# When is sexism okay? **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [March 19, 2009, 4:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-is-sexism-okay/490037 "2009-03-19T16:27:11Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 22
**Author:** ![DocCathode](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/doccathode/32/18773_2.png) [@DocCathode](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DocCathode)\ **Post date:** [March 22, 2009, 10:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-is-sexism-okay/490037/421 "2009-03-22T22:34:35Z")
:smack: you’re right it should have been “Display one’s mammary glands to ostentatious emergency room seabirds”(4,3,7) ---
**Author:** ![twickster](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ec9cab/32.png) [@twickster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/twickster)\ **Post date:** [March 22, 2009, 10:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-is-sexism-okay/490037/422 "2009-03-22T22:51:15Z")
Nice clue, though. (The good doctor has the ability to write cryptic clues, which I totally lack – I just critique 'em.) ---
**Author:** ![Gadarene](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e47c2d/32.png) [@Gadarene](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gadarene)\ **Post date:** [March 22, 2009, 10:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-is-sexism-okay/490037/423 "2009-03-22T22:57:45Z")
**twicks:** > [@](#): > > But because she’s not male – biologically or socially – she’s not “uniquely qualified.” Whether it’s nature or nurture, (many) men tend to respond differently to innuendo (let alone more specific sexual references) than (many) women do. _shrug_ I’m male and heterosexual, and I agree with **Lamia’s** comments in this thread in their entirety. **Rubystreak** , too. And **Dead Badger** , who I’m pretty sure is _also_ male and hetero. Some of you are being pretty jerkish. ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [March 22, 2009, 11:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-is-sexism-okay/490037/424 "2009-03-22T23:14:26Z")
> [@Suse](#): > > I do have one question for you, **Ascenray**. Do you believe that non-sexual topics such as nursing, mammograms, bra-fitting, and the like are also fair game for flirting or lascivious comments? Or do you believe that such discussions should be kept to a female-only forum so that no man is tempted to make such a comment in the first place? If you stand on the street corner and engage the world, you should expect the full range of responses that a random sample of the world is likely to offer. Other than that, I invite you to review my previous posts in this thread. I have nothing to add to those. ---
**Author:** ![twickster](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ec9cab/32.png) [@twickster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/twickster)\ **Post date:** [March 22, 2009, 11:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-is-sexism-okay/490037/425 "2009-03-22T23:21:32Z")
> [@Gadarene](#): > > **twicks:** > _shrug_ I’m male and heterosexual, and I agree with **Lamia’s** comments in this thread in their entirety. **Rubystreak** , too. And **Dead Badger** , who I’m pretty sure is _also_ male and hetero. > > Some of you are being pretty jerkish. **shrug** – it was suggested that because she’s attracted to women, she’s functionally equivalent to a man. I disagree. ---
**Author:** ![Suse](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/df705f/32.png) [@Suse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Suse)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2009, 12:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-is-sexism-okay/490037/426 "2009-03-23T00:06:08Z")
> [@acsenray](#): > > If you stand on the street corner and engage the world, you should expect the full range of responses that a random sample of the world is likely to offer. > > Other than that, I invite you to review my previous posts in this thread. I have nothing to add to those. I’m sorry that you don’t feel that you can expand on any of your previous posts. Of course, that leaves my interpretation as the only interpretation I have of your views since you are unwilling to do so. ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2009, 12:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-is-sexism-okay/490037/427 "2009-03-23T00:21:10Z")
“My views” as I have expressed them in this thread are limited to a very few, narrow points. I have explicitly said that I am not interested in addressing the other questions being asked and it’s pretty shitty for you to try to force me to through intellectual blackmail. ---
**Author:** ![VinylTurnip](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/b2d939/32.png) [@VinylTurnip](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/VinylTurnip)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2009, 12:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-is-sexism-okay/490037/428 "2009-03-23T00:35:36Z")
> [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#): > > Apparently you don’t read many of **VT** ’s posts. Hint: they’re not meant to be taken seriously. Every. Single. One. Is a joke. > > Most of them are pretty good, too. I have to admit I’m not sure what he’s getting at here. My intent was not to “offend **Lamia** ” so much as to toss a rhetorical rubber chicken into the boardroom; when a thread about breasts has grown into a 9-page epistle and degenerated into line-by-line countersniping posts, we’re taking ourselves _way_ too seriously. I’m not sure when the Pit became a spiritual haven for shrinking violets, but I may have missed a Sticky or two. ---
**Author:** ![Rubystreak](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e5b9ba/32.png) [@Rubystreak](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rubystreak)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2009, 12:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-is-sexism-okay/490037/429 "2009-03-23T00:37:59Z")
> [@FinnAgain](#): > > It’s generally poor form to call something a strawman and then go on to say exactly the thing you were claiming is a strawman. You are indeed saying that men should not have sexual reactions. Oh, sure, you’re couching it in terms of saying that men can have sexual reactions as long as they don’t, ya know, actually act on them. It’s the same thing as people who say that they’re not telling people not to be gay, just that they want to make sodomy a crime punishable by jail time. Lay off the inaccurate analogies and stop putting words in my mouth. It makes me think you want to argue in general more than you actually want to engage anything I’m really saying, because if you did, you might have to admit that you attacked the shit out of me for no good reason. You can express your sexual desire in ways that don’t make the recipient feel like shit, can’t you? If you don’t know her well enough to know what might make her feel like shit, then you refrain altogether until you know her better. And let’s not pretend for a second that the comments to TL were actually expressing sexual interest. They were needling jokes, not actual flirting. > [@](#): > > And I’ve already said, many times, in response to you among others unless I miss my guess, that rudeness is bad and that a man should stop hitting on a woman if she makes it clear that it’s making her uncomfortable. Well, then what the fuck are we arguing about? > [@](#): > > Yes, you are vilifying it. No, I’m not vilifying it, but apparently you need to think I am or you wouldn’t have anyone to rage at. > [@](#): > > “Think about that hot chick all you want, but you don’t have to act on the biological imperative built up over thousands of centuries and try to initiate sexual contact, or anything. Geeez!” In point of fact, a man whose only reaction to things that turned him on was to think really hard about them would, by definition, be _sexually unhealthy_ if he had no other outlet for his sexual tension. Wow, didn’t read what I wrote, just responded to what you think I wrote. Express yourself in ways that aren’t obviously insulting, crude, and juvenile. I think most men know the difference, or we’d never survive as a species. “Show me yer tits” is pretty much never OK to say to a stranger unless you’re in a strip club. This is not rocket science. I’m not asking you to utterly suppress your sexual impulses and become a monk. There’s really no need for hyperbole unless you wish to further muddy the already murky waters. > [@](#): > > Libido is a sex _drive_, not a sex contemplate. Libido is attached to a BRAIN that can make decisions about how the libido enacts itself. > [@](#): > > And no, you can not always express such thoughts in a way that everyone will be happy with. Moreover expecting men to only flirt in a way that’s bland enough to be acceptable to 99.9% of the population is absurd. And who said it should? If you’re dealing with a friend, or someone you know, that’s different from how you’d deal with a stranger. TL is a stranger. She needed to self-censor, and so did the people responding to her. These are the social niceties that prevent us from being cavemen, no? > [@](#): > > Demanding that men only hit on women in a manner that’s acceptable to everybody is bonkers. Well, then good thing I didn’t say that. Everyone involved IN THE CONVERSATION should be OK with it, not everyone in the world. That involves everyone using some judgment and not just libido. > [@](#): > > Again, you call something a strawman and then make the very same statement that you’re claiming is a strawman. And as I noted, you’re justifying your claims that men are simply out of control by pointing out men who, correctly, state the facts of human biology. Men who try to have sex with attractive women are no more “out of control” than are women who try to have children. The facts of human biology do not compel men to write out things like “Show us yer tits.” A human brain makes a choice to type that out and hit send. Don’t hide behind biology here. Nothing about biology makes you post on the Straight Dope. No one was trying to have sex with Tracy Lord. They were just trying to irritate and belittle her. Big difference, your irrelevant rants about biology notwithstanding. > [@](#): > > But classifying perfectly normal, healthy, natural human sexuality as “out of control” is offensive and phobic on a number of levels. Please, point out where I said anyone was out of control. I already said this, but I’ll say it one more time: dba Fred said that men could not be expected to control what they said when women mention boobs. I think that’s ridiculous. So, once more with feeling: it’s not me saying that men are out of control. It’s a man saying it. Sic 'em. > [@](#): > > Men initiating sexual advances with women who attract them, as long as the men are looking for a mate, is 100% normal, natural, and healthy behavior. Alleging that it is “out of control” demands that in order to be ‘in control’ men must engage in pathologically unhealthy sexual denial. Wow, to you, saying, “Show us yer tits!” is a man looking for a mate, eh? It’s 100% normal, natural, healthy behavior? I thought you said being obnoxious and rude wasn’t OK. > [@](#): > > Own up to your own words. He characterized men as normal, healthy members of the species doing exactly what they’re evolved to do. You, in turn, characterized normal, healthy male sexuality as “caveman” behavior. And, honestly, it does betray sexism. I can’t help it if you think that men being out of control and rude/juvenile/obnoxious is normal and healthy, but I don’t think you mean to be backing that horse. You did not evolve to type rude shit on a message board. Sorry, but all this bullshit about biology is really missing the point of what we’re talking about here, is which is behavior on the SDMB. Hence, a straw man. I’m not talking about how men behave in the real world, where an actual, flesh and blood woman is standing in front of him, because I guarantee most people would conduct themselves differently. It’s the relative anonymity and groupthink of a message board that allows situations like this to occur. > [@](#): > > Unless, of course, you’re willing to say that any woman who talk about her biological clock is, likewise, admitting to totally being out of control and a cavewoman berserk with primal lust. > Would you say that? Is a woman’s wish for motherhood analogous to a sexually crazed cavewoman? How about a mother obeying maternal urges and protecting her children from danger? A berserker, lunatic Viking, or a “mom protecting her kids”? If me talking about my biological clock offended you, made you feel like shit, or was somehow considered rude, obnoxious, or juvenile in the relevant context, then your analogy would be valid. Since it doesn’t affect you in any way, nor is it remotely about you, then your analogy fails. > [@](#): > > Again, it’s similar to the attitude that any man who has an urge to masturbate and carries it out is somehow sexually damaged. That if someone says that men have to relive sexual tension by ejaculating, that it’s an insult to men, and it’s saying that men are just out of control. Now I just have to ask, what the hell are you talking about now? Who said anything about the acceptability of male masturbation? Please stay on topic. We’re talking bout the posting habits of certain men on the SDMB. Focus! > [@](#): > > So to put a finer point on it, you weren’t alluding to rape as a reified concept, but making a 1:1 comparison between men who think it’s okay to flirt with a woman who makes a point of dropping in and absolutely irrelevant detail in a conversation and telling them how sexually attractive her tits are, and how rapists justify their raping women. Wrong, wrong, wrong. YOU made the connection to rape, and you are riding that pony for all it’s worth in your thirst for something to be outraged about. Victims are blamed in situations other than rape, Finn. Targets are blamed whenever anyone gets hurt, it seems. The connection to rape is coincidental, and it’s your credibility that’s suffering by continuing to flog this illusory connection. I’m not discussing it anymore because you fabricated in and are pinning it on me. Nope, not gonna happen. > [@](#): > > Wouldn’t I be a cowardly, thin-skinned wimp if I cast some undesired flirting as something that ‘victimized’ me? > Yes, yes I would. And so would a woman. Again, you give the word “victim” some intense, horror-filled meaning. I think Tracy Lord was the victim of, at worst, teasing, until you came along and called her a cocktease attention whore offense troll, when it became verbally abusive bullying. A victim doesn’t have to be a murder victim or a rape victim. You can be a victim of bad luck, or bad judgment, or any number of less sinister things. Don’t be all dramatic about it, it muddies the waters. > [@](#): > > All I’m able to do is use my own judgment to try to analyze your words. Especially when you do things like allege that breasts (especially breasts that look _amazing_!) aren’t sexual in western culture, because to you, your own are generally just parts of your body, no different than your knee. Again, wow, totally not what I said at ALL. I said breasts can be sexual or non-sexual, depending on the context. Your black and white depiction of my stance here is another straw man. You’ve got a veritable cornfield full of them. > [@](#): > > Along the same lines, your earlier claim that when Tracy said her breasts looks _amazing_, that she wasn’t really saying she had _amazing_ breasts. Ignoring, of course, that in western culture breasts that ‘look’ _amazing_ are _amazing_ breasts, because that that’s the very definition. We refer to “nice tits” because of how they _look_, not due to any functionality. It isn’t a comment like “Nice tits, I bet you can prop a door open with those real good!” I still contend that there is a difference between saying “my breasts look amazing in that shirt” to “I have amazing breasts.” Maybe, without the shirt, they look horrible. Maybe they ARE actually really ugly, but the shirt has mystical powers that makes them look good, hence her need to get that damn wine stain out. Your need to make the two statements the same is either you being deliberately obtuse so that you can push home another inaccurate point, or a genuine failure to understand why women love certain items of clothing. The shirt MAKES HER LOOK GOOD. Better than other shirts do. If her boobs were inherently amazing, I imagine it wouldn’t matter WHAT shirt she wore. Do you understand the difference now? > [@](#): > > Stuff like that betrays such willful ignorance and agenda driven rationalizations that I cannot, in good conscience, take the rest of what you say at face value. If you’re not going to play straight, I will, perforce, analyze your statements for what you’re really trying to get at. Oh, ditto and right back atcha. > [@](#): > > Do we have to perform some semantic tap dancing here? How about “hitting on”, would that be better than “flirting”? dba Fred was neither hitting on her nor flirting with her. He was needling her. He wasn’t expressing sexual interest, he was just being a dick. Isn’t that clear to you now? Is that someone you really want to defend with such vehemence? He’s not saying what you’re saying, which I actually agree with, which is that there are healthy ways for a man to express his libido. He’s saying that he can’t be expected to curtail his rude, obnoxious comments if he sees that a woman has typed the word “boobs” in a message board post. You don’t agree with that, I don’t agree with that. What’s the problem here? ---
**Author:** ![Suse](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/df705f/32.png) [@Suse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Suse)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2009, 12:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-is-sexism-okay/490037/430 "2009-03-23T00:55:34Z")
> [@acsenray](#): > > “My views” as I have expressed them in this thread are limited to a very few, narrow points. I have explicitly said that I am not interested in addressing the other questions being asked and it’s pretty shitty for you to try to force me to through intellectual blackmail. Well to be plain about it, if my interpretation of what you are saying ends up being that you are only concerned with your own convenience and that of those who think that posters who get offended by the types of ‘joking’ posts we have been discussing in this thread should just shut up and get over it so the boys can play at will without any humorless feminazis to repress their sexual drives, then it might well be a disservice to you that I end up thinking that. I gave you the opportunity to speak and you declined, I tried to make you see that I was actually interested in your thoughts and thought perhaps I was coming to the wrong conclusions and you’ve decided that was ‘intellectual blackmail’. I accept that rational people can have different conclusions, but this tightrope you’re walking in order to avoid saying anything is a bit absurd. ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2009, 1:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-is-sexism-okay/490037/431 "2009-03-23T01:08:46Z")
You should have no reason to make any interpretation regarding questions I have explicitly declined to address. I am sure there are countless issues regarding which I have not told you my position. This is no different. ---
**Author:** ![kidchameleon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/898d66/32.png) [@kidchameleon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kidchameleon)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2009, 1:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-is-sexism-okay/490037/432 "2009-03-23T01:14:23Z")
> [@acsenray](#): > > “My views” as I have expressed them in this thread are limited to a very few, narrow points. I have explicitly said that I am not interested in addressing the other questions being asked and it’s pretty shitty for you to try to force me to through intellectual blackmail. Would photographic blackmail have been worse? ---
**Author:** ![Suse](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/df705f/32.png) [@Suse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Suse)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2009, 1:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-is-sexism-okay/490037/433 "2009-03-23T01:37:52Z")
> [@acsenray](#): > > You should have no reason to make any interpretation regarding questions I have explicitly declined to address. I am sure there are countless issues regarding which I have not told you my position. This is no different. I will endeavor to have no opinion at all regarding your views. ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2009, 1:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-is-sexism-okay/490037/434 "2009-03-23T01:42:18Z")
> [@kidchameleon](#): > > Would photographic blackmail have been worse? Photographic blackmail would definitely be illegal. So, I suppose society thinks it’s worse. Photographic blackmail would also probably cause significant mental anguish to the blackmailer. There are some things you folks just don’t need to see. > [@Suse](#): > > I will endeavor to have no opinion at all regarding your views. Capital! ---
**Author:** ![Invisible\_Chimp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/f05b48/32.png) [@Invisible\_Chimp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Invisible_Chimp)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2009, 1:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-is-sexism-okay/490037/435 "2009-03-23T01:57:49Z")
I love breasts. I am a breast man. Sometimes I get the urge to ask for a cite or pics when breasts are mentioned. But I resist the urge to do so because it’s not funny anymore if it ever was and I’ve only seen it work once on all my time on the web(not on the SDMB.) The one time it did work, she did have amazing boobs though. If I can resist the urge, so can other men on the SDMB. OTOH, I think the OP was being oversensitive because she brought them up first. ---
**Author:** ![Auntbeast](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Auntbeast](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Auntbeast)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2009, 3:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-is-sexism-okay/490037/436 "2009-03-23T03:35:19Z")
If there was ever a doper I would show my amazing breasts to, it would be **Vinyl Turnip**. Thanks for the laughs! A chick named Tracy Lord talks about a shirt that makes her boobs look AMAZING! And she is shocked at sexual comments? Really? 9 pages? I’m thinkin’ this whole thread is a whoosh. ---
**Author:** ![Zeriel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/58956e/32.png) [@Zeriel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zeriel)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2009, 5:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-is-sexism-okay/490037/437 "2009-03-23T05:15:04Z")
> [@Rubystreak](#): > > I still contend that there is a difference between saying “my breasts look amazing in that shirt” to “I have amazing breasts.” Maybe, without the shirt, they look horrible. Maybe they ARE actually really ugly, but the shirt has mystical powers that makes them look good, hence her need to get that damn wine stain out. Your need to make the two statements the same is either you being deliberately obtuse so that you can push home another inaccurate point, or a genuine failure to understand why women love certain items of clothing. The shirt MAKES HER LOOK GOOD. Better than other shirts do. If her boobs were inherently amazing, I imagine it wouldn’t matter WHAT shirt she wore. Do you understand the difference now? See, I dunno, I also think there’s a world of difference between “show us yer tits” and “oh, you look great in the shirt? Photo evidence, please, after you get the stain out!”. And that’s really the other thing I think a lot of us are all getting bent out of shape about–consider the latter query can be easily and low-key flirtatiously answered with a picture one might have on their flickr/facebook account anyway (I know I have a few pics that are labeled “me in my \
”). The other thing, I suppose, is that I’m still not seeing how this is sexist. But then again, I HAVE been asked before to provide a pic after asking a “how do I fix this great item of clothing” (which, for the record, was in my pre-dope days and concerning a rip in the crotch/inseam of my good suit pants). Now maybe it’s just me, but “Let’s see a picture of that!” is not an unreasonable response to “I look great in this item of clothing I can wear to semi-formal occasions”. ---
**Author:** ![RaftPeople](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/6f9a4e/32.png) [@RaftPeople](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RaftPeople)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2009, 6:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-is-sexism-okay/490037/438 "2009-03-23T06:15:33Z")
Can anyone explain how the topic of this thread is “sexist”? I’ve looked at the definitions, looked at wikipedia, it does not appear to be the correct word. I know others have mentioned this too. Am I missing something? ---
**Author:** ![Richard\_Pearse](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/richard_pearse/32/13144_2.png) [@Richard\_Pearse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Richard_Pearse)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2009, 10:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-is-sexism-okay/490037/439 "2009-03-23T10:11:29Z")
It’s not sexist, it was a bad word choice and I think that one thing everyone agrees on except Tracy Lord is that this isn’t sexism. For what it’s worth, I have never heard of Traci Lords except in relation to the poster Tracy Lord. I’m a 35 year old male who watches porn on occasion, but I really haven’t heard of this porn star. So I really don’t think it’s a stretch to imagine that someone else in the world hasn’t heard of her either. **FinnAgain** , there’s been quite sometime spent making a distinction between the statement, “it makes my boobs look amazing”, and the statement, “my tits are amazing”. For some reason you’ve consistently jumped on the words “boobs” and “tits” as being the difference between the statements when the difference is actually the word “look”. I have a shirt that makes me look trim, however I am not trim, the sometimes trimness of my body is a quality of the shirt, not my body. It may be a fine distinction but it is relevant because Tracy was still talking about the qualities of her shirt, she was never talking about the qualities of her boobs. Also, you state that we’re on the same page when I dismiss the possibility she’s trolling in favour of just being naive. No, we were never on the same page there, your statements made it clear that you thought it was most likely she was trolling or similar. Stating that she’d have to be the most clueless person you’ve ever met to not be trolling, does not equate to saying she is most likely naive, it is the opposite, you’re saying she’s most likely trolling. I’ve used “trolling” for simplicity, replace with your other options as necessary. Edit: I can’t be bothered going back through the thread to get quotes, if you’re unhappy with any of my paraphrasing, I’ll clarify with direct quotes. ---
**Author:** ![FinnAgain](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/finnagain/32/12500_2.png) [@FinnAgain](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FinnAgain)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2009, 10:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-is-sexism-okay/490037/440 "2009-03-23T10:40:32Z")
[quote=“1920s Style “Death Ray”, post:439, topic:490037”] **FinnAgain** , there’s been quite sometime spent making a distinction between the statement, “it makes my boobs look amazing”, and the statement, “my tits are amazing”. For some reason you’ve consistently jumped on the words “boobs” and “tits” as being the difference between the statements when the difference is actually the word “look”. [/quote] Meh, then I picked one distinction without a difference instead of another. If the argument is that she wasn’t saying she has nice tits _in general_, only that she has nice tits _while wearing that shirt_, it was still a statement about how she had nice tits [albeit limited to one specific dress, void where prohibited, must have proof of purchase]. Why is that even a distinction someone would spend time making? If some girl posted “I give awesome blowjobs, but only when the guy isn’t really well endowed” would we really be having this conversation with ardent defenders claiming “She didn’t say she gave awesome blowjobs! Can’t men control themselves, or are they berserk cavemen who justifying their flirting with her just like rapists would!” ? A statement about how awesome one’s tits are in a certain dress is still A) a sexual statement B) a statement about the awesomeness of one’s tits, even if it’s bound by situational constraints. And _that_ was the context in which this discussion was taking place, as some were claiming that the mention of the awesomeness quotient of her mammary glands wasn’t an obvious sexual reference in mixed company, because after all she wasn’t saying she had amazing tits, only that her tits looked amazing. [quote=“1920s Style “Death Ray”, post:439, topic:490037”] Also, you state that we’re on the same page when I dismiss the possibility she’s trolling in favour of just being naive. No, we were never on the same page there, your statements made it clear that you thought it was most likely she was trolling or similar. Stating that she’d have to be the most clueless person you’ve ever met to not be trolling, does not equate to saying she is most likely naive, it is the opposite, you’re saying she’s most likely trolling. [/quote] We both say that there are two likely situations: either she is shockingly clueless, or deliberately trolling. You find it more likely that she’s really quite that clueless. I find it much more likely that she’s the kind of person who enjoys being able to generate controversy and look down on people after she’s caused that conflict, as evinced by her keeping the same user name and instead of getting over the fact that mistakes would be made, using it _for years now_ as bait to then sneer at those cultureless clods who know the most famous porn star in history rather than a fairly obscure movie that’s nearly 70 years old. Note, it’s not a stretch that she didn’t know of Traci Lords when she registered, but she found out quickly and instead of accepting that, yeah, that was a mistake that was going to happen somewhat frequently, or changing her user name entirely, she kept the name _and_ used people’s mistakes about its origin as an excuse to sneer at them from her high horse. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-is-sexism-okay/490037.md?page=21) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-is-sexism-okay/490037.md?page=23)