It’s neat that your random and unprovoked comment about a woman’s appearance isn’t indicative that you consider her prey and are having impulse control problems regarding containing your urges.
I’m a really bad mind reader, though, so when I hear such random and unprovoked remarks, where a person randomly says something that everybody already knows for no reason whatsoever, I have no particular reason not to think the person is objectifying the woman in question. Therefore my opinion of a person making such comments will drop.
“What am I going to do about it” is not let it impact or impair what I’m doing.
Doesn’t mean that my dislike of rain is going to stop - and it doesn’t mean I’m going to start being happy about my stupid hormones acting up. But I can’t make the rain stop and I can’t make my hormones stop, so it’s going to be annoying forever - because as you say, I’m not going to refuse to work with women.
I will say that the whole “I wish she would go away” thing is rather a bit more whining than I would personally engage in. Women have every right to be curvy in my presence, and as annoying as my hormones make that situation, I, at least, am well aware that shooing all the curvy women away isn’t a ‘solution’ that’s even worth considering.
No no begbert don’t try to defend me here. Unfortunately I’m outed as a misogynist. it’s too late for me. My first two draft posts were originally worded “if only some right thinking males would disfigure her in some fashion to make things easier for me.” But then I considered changing it to “Why oh why in this culture can’t we compel women to wear abaya robes along with hijab?”
We’ve said nothing of the kind, Cardigan. You are reacting very defensively to an answer that you don’t like.
You feel uncomfortable in the situation. That is hardly unusual or misogynistic. But the answer, as I’ve said, is that the only place a solution can be found is where the discomfort exists, which is psychological in nature.
I get that that the sarcasm was intended to reverse this and reinforce that you aren’t a misogynist, but seriously, that whole “I hope she can go away and get a job that values her entirely for her looks” thing really didn’t work in your favor.
You’re not the victim here, Cardigan. Portraying yourself as such isn’t a good look.
No one is calling you a misogynist. But please realize there’s a big difference between saying something like “I wish my hormones didn’t put me in this position” versus what you actually said, “it would simpler and easier if she were not so attractive.” The first is an admission that the problem lies with you, therefore you should be the one who changes. The second puts the responsibility for change on her. Whether you intended it that way or not, that’s how it came across.
You may not feel victimized by getting second hand reports about your attractiveness (!) but other people may be sick and tired of being objectified by their physical appearance. That applies to everyone, not just “attractive” people.
So my answer to the OP is that over time I would get to know them as a person, and react accordingly.
Sure, I generally get defensive when folks accuse me of not being able to control myself. (see, RF, I’m a victim here)
Probably should have chosen CEO instead, but since the conversation was focused on a woman’s appearances, I chose supermodel, so unfortunately that’s the horse I gotta ride.
Most of the really attractive people I know are already aware that people find them attractive, so I doubt if she will greatly surprised.
I don’t care if she treats me differently as long as she treats me professionally, as I will treat her.
If other men have treated her unprofessionally in the past because of her looks, she needs to talk to those other men. That’s got nothing to do with me, unless she needs my help.
You mean, she is at least six feet tall, 25 to 40 lbs underweight, 17 to 22 years old and flat chested? Because those are the general parameters of the job.
Modeling is being a living clothes hanger. It’s fairly poorly paid, high stress, short lived, and you are subject to quite a bit of abuse not to mention objectification because c’mon, modeling. Modeling and eating disorders are hand and glove. Maybe five people are “super” models at any one time. In the world.
I seriously doubt your attractive coworker would be flattered by your naive idea of her convenient-to-you future career.
Yep - when a guy says something that no professional male in his right mind would ever say, then I assume they’re influenced by other factors than professionalism.
Hell, if a woman is gossiping about Hotty McHotpants over in marketing, that’s also pretty damned unprofessional - but at least there’s no cultural history pretty much cementing that all such comments sprout from an uneven and exploitative power dynamic. When the women pant over men it’s dumb, but when the men pant over women it’s dumb and also creepy. Simple fact.
Fair enough, thank you for being respectful in your replies.
If a woman (or man) finds something offensive, then it is offensive. If they find it hurtful, it is hurtful. Part of my point is that I don’t think everyone automatically finds this behavior hurtful to be on the receiving end of it. of course you can’t tell who will think what in any situation.
That’s pretty much the way it’s been everywhere I’ve ever worked. At the very worst, you might get a “Hey, did you see the new woman they hired in Purchasing? No? She’s pretty hot.” (or something along those lines, but never salacious).
I mean, maybe your good friends at work might say a little more, but that’s in the context of friendship, not colleagues.
As far as the work dynamic goes, that didn’t change anywhere I’ve ever worked. I think the most that ever happened is that one guy hired a woman who was a Cowboys cheerleader and in their swimsuit calendar as his admin assistant. I think a lot of men suddenly had a lot of reasons to go see him instead of sending emails or making phone call for a few days. Even then it was more in a curiosity kind of way- “what DOES a Cowboys cheerleader and swimsuit model actually look like in real life and in person?” was probably the thought on most of their heads.
(the answer is actually “extremely pretty face, and a LOT more tiny and slender than you might think”; one is a preschool teacher at my younger son’s preschool and that pretty much describes her to a T)
My first job in NYC was a low level manual labor type job in the technical theatre industry. I walked in on a recommendation from a friend, got hired and started the next day. I was a very attractive woman back in the day. Personable, too.
My bosses thought it was cute and funny to point me out to my new co-workers and say stuff like “You’re lucky we needed someone, cause I would’ve fired you to hire her.” It made me self-conscious and more difficult to make friends and fit in.
On balance though, being an attractive and personable woman that was also very good at her job helped me more than hurt. People remembered me and remembered my name. Clients were much more likely to call my boss with praise than they were with my male coworkers, I feel I did better in negotiations because of it.
Some of this was the flip side of “the soft prejudice of low expectations”. People would, upon meeting me, assume I’d been hired for my looks. Then when they found out I was really really good at my job they would be somewhat blown away. And they’d tell everyone how awesome I was. I have to admit, it didn’t always suck.
Serious question, as a woman who has been attractive and knows what its like.
What if you started working at a job but people treated you respectfully, and always treated you as a competent professional, but you knew that some of the men (and women) made positive general (not objectifying) comments about your appearance here and there when you weren’t around. If they didn’t infantilize you, degrade you or insult you and it never affected their opinion of you as a professional, how would that have made you feel?
Yeah, that’s called “sexism,” and there IS something wrong with it. If I can’t go around talking about my female coworkers’ gorgeous tits, they’d better not be free to go around talking about some guy’s gorgeous ass.
This isn’t theoretical for me. I worked with a woman once who openly said things of a highly offensive nature about coworkers. The one I remember best was her opining about how she’d live to be the filling a sandwich made with two guys we worked with (who weren’t present). She’d say stuff like this in front of anyone. She did eventually get fired, though she made it easy by being incompetent.