of analyzing and fixing processes and structures over time (because such does not happen overnight).
Backsliding? That you think “good guys” can minimize? Such implies that you honestly believe much actual good has been accomplished other than a couple of monsters being exiled and some flawed good guys too and a bunch of people anxious that their friendliness might be misinterpreted. That you believe most of the actual monsters who are not celebrities, who prey on the powerless who have no big voices or soapboxes, have in way been curtailed. And that some “good guys” can prevent those gains from eroding somehow. I don’t think so. To any of it. I see a lot of signifying akin to buying something that says Fair Trade being sure that others know that is what you did. Not a lot of actual work at fixing the actual structural problems or at protecting the powerless from those of the powerful that prey upon them because the structures still allow for it.
I do not set the course of #metoo. It seems that what titillates those who click does. But to me the original intent seemed to be to create an environment in which women who were victims across the economic spectrum could be empowered to speak up without having to fear retributions and having their stories be taken seriously. That was addressing a structural issue and that issue can be addressed without presuming every man accused of anything is by definition of being accused guilty. And solving that structural issue again is ill served IMHO by what #metoo has morphed into. ZipperJJ maybe his taking credit for your idea was impacted by sexism and maybe not. Maybe if it was he was not explicitly aware of it. But yeah maybe calling him out on the behavior without presuming his sexism overtly? Maybe even let him realize it himself? “You realize you just took credit for my idea without crediting me don’t you? Why did you do that to me do you think?” [Insert knee jerk defensive answer here.] “Nope. I do not accept that. You will not do that again.” Standing up for yourself, and forcing him to consider the obvious, that he presumed he could get away with it because of your gender, on his own intellectual dime, does not require accepting the role of victim requesting to not be victimized in the future. Take the dominant position in the interaction.
