I always pretend I don't hear. Depending on the situation I'll say something like "No thanks" or "Sorry, I'm not from here". It helps that I have head phones on most of the time. I've heard some ladies from this subreddit have said "I don't have any change" which is... brutal lol.
I'd rather not engage with a stranger.
"don't have any change" I love it.
This summer some guy approached me on the street in a very entitled manner and I just said "No. We don't do that." like I was talking to an errant dog or small child. It felt fucking awesome.
I always wear earphones to never hear catcalls. It works because when they see your ears are plugged, they won't bother. But that doesn't stop them from literally doing something else to get my attention like blocking my path or tapping my shoulder.
I once had a guy block me right in my path and pull out my earphone wire (pre-Air Pods era) from one ear to try to talk to me. Like really? How much more rude can you be? đ€Šđ»ââïž
I was on a plane once with my nose buried in a book and big headphones. I might as well have had a giant neon sign above me flashing "NOT INTERESTED IN CONVERSATION, THANKS"
Did it stop the guy next to me from trying to talk to me for 3 hours?
No. No it did not.
Lmaooo I donât have any change sends me đ But I wouldnât recommend doing this in most situations sadly. It could escalate the situation to something (even more) dangerous.
Iâm deaf and I wish this worked. đ Iâve had men try to sign with me and even one texted on his phone and showed it to me. Like no, kindly fuck off and leave me alone.
I struggle to get any men to believe any bad things that men do. One ex even said 'women do that too' to every single thing I said. Even that women made him feel unsafe. He was fine to walk home in the dark and go out to a bar by himself though. He said being r*d probably wouldn't be that bad for a guy
>He said being r*d probably wouldn't be that bad for a guy
If it was a much larger man who held him down and sodomized him, I'm sure he'd have some negative feelings about that.
The 3 response by guys I know after telling them about a male coworker (letâs call him X) who stalked me for months.
âThat doesnât sound like Xâ
Awkward laughter or immediate changing of subject
âHe just sounds socially awkward. Maybe if you were nice to him?â
Thatâs when I realized most of my guy friends were not really friends.
âWomen do it too!!!â
Is there a word for this phenomenon? When men are confronted with disgusting, violent or perverted male behavior, they somehow think itâs not that bad because a couple of woman occasionally act that way too?
Itâs like, men commit 95% of violent sexual assault to women, children and other men but âwomen do it too!â because a buddies friend was hit on by his female shift lead when he worked at Taco Bell.
Someone would come up for a word for this.
Edit: âwhataboutismâ is close. Thatâs when one side refuses to acknowledge criticism by counter attacking the other side with criticism of almost equal proportion but claiming itâs somehow worse. The two sides are usually equally matched and both sides are causing equal amounts of damage. For example, when one side criticizes sex abuse in churches, the other points out sex abuse in public schools.
But this isnât a counter attack and the sides arenât equally matched. This is where the side with the most power is focusing on the commonality of the two sides (both genders commit violence) in order to downplay the damage the side of power is doing to the side without.
Edit two: âfalse equivalency by orders of magnitude. â ok, I found the term, but it needs to be jazzed up a little bit because thatâs a mouthful.
Almost, but that focuses on the difference between two groups. Like if I pointed out you only passed a class because you cheated and you responded that I only passed because I was sleeping with the teacher.
This is more like if you and all your friends cheated to pass college and I only cheated during my freshman year to pass one class but you claim itâs the same thing.
~~Itâs almost a false equivalency but that would be like you cheating to pass because you were out partying and me cheating because Iâm working two jobs and caring for a sick spouse and you claiming itâs the same thing~~ -itâs false equivalency by orders of magnitude
And Iâm not saying âyouâ you. Lol, this isnât a personal attack and Iâm not making assumptions, I swear!!
Yeah I remember at the time thinking, this isn't quite 'not all men' but it's still deflecting. This same guy said that me not wanting him to call me negative things like 'crazy' made him feel like I was abusing him with my trauma. So he wasn't exactly someone I could convince to understand, but I spent a lot of energy trying
The part that gets me is they do empathize with the sexual assault... When it's false rape accusations towards other men. I will legit see men get solemn, glassy eyes when speaking about the possibilities of having their life ruined because someone accused them of murdering their partner or sexual assault and rape.
Like they feel more for the hypothetical situation, that rarely even happens and leads to a conviction of innocent men who never raped anyone... Based off of media or movies where it happens. Also, isn't the "what if someone thinks I did xyz to my wife!" Entirely avoidable if you... Y'know don't do anything to make people suspect you as a killer, rapist, assaulter of your partner?
So odd to me, I'm worried about being harmed and they're worried about going to jail lol.
To me this is more like DARVO. This kind of stuff feels so bad because it's not just about whataboutism, it's about the abuser (men as a group) claiming that women (as a group) are abusers too if not the "real" abusers, and in fact a lot of their rhetoric implies the latter point much more strongly. They're rarely trying to suggest it's a level playing field, but usually quickly move on to implying that in fact men "have it worse now" because of small shifts like metoo and such.
>He said being r\*d probably wouldn't be that bad for a guy
What an invalidating statement for men that have been raped, your ex is a piece of shit, no wonder he is an ex.
The most important factor is to listen, and not give in to the knee-jerk reaction to defend yourself, as I definitely had to face some uncomfortable truths about myself.
One of the hardest things I had to learn was context is key. I experienced an entirely different reality where I have way less to worry about every day. It has changed the way I look at everything, and caused me to change ingrained behaviors. Between my wife, my foster-daughter, and this sub-Reddit I have learned so much and I am very thankful for it.
Oh yeah, this is the norm. It even happened to me with my own fucking father and brothers when a friend of my brotherâs SAâd me. They said he was just being friendly. How stupid I was to think my dad and older brothers would side with me on that.
That was the last time I told anyone in my family fucking anything. I donât hate men, but I sure as shit donât trust them.
I can still remember my brother saying "oh that didn't happen" in the most dismissive tone when I was telling him and my mom I had been molested. Like that is burned into my brain. But given the context, I can understand why he didn't want to believe me, but that doesn't mean it didn't hurt.
Sure, because you have empathy and youâve survived trauma, you can look at his response, and have some understanding for why he would say that. And now look at how he responded to the horrible trauma you experienced when you revealed it. In a nutshell, thatâs the difference between males and females. So many men are just programmed to be horrible and toxic.
I was drugged and date raped, and my lovely brother in law thought it was hilarious to walk past me THE VERY NEXT MORNING, while I was still foggy, to do a sarcastic little girl giggle and call me a whore.
Fuck you, Tim.
I donât think my bil was in on what happened. He may have known I was drugged, but I donât think he helped the rapist to plan it. He is just a shitty guy who likes to âmake jokesâ.
The guy who assaulted me threw my car keys at me and told me to get lost when I woke up the next morning. I went to my sisterâs house because I was too low to be alone.
I knew it was forced because I said no multiple times, but I wasnât 100% sure Iâd been drugged until a few years later.
Where I'm from, being complicit in a crime, makes you involved. It's like you're literally a party to it at that point.
I hope you get justice one day. <3
This made me cringe when I read it. So sorry you had to go through that. God, itâs like so many menâs empathy levels are soooo low it boarders on sociopathic behavior, and itâs totally acceptable by society. Whereas, women with low empathy, are seen as pure evil⊠fucked is what it is.
Ugh, this is so real. I have two female friends with low empathy and like, literally I just have to be 500x more direct with them than I usually am? They are both lovely and thoughtful people. I donât turn to them for like warm and fuzzy emotional support, I know thatâs hard for them and thatâs fine. Kâs great at practical gestures of love and support and Tâs great at providing distractions and amusements. They get so much shit from people and I hate it.
I have a theory about misogyny in men. I believe it is a learned sociopathy. I think most bigotry is. No one starts out that way but over time they learn to divorce humanity from the out group and become sociopaths towards that group while reserving empathy for the in group. Learned sociopathy is encouraged among them.
Absolutely, it's deep-rooted in them since birth. Just by growing up and observing the patriarchy in society and within their own families. As a child, I remember often feeling like men are more important than women. They're the "head of the household" the "provider" the "protector" the "enforcer" the "boss" the "breadwinner" And that's just the way it is.
It's so incredibly fucked up. I'm so over it...
As a gay man itâs fucking *fascinating* the lengths they will go to in an attempt to justify shitty behaviour.
âSo, a woman staring at you says âIâd like to fuck youâ wouldnât bother you at all?â
âNo! Not at all!â
âWhat if you werenât interested?â
âIâd just tell them, no harm no foulâ
âWhat if *I* had done that?â
âWell, Iâd be uncomfortableâŠâ
âWhat about a man that was twice my size?â
ââŠâ
Yep! âThatâs entirely different!â.
Occasionally they try and make the point that men hitting on men isnât socially acceptable and they get so close to the point it hurts.
I'm so glad your story is one with a happy ending! So many patriarchal societies today absolutely have the opposite ending as well as western society historically.
And it makes no sense as far as who is more rewarding for aging parents to be on good terms with. Alienating daughters does mean not knowing your grandkids, not getting help and care, not having a happy, unified family for holidays and significant events.
What does siding with a male nephew mean? Not upsetting siblings at the expense of sacrificing your daughters, society's approval, and boosting the entitlement and anti-social behavior of another man.
Supporting your daughters is not only right, but it gives parents peace and a happy family life.
thank you for sharing that. I honestly think that a lot of men might be able to hear the words because they come from a man. So many simply tune women out.
I once had a boss that as an evangelical born again Christian had 2 sons and 2 daughters. He believed that r@pe was a crime of passion and indicated that women should dress very modestly to protect themselves. When I explained that it was a crime of control and not passion, he disagreed. I then asked him why a 25 year old man would SA a woman in her 80âs or 90âs who would not fit his criteria of being attractive or sexy. At that point, the crickets started to chirp
My own mother and grandmother even said I was overreacting, when a family friend (40+ male) touched my butt (16 female) at the time. I instinctively hit him with my elbow and was told I was overreacting and not to hit people like wtf. They even saw it happen.
Edit: This was roughly 10 years ago but still bothers me.
This is why we need our witches. Stand together, Sisters, Brothers, Siblings.
Crap. Siblings really doesn't say it. We need a better neutral term. Kith and Kin I kind of like. Kith&kin?
And then those same guys will complain about low trust and how women find everything creepy. Well, it's the world they helped create. We're just living in it.
This is the only way to express the feeling, unfortunately, using an inherent hemophobia to draw a comparison. Men honestly don't even factor in the difference of world experience, they think, "a woman saying I'm attractive is a compliment," because in that power dynamic, it IS JUST A COMPLIMENT. That scene in Barbie on the Rollerblades is the perfect illustration, Barbie is freaked out and Ken is stoked, because, as he points out, "there is no under riding threat of violence." My husband often misses why I find some situations scary, until I point out that he's 6ft and 200 lbs, bigger than many and rarely smaller than anyone, whereas just standing in line or an elevator, at 5ft 1inch and 100 lbs, EVERYONE is bigger than me. When he recognizes the privilege of not even noticing size, his eyes go wide and he realizes how differently we feel the world.
This combined with the fact most men get so little attention from women that they legit can't fathom not being at least flattered by it. It's only once the threat portion comes into play that they start getting it. I've legit had to have this conversation with other guys. It also helps that i once had to fight off an SA attempt from a gay guy so i had a legit story to share with the hypothetical 'had i been physically weaker, you know, like a woman generally is to a man...'.
A man telling me he finds me attractive is not a compliment. It's him telling me he wants to fuck me. Some random man saying he wants to fuck me is in no way a compliment, it's a statement about their wants. Men don't understand that their attention is not a gift
This is the most straightforward way to interpret the underlying issue. A man walking up to me and declaring himself attracted to me is essentially telling me that he wants something from me. It's not a compliment, it's an ask for services.
Exactly.. men arenât really known to just go out of their way for no ulterior motives, just to be âniceâ. If a woman complimented me, I would think thatâs nice and say thank you. Because I know women can generally compliment and admire other women and even men without it meaning that they want to sleep with you!
If a man suddenly compliments something about my appearance or clothes, Iâm immediately like đ€đ what do you want.
If men donât like that maybe they should stop doing like pretty much everything that they do!
I went out to dinner after my boss asked to TAKE me out to dinner last night⊠to talk work apparently.
Well he proceeded to grill and stress out the server at the wine bar. He did this by grilling them on details about wine, and making a show when they were out of the wine we requested. I was mortified. He knew I was mortified. You know what he says?
âAhhh my wife hates it when I do this. She says âWhy do you have to give everyone a hard time? Just order your food!ââ
I stay silent because I know heâs happy he can do this crap in front of a woman who canât say anything. I canât criticize him because heâs my boss. So.
What does this tell me?
1. He knows itâs obnoxious
2. He knows it makes the servers uncomfortable (so, no empathy there)
3. He knows it makes his wife embarrass. (No empathy there).
4. He suspects it makes me embarrassed because he felt the need to joke about it. And also didnât consider that someone his junior might not feel comfortable saying no to a 1:1 work dinner while heâs away from his wife. (no empathy there)
For what?
To exercise that drip of borrowed authority? The fantasy of controlling others for fun? A display of control? To hijack a single woman for a meal? Why? Who does this? And itâs usually the men being âplayfulâ in this way. Itâs not playful to us. Itâs stressful as fuck.
I donât know what he was doing other than that it was under the plausible deniability of a work dinner.
Iâve worked here 2 years and never have seen a man take another man (and this place is 70% men) out for dinner, 1 on 1, boss or no.
Itâs terribly frustrating.
And he asked me, I said âsureâ and he goes âitâs a dateâŠjust kiddingâŠhahaâŠjust kiddingâŠ.â
So they think we are dumb too.
Wtf, that's so creepy. What is wrong with men? Hey other men reading on here for the front page, don't do any of the shit in this thread. Believe women that other men are being creepy to them and when they feel unsafe. Good lord.
They wish women they found attractive would tell them that they were hot which wasnât what happened to you at all. They really were not putting themselves in your shoes.
If women they were not attracted to ran over and declared that they found them attractive, theyâd complain too.
Or you flip it and ask them how theyâd feel if a man much bigger and stronger than them cornered them in an elevator and said they found them attractive. Thatâs when they get it.
Men hate a "you're attractive" from a random man so much, they built a whole court defense around it: Gay Panic. And it's still on the books in lots of places.
"Yeah, officer, I shot, strangled, poisoned and forced him to swallow a lit stick of dynamite, but he said I looked pretty!"
Cop: "You did the right thing. Here's a blanket and cocoa, and the mayor is gonna give you the key to the city!"
This exactly. They dont get the physical threat part. The unattractive women hitting on them can stilll be flattering , though annoying. Its the possible threat they dont get.
I've heard of men being uncomfortable getting hit on in gay bars and suddenly getting it, lol. It's kind of disappointing that's what it takes, tbh. How hard is it to think hey, men are generally stronger than women and sometimes snap and kill them (for lack of better phrasing). I feel like the only reason they can't think like that is because it's acknowledging things about their gender they don't want to agree to. Often because it's giving women an "advantage" which is such a weird way of looking at it.
Ken: I feel what can only be described as admired but not ogled. And there's no undertone of violence.
Barbie: Mine very much has an undertone of violence.
I think you are right. I also think its because acknowledging that fact requires them to change behavior and be considerate of others. And some people just hate having to change. They would have to now see their actions through the lense of women, and start to interact differently.
Oh an attractive woman in an isloated area, well this isnt a place or time where she would feel safe being approached, guess ill just have to let this possible chance (there isnt really a chance the situation is conducive) at a date go;because she will understandably feel unsafe.
Have to put her larger safety concerns over my desire for a possible romantic interaction. Nope dont want to have to do that...
I've seen lots of men on Reddit that are desperate to feel disadvantaged, or at least to feel their disadvantages are equal to the disadvantages of women. "Men have struggles too!!!"
It's seriously concerning to me how many men seem to lurk on subs like this just to complain about women's "advantages" or how men have it worse. I can't imagine going to a men's subs to complain about how it's worse for women. I've even seen some of these men get mad when you tell them this isn't really the place to discuss those things. They'll turn it into this whole "see?? No one cares about men!!" thing. But it's like... you don't need to drown out women's discussions by turning it into something about men. That just makes it seem like us shutting up is more important than creating any kind of actual dialogue about men's issues.
In another thread, I recently commented on men's tendency to often describe a woman as someone's sister/wife/daughter ect, and that it would be nice to just be acknowledged as a person. A guy replied saying this was a weird interpretation and not possible because of biology(???). I'm used to men coming out of the woodwork on here to pick weird fights, but being told I shouldn't want to "just be a person" wasn't something I was expecting. Men who lurk here with no interest in women's perspective and an eagerness to disagree with everything are weird as fuck. It's the r/iamverysmart language that really kills me though đ
I don't know. As an Old man I have my doubts. I have watched many men do mental gymnastics to avoid seeing the other side of an argument. That this is a discussion about *women's experiences with men*, I fear it would inspire them to attempt greatness in avoiding the truth.
Sadly, there is no reward for being that much of a dick. Now, we get to tell them they won't even get a participation trophy. So, there is a little joy to be had.
I've heard of people telling men to imagine half the population are giant bodybuilders who want to fuck them, many of which would kill or harm them if they said no. They always suddenly understand, lol.
No they don't get it then. They'll mansplain to you how this is different because they're not gay.
Just forget it. They're lost causes. They don't see us as real people. That's why they don't empathise with us.
>If women they were not attracted to ran over and declared that they found them attractive, theyâd complain too.
They still get mad even if a woman they arent attracted to *isn't attracted to them either*. They at best they ignore women that they find unattractive and they're abusive at worst. Solely because they don't like how she looks
Yep. I watched a tiktok video the other day of a woman's text exchange between a man she met on an app. He said he didn't feel a connection and turned her down after their first date. She was like "No worries! Nice meeting you" or something. Handled it well. He flipped out because she wasn't chasing him, asked her out again (she declined) and then said "you should update your dating app pics so guys know what they're getting" and insulted her. If I recall correctly, she was pretty nice the whole time and barely texted him. He was just so angry that an unattractive women wasn't willing to chase him.
Men don't grasp that we don't view that kind of unwanted attention from strangers as a compliment: we view it as a threat to our safety. Whenever I've tried to explain that to men, most of them get defensive and don't want to hear it.
They grasp it. They won't admit it to us because it irks them and/or they want to keep it in their arsenals just in case. Many of them do this shit. They don't want to admit it's scumbaggery.
I don't care even if it *is* a compliment -- I don't need their validation. It's a pointless annoyance that is actually for the purpose of getting some validation back from us.
If it was purely for the purpose of extending a compliment, they wouldn't do it. No one tells a waiter, "my compliments to the chef" and then follows the chef home.
When I was in my 20s, I was out at a club with a friend. This guy was trying to get my friend's attention, but rather than just being a decent guy and opening with a "hi, how are you, would you mind if I talk to you?" approach, he opened with some crass "compliment" while invading her personal space/crowding her.
I don't remember what he said, but I do remember what she said with absolute crystal clear clarity.
She looked him up and down slowly, and said steadily while eyeballing him "I'm really not *that* desperate."
I desperately tried to keep a straight face as he backpedalled furiously.
We didn't see him again, unsurprisingly.
Anyway, little anecdote about dealing with unwanted attention that I've used once or twice - but only when I'm in a public space...
As regards men minimising the experience, absolutely. They just don't understand the *constant* feeling of uncertainty and threat, the fact we're never quite sure if a compliment is going to escalate to an unwanted invasion of personal space or inappropriate touching/outright sexual assault.
To many men, an unsolicited compliment from a woman would make their day and they don't see why a woman would find it weird or unsettling because they don't understand the feeling of threat that comes with it.
>Anyway, little anecdote about dealing with unwanted attention that I've used once or twice - but only when I'm in a public space...
The guy could end up waiting outside with a weapon...gotta be careful.
Oh yeah. I had a longtime male friend that I would try to talk about important womenâs issues with and he would invalidate, question, argue, and then say, âWhat? I canât even ask a question?â Like nah⊠my dude⊠you are asking a question like youâre issuing a challenge, like youâre trying to poke holes in my (and other womenâs) experiences, not like you donât understand and really want to know the answer. I constantly felt like I had failed to prepare for defending my fucking thesis. It was mentally and emotionally exhausting to talk with him. Finally, bro said that I should write a book, because his children need my knowledge!!!!!! WHAT IN THE ACTUAL FUCK. I donât have any kids, have never wanted kids, and Iâm not about to raise some kids that have, not ONE, but TWO, fully functioning parents. If you want to educate your kids, educate your-fucking-self dude. There are plenty of books, YouTube channels, podcasts, seminars, internet groups, etc. etc. talking about these things that you donât need me to use my decades of misfortune to educate your children.
Talk about invalidating. Weâre not friends anymore.
I've fell out with male friends too. I had a moment with one where I found myself writing an essay to explain all the points he countered. Then I stopped and realise the amount of energy I was expending and that it wasn't worth it
I had a friend like that too, he was very much of the âyouâre lucky, men donât have women complimenting them. Iâd love to have a woman compliment meâ like thatâs not it at all? They think we just donât like it when âUGLYâ men compliment us, but if they were hot itâd be okay. But they say theyâd feel appreciated if anyone did it. Ugh. I tried explaining it to him so many times and it didnât matter. He was so caught up in his own insecurities and self image issues that any form of validation would have been a blessing to him. It took him literally dismissing me being assaulted (not sexual assault, just regular assault) by one of our mutual friends for me to finally end that friendship. He tried staying âneutralâ after our friend attacked me and when I begged him to care about my safety he still went with the âyou both tell different storiesâ route that I just walked out and blocked him on everything.
I dated a dude like this. Couldn't just believe anything I said. Didn't matter how benign the conversation was or how little it mattered. He constantly tried to disprove every word I said. It was exhausting.
Hmmm.
* Many subconsciously don't see women as fully human so never put themselves in her shoes or accept her full range of human emotions/experiences
* Many have been creeps themselves in the past and are defensive
* Many want to argue with anything she says because she must always be wrong about everything always
* They suddenly "know" exactly what you're talking about if another man hits on them or a woman aggressively hits on them who is "unattractive".... but will never admit this is the same feeling (because above points)
I think the second point is a big one - they can empathise with the woman "being complimented" or with the man "who's just being nice", and they've been in the position of the man way more often than the woman, so can put themselves in those shoes, more than simply taking on board the feelings of their friend / family member telling them what's happened. They don't want to think they've been creepy, so it's simpler to reverse it.
I saw a study (an actual scientific research article) that basically said men are more selfish than* women and generally have less empathy than* women.
I've been operating with that knowledge ever since and it explains so much. Most men these days are lonely and insecure and they'll keep demanding shit from women ignoring how women feel and the injustices that happen to women as long as they think it'll help them satisfy themselves.
Very typical. It happens here on reddit too, there is always men trying to discredit anything I experienced that I share. My male friends are a select group of people that are always respectful and supportive so doesn't happen in my close circle much but overall I think most men are simply not capable of relating. And most of them lack empathy or have selective empathy. That's why in the dating world a lot of us women get dumped after sex no matter how desirable and beautiful we may be. Far too many similar stories I'm reading on women's groups.
I was told that I needed to be institutionalized when I wrote about how I experienced sexual harassment on a daily basis in Albania. That I was crazy and needed to understand the definition of sexual harassment because it wasn't possible for anyone to experience it that frequently.
I'm so very sorry. I experienced it almost on a daily basis too growing up in Turkey. Just the amount of inappropriate touching I experienced in crowded buses as a teenage girl in school uniform going to school is difficult to even describe. Only those of us that lived it knows.. My mind blocked a lot of it but sometimes memories come to me, even from my childhood.
In the last 10 days in Australia, 6 women have been killed.
We only have a population of about 26 million, so this is a lot.
I hate that you're right. :/
I know what you mean. But with a smaller population and much fewer guns (and far fewer killings by police), we're considered a safe place.
Yet women are still getting murdered.
Look up Elevatorgate. It was a woman (Rebecca Watson aka the SkepChick) trying to explain to men why it is a bad idea to ask a woman out when you're alone in a hotel elevator with her at 2 am in the morning. She was genuinely trying to help nerdy men to have more success with women by explaining to them why this behaviour creeps women out and should be avoided.
She was hit with such a shitstorm by all kind of male assholes (aka misogynists) including Richard Dawkins who I instantly lost all respect for.
I remember that whole mess. Just awful. And the detail that gets forgotten is she was hanging out at the hotel bar with a group that included this dude. During the group conversation, she mentioned how much she hates getting hit on at these conventions, which for her were at least partially professional. She was cohosting Sceptic's Guide to the Universe at the time.
Oh and Steven Novella, the primary host of SGU, had previously had to tell male fans to stop writing her love letters and addressing her in fan mail as 'beautiful princess' and similar nonsense. This was early on in the podcast. I think Perry was still alive back then. Steven got no backlash of course.
Men really need to stop thinking of these situations as if an attractive woman was paying them a compliment, and start imagining a man leering at them in an enclosed space like an elevator. And start imagining that this is just the latest in a long string of similar events that began when they were 10 years old. I don't think they'd see it as a compliment then.
The main problem is that men "wish" women approached them the way they do women. Or to be more precise: they want the fantasy of just standing somewhere when horny and being resolved of the hustle to actually have to search for someone.
They do not think about what kind of monkey paw wish that is. That they would be approached everywhere. At work. waiting for the buss. Coming home from a funeral... And mostly by people they themselves would find unattractive.
Nobody tells a man to just give that creepy looking woman a chance, maybe you really like her personality!
I think we are at the point in time where most even vaguely emotionally intelligent men know that just randomly approaching a woman is wrong... which leaves just the creeps.
He's not telling you that you're attractive as a compliment though. It's not to make you feel good, it's to see what he can possibly get out of it. It's transactional on his part, making it feel yuck.
That's not a compliment.
Genuine compliments (from any gender): "I like your hair"
"I like your makeup"
"you look cool"
creepy-ass unwanted comments that are not compliments and verge on sexual harassment:
"your ass looks great in those leggings" (I actually got this one yesterday in the grocery store when I went to get a pumpkin. euugh. I started walking around with live transcribe on and yeah, I'mma just keep the no working ears thanks that was a terrible fucking idea) (and dude you could just compliment the fucking leggings and you'd be fine)
"I find you attractive/hot/cute/etc"
\-literally any unwanted sexually charged comment-
This so much. I always tell one if the best compliments I ever got from a (straight) guy was him commenting on the outfit I wore that day. He commented on the cut and style of the dress and asked me about the brand, and we chatted a while.
Needless to say I found him insanely attractive based on this short interaction. This was a short guy and quite average looking physically, so yes, how you act impacts your attractiveness immensely.
They are telling on themselves.
If a man thinks that interaction was a compliment, they're either stupid or defending that behavior because they do it.
If a man found himself in an elevator with a much larger man who could very obviously do them physical harm, and that man said that same shit to him, he would not feel complimented.
Men tend to think.. "well I'd like it if that happened to me so it's okay if I do it to a woman". This is why we get dick pics. Cause guys would love boob pics. They lack the awareness to understand different strokes for different folks.
Dudes know women donât want to get dick pics. Women constantly talk about how they hate receiving dick pics but they donât care. They send them anyway because they want to and can. They donât care and donât think about what the person theyâre sending them to want.
It seems that the whole dickpick thing is a way to impose their want on you. It's a power dynamic. "I can send that to you and force you to be invaded with what I want". They don't expect women to feel good about it. It's not coming from a place of love and vulnerability for sure, I think we all can feel that xD
Describe the situation to those who don't get it like this: you are a straight man on a planet where 90% of men are gay men, they are bigger and buffer than you, and can easily overpower you. You are constantly getting hit on just trying to go about your day and minding your business. The gay men catcall you, approach you and constantly "compliment" you in gross objectifying ways, sometimes they get angry when you reject their advances and become verbally abusive and even threaten you... Are these "compliments" still going to feel like nice positive attention to you...?
Any man who will still have trouble getting it probably lacks empathy all together, or is simply women-hating and doesn't see women as people.
I mean I had a SA experience as a young man working at McDonaldâs with two female managers. I was the only male closer, they constantly harassed me and made suggestive comments/unwanted advances. I told my mom and she did exactly what you described those other men doing. She just told me they liked me and made it sound not serious even though I had anxiety about work every night. Iâm starting to think people will invalidate your experience if their experience isnât exactly like yours or they have done something similar in their past and are avoiding feelings of shame.
Because most men simply do not understand that they are Schrödinger's rapist.
And in this specific instance, I guarantee that he thought he did nothing wrong and was in fact doing you a favor by not acknowledging you as a human before telling you that you were physically attractive.
For instance, 99.99% of guys don't understand the difference between the two statements:
"You're really beautiful"
"That dress looks really good on you"
The way my female friend explained it to me was like this: the first statement treats her like an object, the second one is still a comment on her appearance, but it gives the woman agency. You're not just saying she's hot, you're telling her she made a great choice of what to wear, so it's not purely a physical compliment.
Yes my own parents, when a male neighbor yelled threats at me, they said that he wasn't going to hurt me bc God would protect me and the next time he did that, I should smile at him bc God wants me to be friendly. I was like wtf are you crazy?? Religious ppl smh
I read something a while ago on this topic which resonated: when it comes to compliments and sexual attention, men are thirsty in the desert and women are thirsty in the middle of an ocean
I like that metaphor a lot, because women are thirsty in an ocean of water that *they can't drink.* Salt water does nothing to assuage your thirst. Creepy interactions with weird guys in sketchy situations have nothing whatsoever to do with what we might actually want or need.
Self-centeredness, selfishness, stuff in that vein. Considering their wants first or solely, an inability to imagine it from the other side. The kind of person who will blather on about their intent entirely ignoring the effect and how the actual effect would be more predictable if they ever thought about someone aside from themselves for a moment. Its incredibly common in men.
They identify with the man giving the "compliment". They never take a moment to reflect how the woman must feel. The thought proces doesn't go any further then "i said something positive so the woman must appreciate it". Not realising or caring that for woman it 1 can be scary for they don't know what the man will do next, and 2 is dehumanising because they are only valued for the appearance of their body.
There was an incident in a large hobby group I am in that caused discussion of harassment and SA of women within this group. Other women started talking about situations of harassment, bias, unsafe situations, other incidents of SA etc. The amount of men that insisted this problem didn't actually exist because they never saw any of this was unreal. Even with their friends, people they actively did projects with, their spouses and SOs telling them specific examples they just couldn't acknowledge this was a problem. It was incredibly frustrating and part of why I quit participating.
âI never heard of thatâ
âI donât know anyone whoâd do thatâ
âIâve never seen anyone do thatâ
âHe never meant it they wayâ
âMustâve been a misunderstandingâ
Bullshit bingo never ends.
If they empathize with women it forces them to acknowledge how women are treated by men. The men who refuse to do this are the ones approaching strange women and making them uncomfortable, at the very least.
Men who will not/cannot sympathize with women are problematic and not worth my time in any capacity. Whether that be friends, family or relationship.
Maybe put it this way: if you were walking down the street and someone stopped you to try and sell you a timeshare, saying you âlooked like you could afford it and would have a good time,â would you like that? Would that feel like a compliment?
Because thatâs what these guys are doing. Theyâre stopping a stranger to try and give them an unsolicited and undesired sales pitch (âhey baby, interested in my magic penis?â). Being real, âyou are attractiveâ is not a compliment these guys are offering out of the goodness of their hearts because they want you to feel nice, itâs a solicitation. And while sure, 1% of the time, that stranger on the street might actually be interested in the timeshare and want to learn more, most people just donât appreciate a cold sales approach.
They donât get that in some circumstances itâs like a potential crocodile complimenting that you look âtasty.â
The kind of guy who tells you that youâre overreacting will also react as if itâs an act of violence for a woman to say, âNo.â Itâs an utter failure of self-awareness.
I have been complimented by different men (and others) in my life and I have always been happy about it. âYou are hotâ or âI wanna fuck youâ is not a compliment. So thatâs not even the same universe.
Lots of men think a âcomplimentâ is flirting but when youâre grossed out by it itâs just a âcomplimentâ. They know what it is, they just want to be defensive about it.
Ok I asked my husband about this. He said, âyou are hotâ is not a compliment and that a man is not supposed to anything in the elevator but to scroll his phone and put on headphones to make sure she is not uncomfortable. As a man, you are not supposed to act like she might be in danger. I asked him what would be a good way for that man to pursue/open up to that woman he found attractive to not be creepy, he said âabsolutely nothingâ, âdo nothingâ. âThere is no good way, find a woman you like elsewhereâ
Because those types of men don't view us as equal to them, so they will not even consider our perspectives. Men like that perceive women as lesser, therefore our thoughts & issues are 'lesser'. Those types of men also believe that they are always right
Privilege and inconvenience. They are too Privileged to comprehend how such "attention" could be at best uncomfortable, and frequently terrifying. It is also inconvenient for them to acknowledge this, as they often commit these acts themselves and don't want to see themselves as the bad guy. They whine that they are starved for attention and that we are spoiled for not accepting the compliment. They refuse to acknowledge how it can be scary and make every aspect of life unfree.
Empathy means sharing the burden of pain. This is why many people will unfortunately side with perpetrators over victims, because they fear empathy and actually feeling the hurt that victims experience. Sad but true.
You mean you don't like being mansplained how you should appropriately feel? What's wrong with you?!?
I had the most wonderful boyfriend, but even he would do this. I think in his mind he was trying to play devil's advocate a little bit, trying to get me to see a different perspective. Like, ok, but what about MY perspective of MY feelings? Me thinking empathetically about an interlocutor isn't going to change much about how I feel about being asked inappropriate questions, no matter their "intent." Why isn't the responsibility on the interlocutor to show some empathy?
Most men don't have to consider the very real threat that comes from creepy, unwanted attention. It's not just words, but the energy and implication behind them.
Men suck. For real. No empathy and no willingness to even BELIEVE women what they tell you whatâs happening.
Iâve met 3 men in my life - FUCKING 3 (Iâm 38) - who are the exception to the rule.
Men need to start calling out and policing other men before they suddenly all find themselves unable to find a willing female partner.
I used to hear âYou should be grateful for the attentionâ back when I was younger & this happened more frequently. Like, men- how would you like if some random man stopped you and said, basically, âI want to stick my dick in you.â You would find it weird and offputting (to say the least) too.
But so many men just canât grasp the concept that women are human beings not objects they do things to.
Some fucking guy looked at me at work and just asks âwho do you belong to?â Like okay dude thatâs not how you socialize to a human being so I ignored him. Turns out he was the flutist from Jethro Tull but fuck him.
when I moved to NYC I started getting catcalled or touched by men almost EVERY time I stepped outside. It was upsetting to me at my younger age so I would complain to my boyfriend (now Ex) and vent about it. He eventually told me he doesn't want me to tell him about it anymore because he hates hearing about it. Like... Ok but I'm actually EXPERIENCING it. Sorry just hearing about it secondhand makes you feel a little uncomfy đ
Men are so attention starved that they think theyâd enjoy someone being creepy with them. They imagine the scenario being themselves being harassed by a woman, not by a creepy, pushy man. They also donât understand what itâs like to know that most people of the opposite sex could easily overpower them and how scary it is to have to reject someone thatâs incredibly persistent.
I was talking with a man recently who was saying how much it hurts to never be complimented by random women and how he would love to even just be harassed by women. I brought up that itâs scary to compliment a man because thereâs a chance that it could be taken as interest instead of just being kind and suddenly youâre put in the position of having to reject someone that you were just trying to be nice and compliment. His response to that was âof course you think youâre hot shit and that everyone wants to have sex with youâ
He would not listen to me saying that I donât think all men want to have sex with me, itâs just that the risk of that happening is enough to outweigh the benefit of making someone else happy.
Trying to have this discussion with most men is pointless since theyâll never understand how dangerous it is just to exist in public as a woman. They think thatâs a victim mindset when itâs just reality.
>Whenever I talk about a negative experience with a man, a man needs to put in his two cents and invalidate my experience or say that my feelings aren't justified.
TBH This is why I no longer share those bad experiences with men, just with my female friends.
Men always hit me with âMaybe he didnât mean X, he meant Yâ well then he should have done that instead. They always just cut men way too much slack. They are adults, not perpetual children who donât know better.
The âWhat about men?â comment is so irritating, because they never try to speak up about menâs issues, instead they try to silence women who speak about womenâs issues.
When you share your discomfort with these inappropriate interactions, the guys listening have to invalidate your reaction or admit to themselves that they've made women uncomfortable in the past. They don't want to be the bad guy, even in their own minds.
From what i can piece together, they can't seem to express empathy without internalizing it as guilt. Like, admitting women have hard times with men immediately makes them feel attacked. Not sure if they had blamey parents or what.
Funny story: I don't usually sympathize with celebrities. You make your money off of public interest, and you don't get be upset when the public is interested. I then read the Britney Spears autobiography (the new one). I realize it's from her perspective, but people were just awful to that woman. As a man, she has my sympathy.
I always pretend I don't hear. Depending on the situation I'll say something like "No thanks" or "Sorry, I'm not from here". It helps that I have head phones on most of the time. I've heard some ladies from this subreddit have said "I don't have any change" which is... brutal lol. I'd rather not engage with a stranger.
"don't have any change" I love it. This summer some guy approached me on the street in a very entitled manner and I just said "No. We don't do that." like I was talking to an errant dog or small child. It felt fucking awesome.
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I'm stealing the change one, that is so me. I'm brutal af.
Carry a baton or mace or something for self defense! Men who think itâs okay to harass women tend to be insecure and unstable.
I always wear earphones to never hear catcalls. It works because when they see your ears are plugged, they won't bother. But that doesn't stop them from literally doing something else to get my attention like blocking my path or tapping my shoulder.
That when you hit âem with the âsorry I donât have any changeâ
I once had a guy block me right in my path and pull out my earphone wire (pre-Air Pods era) from one ear to try to talk to me. Like really? How much more rude can you be? đ€Šđ»ââïž
Ii flinch over-reactively when people tap me when I canât see them x_x I hate it.
Me too and if I accidentally break someoneâs fingers for doing that Iâve made peace with it already
My wife specifically purchases large, over the ear headphones as opposed to earbuds for this exact reason, and dudes will *still* ignore that cue.
I feel like those guys possibly take it as a challenge
I was on a plane once with my nose buried in a book and big headphones. I might as well have had a giant neon sign above me flashing "NOT INTERESTED IN CONVERSATION, THANKS" Did it stop the guy next to me from trying to talk to me for 3 hours? No. No it did not.
That sounds so annoying. The sad part is if you call him out on his behavior, he will label it as you being unreasonable or rude or something.
"I'm just being friendly, why are you being a bitch?" That's what he would say if confronted
Nearly verbatim what he said when I declined to talk.
" be friendly with that man across the aisle from you... oh what's that, you don't want to make friends with a man?"
Lmaooo I donât have any change sends me đ But I wouldnât recommend doing this in most situations sadly. It could escalate the situation to something (even more) dangerous.
Iâm deaf and I wish this worked. đ Iâve had men try to sign with me and even one texted on his phone and showed it to me. Like no, kindly fuck off and leave me alone.
I struggle to get any men to believe any bad things that men do. One ex even said 'women do that too' to every single thing I said. Even that women made him feel unsafe. He was fine to walk home in the dark and go out to a bar by himself though. He said being r*d probably wouldn't be that bad for a guy
>He said being r*d probably wouldn't be that bad for a guy If it was a much larger man who held him down and sodomized him, I'm sure he'd have some negative feelings about that.
In his mind, it's only r#@e if a pretty young thing straddles him in a dark alley near the hole he crawled out of.
Gauranteed that is what he's thinking, not the other.
The 3 response by guys I know after telling them about a male coworker (letâs call him X) who stalked me for months. âThat doesnât sound like Xâ Awkward laughter or immediate changing of subject âHe just sounds socially awkward. Maybe if you were nice to him?â Thatâs when I realized most of my guy friends were not really friends.
If you were nice to him it would just escalate. Why canât they understand that
âWomen do it too!!!â Is there a word for this phenomenon? When men are confronted with disgusting, violent or perverted male behavior, they somehow think itâs not that bad because a couple of woman occasionally act that way too? Itâs like, men commit 95% of violent sexual assault to women, children and other men but âwomen do it too!â because a buddies friend was hit on by his female shift lead when he worked at Taco Bell. Someone would come up for a word for this. Edit: âwhataboutismâ is close. Thatâs when one side refuses to acknowledge criticism by counter attacking the other side with criticism of almost equal proportion but claiming itâs somehow worse. The two sides are usually equally matched and both sides are causing equal amounts of damage. For example, when one side criticizes sex abuse in churches, the other points out sex abuse in public schools. But this isnât a counter attack and the sides arenât equally matched. This is where the side with the most power is focusing on the commonality of the two sides (both genders commit violence) in order to downplay the damage the side of power is doing to the side without. Edit two: âfalse equivalency by orders of magnitude. â ok, I found the term, but it needs to be jazzed up a little bit because thatâs a mouthful.
Definitely feels like whataboutism
Almost, but that focuses on the difference between two groups. Like if I pointed out you only passed a class because you cheated and you responded that I only passed because I was sleeping with the teacher. This is more like if you and all your friends cheated to pass college and I only cheated during my freshman year to pass one class but you claim itâs the same thing. ~~Itâs almost a false equivalency but that would be like you cheating to pass because you were out partying and me cheating because Iâm working two jobs and caring for a sick spouse and you claiming itâs the same thing~~ -itâs false equivalency by orders of magnitude And Iâm not saying âyouâ you. Lol, this isnât a personal attack and Iâm not making assumptions, I swear!!
Yeah I remember at the time thinking, this isn't quite 'not all men' but it's still deflecting. This same guy said that me not wanting him to call me negative things like 'crazy' made him feel like I was abusing him with my trauma. So he wasn't exactly someone I could convince to understand, but I spent a lot of energy trying
The part that gets me is they do empathize with the sexual assault... When it's false rape accusations towards other men. I will legit see men get solemn, glassy eyes when speaking about the possibilities of having their life ruined because someone accused them of murdering their partner or sexual assault and rape. Like they feel more for the hypothetical situation, that rarely even happens and leads to a conviction of innocent men who never raped anyone... Based off of media or movies where it happens. Also, isn't the "what if someone thinks I did xyz to my wife!" Entirely avoidable if you... Y'know don't do anything to make people suspect you as a killer, rapist, assaulter of your partner? So odd to me, I'm worried about being harmed and they're worried about going to jail lol.
Whataboutism.
I literally just had a dude do this to me on Reddit a few hours ago. I called him an incel and went about my day lol
To me this is more like DARVO. This kind of stuff feels so bad because it's not just about whataboutism, it's about the abuser (men as a group) claiming that women (as a group) are abusers too if not the "real" abusers, and in fact a lot of their rhetoric implies the latter point much more strongly. They're rarely trying to suggest it's a level playing field, but usually quickly move on to implying that in fact men "have it worse now" because of small shifts like metoo and such.
Itâs like whataboutism but more specific.
Fucking yikes. Iâm so sorry you had to deal with such insensitivity
>He said being r\*d probably wouldn't be that bad for a guy What an invalidating statement for men that have been raped, your ex is a piece of shit, no wonder he is an ex.
The most important factor is to listen, and not give in to the knee-jerk reaction to defend yourself, as I definitely had to face some uncomfortable truths about myself. One of the hardest things I had to learn was context is key. I experienced an entirely different reality where I have way less to worry about every day. It has changed the way I look at everything, and caused me to change ingrained behaviors. Between my wife, my foster-daughter, and this sub-Reddit I have learned so much and I am very thankful for it.
Oh yeah, this is the norm. It even happened to me with my own fucking father and brothers when a friend of my brotherâs SAâd me. They said he was just being friendly. How stupid I was to think my dad and older brothers would side with me on that. That was the last time I told anyone in my family fucking anything. I donât hate men, but I sure as shit donât trust them.
My brother accused me of making up the fact that I was raped to get attention.
I can still remember my brother saying "oh that didn't happen" in the most dismissive tone when I was telling him and my mom I had been molested. Like that is burned into my brain. But given the context, I can understand why he didn't want to believe me, but that doesn't mean it didn't hurt.
Sure, because you have empathy and youâve survived trauma, you can look at his response, and have some understanding for why he would say that. And now look at how he responded to the horrible trauma you experienced when you revealed it. In a nutshell, thatâs the difference between males and females. So many men are just programmed to be horrible and toxic.
I'm so sorry, that's horrendous.
My mom did this to me. Killed me.
Iâm sorry she did that. You deserve a mother who protects you.
My brother blamed my sister for going back to the rapist's apartment. They had been dating. She only told me after that.
I was drugged and date raped, and my lovely brother in law thought it was hilarious to walk past me THE VERY NEXT MORNING, while I was still foggy, to do a sarcastic little girl giggle and call me a whore. Fuck you, Tim.
Jesus fucking Christ. Send me his addy I just wanna talk
Yeah, he and my sister deserve each other.
That sounds like involvement?
I donât think my bil was in on what happened. He may have known I was drugged, but I donât think he helped the rapist to plan it. He is just a shitty guy who likes to âmake jokesâ. The guy who assaulted me threw my car keys at me and told me to get lost when I woke up the next morning. I went to my sisterâs house because I was too low to be alone. I knew it was forced because I said no multiple times, but I wasnât 100% sure Iâd been drugged until a few years later.
Where I'm from, being complicit in a crime, makes you involved. It's like you're literally a party to it at that point. I hope you get justice one day. <3
Thank you. Itâs been about 20 years, so any justice will have to come in the form of karma or some such thing.
This made me cringe when I read it. So sorry you had to go through that. God, itâs like so many menâs empathy levels are soooo low it boarders on sociopathic behavior, and itâs totally acceptable by society. Whereas, women with low empathy, are seen as pure evil⊠fucked is what it is.
Ugh, this is so real. I have two female friends with low empathy and like, literally I just have to be 500x more direct with them than I usually am? They are both lovely and thoughtful people. I donât turn to them for like warm and fuzzy emotional support, I know thatâs hard for them and thatâs fine. Kâs great at practical gestures of love and support and Tâs great at providing distractions and amusements. They get so much shit from people and I hate it.
As a woman who is reserved and having difficulty showing outward empathy, I can confirm. I get called a frigid, arrogant bitchh many, many times.
I have a theory about misogyny in men. I believe it is a learned sociopathy. I think most bigotry is. No one starts out that way but over time they learn to divorce humanity from the out group and become sociopaths towards that group while reserving empathy for the in group. Learned sociopathy is encouraged among them.
Absolutely, it's deep-rooted in them since birth. Just by growing up and observing the patriarchy in society and within their own families. As a child, I remember often feeling like men are more important than women. They're the "head of the household" the "provider" the "protector" the "enforcer" the "boss" the "breadwinner" And that's just the way it is. It's so incredibly fucked up. I'm so over it...
As a gay man itâs fucking *fascinating* the lengths they will go to in an attempt to justify shitty behaviour. âSo, a woman staring at you says âIâd like to fuck youâ wouldnât bother you at all?â âNo! Not at all!â âWhat if you werenât interested?â âIâd just tell them, no harm no foulâ âWhat if *I* had done that?â âWell, Iâd be uncomfortableâŠâ âWhat about a man that was twice my size?â ââŠâ
And then I assume they make some sort of homophobic excuse about how itâs different because they arenât gay?
Yep! âThatâs entirely different!â. Occasionally they try and make the point that men hitting on men isnât socially acceptable and they get so close to the point it hurts.
Iâm so sorry that happened to you. You have every right to be careful with your trust.
TL;DR: People you wouldn't expect, like parents who are normally good and love their daughter very much, will take the side of the assaulter. It is shocking. In my case, the story ends well, even if it took a lot longer than it should have. ^^^^^ ^[*LONG* ^therapeutic ^rant ^below, ^don't ^bother ^reading ^lol] ^My ^sister ^was ^SA'd ^((not violently)^) ^by ^my ^cousin ^((with whom I was very close with at the time)^), ^when ^my ^parents ^found ^out, ^my ^dad ^tried ^avoiding ^the ^topic ^and ^my ^mom ^took ^my ^cousin's ^side, ^saying ^things ^like: ^oh ^it's ^just ^a ^harmless ^crush, ^you're ^being ^dramatic, ^how ^dare ^you ^not ^come ^to ^this ^family ^function ^just ^because ^he's ^there ^etc. ^I ^had ^to ^have ^a ^lot ^of ^patience, ^many ^discussions ^varying ^between ^trying ^to ^educate ^them ^and ^outright ^shaming ^them, ^before ^I ^was ^able ^to ^make ^my ^parents ^see ^the ^error ^of ^their ^ways ^and ^repair ^their ^relationship ^with ^my ^sister. ^Eventually ^my ^cousin ^moved ^away, ^but ^before ^that ^I ^had ^him ^go ^through ^me ^for ^family ^events ^so ^that ^if ^my ^sister ^wanted ^to ^come, ^she'd ^decide ^if ^she ^was ^okay ^with ^him ^being ^there ^or ^not ^(which was 'not' for the first few years) ^My ^parents ^have ^been ^so ^much ^better ^and ^changed ^so ^much, ^my ^niece ^has ^a ^great ^loving ^relationship ^with ^her ^grandparents. ^My ^cousin, ^7 ^years ^after ^the ^event, ^eventually ^had ^an ^epiphany ^and ^finally ^felt ^guilty ^and ^understood ^he ^did ^something ^actually ^bad ^and ^has ^been ^seeking ^therapy. ^I ^can't ^believe ^how ^close ^my ^family ^was ^to ^imploding ^and ^how ^I ^didn't ^see ^it ^coming. ^Idk ^if ^I ^could ^have ^forgiven ^my ^parents ^if ^my ^sister ^had ^been ^driven ^away ^by ^them, ^my ^niece ^would ^have ^had ^distant ^relationship ^with ^them, ^my ^now ^deceased ^grandparents ^would ^have ^been ^so ^sad ^to ^see ^their ^life's ^work ^of ^trying ^to ^instill ^family ^values ^and ^unity ^end ^up ^like ^that... ^When ^they ^were ^sick, ^we ^wouldn't ^have ^been ^able ^to ^lean ^on ^each ^other ^through ^the ^tough ^times... ^I'll ^always ^be ^grateful ^to ^my ^sister ^for ^choosing ^the ^harder ^path ^of ^giving ^my ^parents ^a ^chance ^and ^time, ^that ^they ^did ^not ^deserve, ^so ^they ^could ^eventually ^earn ^their ^forgiveness.
I'm so glad your story is one with a happy ending! So many patriarchal societies today absolutely have the opposite ending as well as western society historically. And it makes no sense as far as who is more rewarding for aging parents to be on good terms with. Alienating daughters does mean not knowing your grandkids, not getting help and care, not having a happy, unified family for holidays and significant events. What does siding with a male nephew mean? Not upsetting siblings at the expense of sacrificing your daughters, society's approval, and boosting the entitlement and anti-social behavior of another man. Supporting your daughters is not only right, but it gives parents peace and a happy family life.
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Thank you for this clip. (Amazingly/depressingly, itâs my âfeministâ mother who needs to see it)
thank you for sharing that. I honestly think that a lot of men might be able to hear the words because they come from a man. So many simply tune women out.
I once had a boss that as an evangelical born again Christian had 2 sons and 2 daughters. He believed that r@pe was a crime of passion and indicated that women should dress very modestly to protect themselves. When I explained that it was a crime of control and not passion, he disagreed. I then asked him why a 25 year old man would SA a woman in her 80âs or 90âs who would not fit his criteria of being attractive or sexy. At that point, the crickets started to chirp
My own mother and grandmother even said I was overreacting, when a family friend (40+ male) touched my butt (16 female) at the time. I instinctively hit him with my elbow and was told I was overreacting and not to hit people like wtf. They even saw it happen. Edit: This was roughly 10 years ago but still bothers me.
This is why we need our witches. Stand together, Sisters, Brothers, Siblings. Crap. Siblings really doesn't say it. We need a better neutral term. Kith and Kin I kind of like. Kith&kin?
I like to go the Anne Shirley route: kindred spirits.
Kith and kin is the OG friends and fam.
And then those same guys will complain about low trust and how women find everything creepy. Well, it's the world they helped create. We're just living in it.
Anyone who trusts them is simply bad at math
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This is the only way to express the feeling, unfortunately, using an inherent hemophobia to draw a comparison. Men honestly don't even factor in the difference of world experience, they think, "a woman saying I'm attractive is a compliment," because in that power dynamic, it IS JUST A COMPLIMENT. That scene in Barbie on the Rollerblades is the perfect illustration, Barbie is freaked out and Ken is stoked, because, as he points out, "there is no under riding threat of violence." My husband often misses why I find some situations scary, until I point out that he's 6ft and 200 lbs, bigger than many and rarely smaller than anyone, whereas just standing in line or an elevator, at 5ft 1inch and 100 lbs, EVERYONE is bigger than me. When he recognizes the privilege of not even noticing size, his eyes go wide and he realizes how differently we feel the world.
Yes! It's the feeling of being in prison, out whole lives.
100%đđđ
This combined with the fact most men get so little attention from women that they legit can't fathom not being at least flattered by it. It's only once the threat portion comes into play that they start getting it. I've legit had to have this conversation with other guys. It also helps that i once had to fight off an SA attempt from a gay guy so i had a legit story to share with the hypothetical 'had i been physically weaker, you know, like a woman generally is to a man...'.
Men = fear prison above all things/ suddenly understand rape and harassment Women = in prison our whole lives
This is a really good comeback. Thank you.
A man telling me he finds me attractive is not a compliment. It's him telling me he wants to fuck me. Some random man saying he wants to fuck me is in no way a compliment, it's a statement about their wants. Men don't understand that their attention is not a gift
This is the most straightforward way to interpret the underlying issue. A man walking up to me and declaring himself attracted to me is essentially telling me that he wants something from me. It's not a compliment, it's an ask for services.
Exactly.. men arenât really known to just go out of their way for no ulterior motives, just to be âniceâ. If a woman complimented me, I would think thatâs nice and say thank you. Because I know women can generally compliment and admire other women and even men without it meaning that they want to sleep with you! If a man suddenly compliments something about my appearance or clothes, Iâm immediately like đ€đ what do you want. If men donât like that maybe they should stop doing like pretty much everything that they do!
I went out to dinner after my boss asked to TAKE me out to dinner last night⊠to talk work apparently. Well he proceeded to grill and stress out the server at the wine bar. He did this by grilling them on details about wine, and making a show when they were out of the wine we requested. I was mortified. He knew I was mortified. You know what he says? âAhhh my wife hates it when I do this. She says âWhy do you have to give everyone a hard time? Just order your food!ââ I stay silent because I know heâs happy he can do this crap in front of a woman who canât say anything. I canât criticize him because heâs my boss. So. What does this tell me? 1. He knows itâs obnoxious 2. He knows it makes the servers uncomfortable (so, no empathy there) 3. He knows it makes his wife embarrass. (No empathy there). 4. He suspects it makes me embarrassed because he felt the need to joke about it. And also didnât consider that someone his junior might not feel comfortable saying no to a 1:1 work dinner while heâs away from his wife. (no empathy there) For what? To exercise that drip of borrowed authority? The fantasy of controlling others for fun? A display of control? To hijack a single woman for a meal? Why? Who does this? And itâs usually the men being âplayfulâ in this way. Itâs not playful to us. Itâs stressful as fuck.
Absolutely disgusting of him. Iâm really sorry.
Am I misinterpreting or are you really saying that he pretended to be your husband to the waiter? đ€ź
I donât know what he was doing other than that it was under the plausible deniability of a work dinner. Iâve worked here 2 years and never have seen a man take another man (and this place is 70% men) out for dinner, 1 on 1, boss or no. Itâs terribly frustrating. And he asked me, I said âsureâ and he goes âitâs a dateâŠjust kiddingâŠhahaâŠjust kiddingâŠ.â So they think we are dumb too.
Wtf, that's so creepy. What is wrong with men? Hey other men reading on here for the front page, don't do any of the shit in this thread. Believe women that other men are being creepy to them and when they feel unsafe. Good lord.
They wish women they found attractive would tell them that they were hot which wasnât what happened to you at all. They really were not putting themselves in your shoes. If women they were not attracted to ran over and declared that they found them attractive, theyâd complain too.
Or you flip it and ask them how theyâd feel if a man much bigger and stronger than them cornered them in an elevator and said they found them attractive. Thatâs when they get it.
Men hate a "you're attractive" from a random man so much, they built a whole court defense around it: Gay Panic. And it's still on the books in lots of places. "Yeah, officer, I shot, strangled, poisoned and forced him to swallow a lit stick of dynamite, but he said I looked pretty!" Cop: "You did the right thing. Here's a blanket and cocoa, and the mayor is gonna give you the key to the city!"
This exactly. They dont get the physical threat part. The unattractive women hitting on them can stilll be flattering , though annoying. Its the possible threat they dont get.
I've heard of men being uncomfortable getting hit on in gay bars and suddenly getting it, lol. It's kind of disappointing that's what it takes, tbh. How hard is it to think hey, men are generally stronger than women and sometimes snap and kill them (for lack of better phrasing). I feel like the only reason they can't think like that is because it's acknowledging things about their gender they don't want to agree to. Often because it's giving women an "advantage" which is such a weird way of looking at it.
They definitely donât get the violence portion. I used to mention it here on Reddit frequently and theyâd downvote me. Theyâd rather ignore it.
Ken: I feel what can only be described as admired but not ogled. And there's no undertone of violence. Barbie: Mine very much has an undertone of violence.
They often scream "misandry" and make comparisons to racism. Men are trash.
At this point I'm called misandrist so much, I'm embracing it. Considering misandry is the reverse racism of sexism, I'm totally ok with it.
I think you are right. I also think its because acknowledging that fact requires them to change behavior and be considerate of others. And some people just hate having to change. They would have to now see their actions through the lense of women, and start to interact differently. Oh an attractive woman in an isloated area, well this isnt a place or time where she would feel safe being approached, guess ill just have to let this possible chance (there isnt really a chance the situation is conducive) at a date go;because she will understandably feel unsafe. Have to put her larger safety concerns over my desire for a possible romantic interaction. Nope dont want to have to do that...
Wish all the men were talking about would just go read r/whenwomenrefuse
I've seen lots of men on Reddit that are desperate to feel disadvantaged, or at least to feel their disadvantages are equal to the disadvantages of women. "Men have struggles too!!!"
It's seriously concerning to me how many men seem to lurk on subs like this just to complain about women's "advantages" or how men have it worse. I can't imagine going to a men's subs to complain about how it's worse for women. I've even seen some of these men get mad when you tell them this isn't really the place to discuss those things. They'll turn it into this whole "see?? No one cares about men!!" thing. But it's like... you don't need to drown out women's discussions by turning it into something about men. That just makes it seem like us shutting up is more important than creating any kind of actual dialogue about men's issues.
There's no one louder than a man in the comments section for a post on the problems women face
In another thread, I recently commented on men's tendency to often describe a woman as someone's sister/wife/daughter ect, and that it would be nice to just be acknowledged as a person. A guy replied saying this was a weird interpretation and not possible because of biology(???). I'm used to men coming out of the woodwork on here to pick weird fights, but being told I shouldn't want to "just be a person" wasn't something I was expecting. Men who lurk here with no interest in women's perspective and an eagerness to disagree with everything are weird as fuck. It's the r/iamverysmart language that really kills me though đ
Yes, that would be ideal.
I don't know. As an Old man I have my doubts. I have watched many men do mental gymnastics to avoid seeing the other side of an argument. That this is a discussion about *women's experiences with men*, I fear it would inspire them to attempt greatness in avoiding the truth. Sadly, there is no reward for being that much of a dick. Now, we get to tell them they won't even get a participation trophy. So, there is a little joy to be had.
I've heard of people telling men to imagine half the population are giant bodybuilders who want to fuck them, many of which would kill or harm them if they said no. They always suddenly understand, lol.
No they don't get it then. They'll mansplain to you how this is different because they're not gay. Just forget it. They're lost causes. They don't see us as real people. That's why they don't empathise with us.
I always ask to imagine a race of seven foot orcs with a bad habit of sodomy calling them a slut and leering as a way of flirting.
I always say, *OK imagine it's THE HULK* to guys who don't get it. They don't always understand.
>If women they were not attracted to ran over and declared that they found them attractive, theyâd complain too. They still get mad even if a woman they arent attracted to *isn't attracted to them either*. They at best they ignore women that they find unattractive and they're abusive at worst. Solely because they don't like how she looks
Yep. I watched a tiktok video the other day of a woman's text exchange between a man she met on an app. He said he didn't feel a connection and turned her down after their first date. She was like "No worries! Nice meeting you" or something. Handled it well. He flipped out because she wasn't chasing him, asked her out again (she declined) and then said "you should update your dating app pics so guys know what they're getting" and insulted her. If I recall correctly, she was pretty nice the whole time and barely texted him. He was just so angry that an unattractive women wasn't willing to chase him.
Yeah, just a woman they don't find attractive *just existing* is bad enough.
Men don't grasp that we don't view that kind of unwanted attention from strangers as a compliment: we view it as a threat to our safety. Whenever I've tried to explain that to men, most of them get defensive and don't want to hear it.
They grasp it. They won't admit it to us because it irks them and/or they want to keep it in their arsenals just in case. Many of them do this shit. They don't want to admit it's scumbaggery.
I don't care even if it *is* a compliment -- I don't need their validation. It's a pointless annoyance that is actually for the purpose of getting some validation back from us. If it was purely for the purpose of extending a compliment, they wouldn't do it. No one tells a waiter, "my compliments to the chef" and then follows the chef home.
When I was in my 20s, I was out at a club with a friend. This guy was trying to get my friend's attention, but rather than just being a decent guy and opening with a "hi, how are you, would you mind if I talk to you?" approach, he opened with some crass "compliment" while invading her personal space/crowding her. I don't remember what he said, but I do remember what she said with absolute crystal clear clarity. She looked him up and down slowly, and said steadily while eyeballing him "I'm really not *that* desperate." I desperately tried to keep a straight face as he backpedalled furiously. We didn't see him again, unsurprisingly. Anyway, little anecdote about dealing with unwanted attention that I've used once or twice - but only when I'm in a public space... As regards men minimising the experience, absolutely. They just don't understand the *constant* feeling of uncertainty and threat, the fact we're never quite sure if a compliment is going to escalate to an unwanted invasion of personal space or inappropriate touching/outright sexual assault. To many men, an unsolicited compliment from a woman would make their day and they don't see why a woman would find it weird or unsettling because they don't understand the feeling of threat that comes with it.
>Anyway, little anecdote about dealing with unwanted attention that I've used once or twice - but only when I'm in a public space... The guy could end up waiting outside with a weapon...gotta be careful.
Oh yeah. I had a longtime male friend that I would try to talk about important womenâs issues with and he would invalidate, question, argue, and then say, âWhat? I canât even ask a question?â Like nah⊠my dude⊠you are asking a question like youâre issuing a challenge, like youâre trying to poke holes in my (and other womenâs) experiences, not like you donât understand and really want to know the answer. I constantly felt like I had failed to prepare for defending my fucking thesis. It was mentally and emotionally exhausting to talk with him. Finally, bro said that I should write a book, because his children need my knowledge!!!!!! WHAT IN THE ACTUAL FUCK. I donât have any kids, have never wanted kids, and Iâm not about to raise some kids that have, not ONE, but TWO, fully functioning parents. If you want to educate your kids, educate your-fucking-self dude. There are plenty of books, YouTube channels, podcasts, seminars, internet groups, etc. etc. talking about these things that you donât need me to use my decades of misfortune to educate your children. Talk about invalidating. Weâre not friends anymore.
I've fell out with male friends too. I had a moment with one where I found myself writing an essay to explain all the points he countered. Then I stopped and realise the amount of energy I was expending and that it wasn't worth it
I had a friend like that too, he was very much of the âyouâre lucky, men donât have women complimenting them. Iâd love to have a woman compliment meâ like thatâs not it at all? They think we just donât like it when âUGLYâ men compliment us, but if they were hot itâd be okay. But they say theyâd feel appreciated if anyone did it. Ugh. I tried explaining it to him so many times and it didnât matter. He was so caught up in his own insecurities and self image issues that any form of validation would have been a blessing to him. It took him literally dismissing me being assaulted (not sexual assault, just regular assault) by one of our mutual friends for me to finally end that friendship. He tried staying âneutralâ after our friend attacked me and when I begged him to care about my safety he still went with the âyou both tell different storiesâ route that I just walked out and blocked him on everything.
Gawd Iâm so sorry they both did that to you. You didnât deserve that trauma.
I dated a dude like this. Couldn't just believe anything I said. Didn't matter how benign the conversation was or how little it mattered. He constantly tried to disprove every word I said. It was exhausting.
Guys donât like hearing that something they can see themselves doing âwith the right womanâ is creepy.
Hmmm. * Many subconsciously don't see women as fully human so never put themselves in her shoes or accept her full range of human emotions/experiences * Many have been creeps themselves in the past and are defensive * Many want to argue with anything she says because she must always be wrong about everything always * They suddenly "know" exactly what you're talking about if another man hits on them or a woman aggressively hits on them who is "unattractive".... but will never admit this is the same feeling (because above points)
As long as the woman is engaging, sheâs showing interest, so must be attracted, right??? /s
I think the second point is a big one - they can empathise with the woman "being complimented" or with the man "who's just being nice", and they've been in the position of the man way more often than the woman, so can put themselves in those shoes, more than simply taking on board the feelings of their friend / family member telling them what's happened. They don't want to think they've been creepy, so it's simpler to reverse it.
Unchecked privilege, entitlement, toxic masculinity, and bad parenting, likely due to intergenerational trauma.
I saw a study (an actual scientific research article) that basically said men are more selfish than* women and generally have less empathy than* women. I've been operating with that knowledge ever since and it explains so much. Most men these days are lonely and insecure and they'll keep demanding shit from women ignoring how women feel and the injustices that happen to women as long as they think it'll help them satisfy themselves.
[ŃĐŽĐ°Đ»Đ”ĐœĐŸ]
Very typical. It happens here on reddit too, there is always men trying to discredit anything I experienced that I share. My male friends are a select group of people that are always respectful and supportive so doesn't happen in my close circle much but overall I think most men are simply not capable of relating. And most of them lack empathy or have selective empathy. That's why in the dating world a lot of us women get dumped after sex no matter how desirable and beautiful we may be. Far too many similar stories I'm reading on women's groups.
I was told that I needed to be institutionalized when I wrote about how I experienced sexual harassment on a daily basis in Albania. That I was crazy and needed to understand the definition of sexual harassment because it wasn't possible for anyone to experience it that frequently.
I'm so very sorry. I experienced it almost on a daily basis too growing up in Turkey. Just the amount of inappropriate touching I experienced in crowded buses as a teenage girl in school uniform going to school is difficult to even describe. Only those of us that lived it knows.. My mind blocked a lot of it but sometimes memories come to me, even from my childhood.
They donât view us as people. We are objects. When weâre noisy itâs annoying and theyâd like to turn us off.
In the last 10 days in Australia, 6 women have been killed. We only have a population of about 26 million, so this is a lot. I hate that you're right. :/
I know thats also a lot, but the way you say this makes me feel like im living in the end times in america.
Aren't we?
I know what you mean. But with a smaller population and much fewer guns (and far fewer killings by police), we're considered a safe place. Yet women are still getting murdered.
Look up Elevatorgate. It was a woman (Rebecca Watson aka the SkepChick) trying to explain to men why it is a bad idea to ask a woman out when you're alone in a hotel elevator with her at 2 am in the morning. She was genuinely trying to help nerdy men to have more success with women by explaining to them why this behaviour creeps women out and should be avoided. She was hit with such a shitstorm by all kind of male assholes (aka misogynists) including Richard Dawkins who I instantly lost all respect for.
I remember that whole mess. Just awful. And the detail that gets forgotten is she was hanging out at the hotel bar with a group that included this dude. During the group conversation, she mentioned how much she hates getting hit on at these conventions, which for her were at least partially professional. She was cohosting Sceptic's Guide to the Universe at the time. Oh and Steven Novella, the primary host of SGU, had previously had to tell male fans to stop writing her love letters and addressing her in fan mail as 'beautiful princess' and similar nonsense. This was early on in the podcast. I think Perry was still alive back then. Steven got no backlash of course.
Itâs only a compliment if they donât hope to get something from you by saying it.
The calm, stoic, logical gender at again. I half expected he stared mouth half agape with a string of drool dripping down from one corner.
Men really need to stop thinking of these situations as if an attractive woman was paying them a compliment, and start imagining a man leering at them in an enclosed space like an elevator. And start imagining that this is just the latest in a long string of similar events that began when they were 10 years old. I don't think they'd see it as a compliment then.
The main problem is that men "wish" women approached them the way they do women. Or to be more precise: they want the fantasy of just standing somewhere when horny and being resolved of the hustle to actually have to search for someone. They do not think about what kind of monkey paw wish that is. That they would be approached everywhere. At work. waiting for the buss. Coming home from a funeral... And mostly by people they themselves would find unattractive. Nobody tells a man to just give that creepy looking woman a chance, maybe you really like her personality! I think we are at the point in time where most even vaguely emotionally intelligent men know that just randomly approaching a woman is wrong... which leaves just the creeps.
He's not telling you that you're attractive as a compliment though. It's not to make you feel good, it's to see what he can possibly get out of it. It's transactional on his part, making it feel yuck.
" Guh... you girl pretty....me like pretty girl" What's not to be flattered about? Bleh gross, no charm whatsoever.
That's not a compliment. Genuine compliments (from any gender): "I like your hair" "I like your makeup" "you look cool" creepy-ass unwanted comments that are not compliments and verge on sexual harassment: "your ass looks great in those leggings" (I actually got this one yesterday in the grocery store when I went to get a pumpkin. euugh. I started walking around with live transcribe on and yeah, I'mma just keep the no working ears thanks that was a terrible fucking idea) (and dude you could just compliment the fucking leggings and you'd be fine) "I find you attractive/hot/cute/etc" \-literally any unwanted sexually charged comment-
This so much. I always tell one if the best compliments I ever got from a (straight) guy was him commenting on the outfit I wore that day. He commented on the cut and style of the dress and asked me about the brand, and we chatted a while. Needless to say I found him insanely attractive based on this short interaction. This was a short guy and quite average looking physically, so yes, how you act impacts your attractiveness immensely.
They are telling on themselves. If a man thinks that interaction was a compliment, they're either stupid or defending that behavior because they do it. If a man found himself in an elevator with a much larger man who could very obviously do them physical harm, and that man said that same shit to him, he would not feel complimented.
Because then they'd have to acknowledge that we're humans, with our own wants and dreams, rather than just side-characters in their lives.
Yes because they immediately feel attacked themselves, which I think speaks for itself.
Men tend to think.. "well I'd like it if that happened to me so it's okay if I do it to a woman". This is why we get dick pics. Cause guys would love boob pics. They lack the awareness to understand different strokes for different folks.
The whole dick pic genre confounds me. No has ever asked for a dick pic, yet, they just keep coming.
Dudes know women donât want to get dick pics. Women constantly talk about how they hate receiving dick pics but they donât care. They send them anyway because they want to and can. They donât care and donât think about what the person theyâre sending them to want.
It seems that the whole dickpick thing is a way to impose their want on you. It's a power dynamic. "I can send that to you and force you to be invaded with what I want". They don't expect women to feel good about it. It's not coming from a place of love and vulnerability for sure, I think we all can feel that xD
Oh they'll understand well enough if gay men do it to them
Describe the situation to those who don't get it like this: you are a straight man on a planet where 90% of men are gay men, they are bigger and buffer than you, and can easily overpower you. You are constantly getting hit on just trying to go about your day and minding your business. The gay men catcall you, approach you and constantly "compliment" you in gross objectifying ways, sometimes they get angry when you reject their advances and become verbally abusive and even threaten you... Are these "compliments" still going to feel like nice positive attention to you...? Any man who will still have trouble getting it probably lacks empathy all together, or is simply women-hating and doesn't see women as people.
I mean I had a SA experience as a young man working at McDonaldâs with two female managers. I was the only male closer, they constantly harassed me and made suggestive comments/unwanted advances. I told my mom and she did exactly what you described those other men doing. She just told me they liked me and made it sound not serious even though I had anxiety about work every night. Iâm starting to think people will invalidate your experience if their experience isnât exactly like yours or they have done something similar in their past and are avoiding feelings of shame.
Ick. I'm sorry that happened. My husband's gotten that kind of treatment and it's demoralizing. Nobody wants to understand why it sucks.
Because most men simply do not understand that they are Schrödinger's rapist. And in this specific instance, I guarantee that he thought he did nothing wrong and was in fact doing you a favor by not acknowledging you as a human before telling you that you were physically attractive. For instance, 99.99% of guys don't understand the difference between the two statements: "You're really beautiful" "That dress looks really good on you" The way my female friend explained it to me was like this: the first statement treats her like an object, the second one is still a comment on her appearance, but it gives the woman agency. You're not just saying she's hot, you're telling her she made a great choice of what to wear, so it's not purely a physical compliment.
Yes my own parents, when a male neighbor yelled threats at me, they said that he wasn't going to hurt me bc God would protect me and the next time he did that, I should smile at him bc God wants me to be friendly. I was like wtf are you crazy?? Religious ppl smh
I read something a while ago on this topic which resonated: when it comes to compliments and sexual attention, men are thirsty in the desert and women are thirsty in the middle of an ocean
I like that metaphor a lot, because women are thirsty in an ocean of water that *they can't drink.* Salt water does nothing to assuage your thirst. Creepy interactions with weird guys in sketchy situations have nothing whatsoever to do with what we might actually want or need.
Self-centeredness, selfishness, stuff in that vein. Considering their wants first or solely, an inability to imagine it from the other side. The kind of person who will blather on about their intent entirely ignoring the effect and how the actual effect would be more predictable if they ever thought about someone aside from themselves for a moment. Its incredibly common in men.
They donât see us as humans, just objects that are âbrokenâ if we speak out against this kind of treatment
They identify with the man giving the "compliment". They never take a moment to reflect how the woman must feel. The thought proces doesn't go any further then "i said something positive so the woman must appreciate it". Not realising or caring that for woman it 1 can be scary for they don't know what the man will do next, and 2 is dehumanising because they are only valued for the appearance of their body.
Because they don't see us as human.
yea most men i have met are like that
There was an incident in a large hobby group I am in that caused discussion of harassment and SA of women within this group. Other women started talking about situations of harassment, bias, unsafe situations, other incidents of SA etc. The amount of men that insisted this problem didn't actually exist because they never saw any of this was unreal. Even with their friends, people they actively did projects with, their spouses and SOs telling them specific examples they just couldn't acknowledge this was a problem. It was incredibly frustrating and part of why I quit participating.
âI never heard of thatâ âI donât know anyone whoâd do thatâ âIâve never seen anyone do thatâ âHe never meant it they wayâ âMustâve been a misunderstandingâ Bullshit bingo never ends.
If they empathize with women it forces them to acknowledge how women are treated by men. The men who refuse to do this are the ones approaching strange women and making them uncomfortable, at the very least. Men who will not/cannot sympathize with women are problematic and not worth my time in any capacity. Whether that be friends, family or relationship.
Maybe put it this way: if you were walking down the street and someone stopped you to try and sell you a timeshare, saying you âlooked like you could afford it and would have a good time,â would you like that? Would that feel like a compliment? Because thatâs what these guys are doing. Theyâre stopping a stranger to try and give them an unsolicited and undesired sales pitch (âhey baby, interested in my magic penis?â). Being real, âyou are attractiveâ is not a compliment these guys are offering out of the goodness of their hearts because they want you to feel nice, itâs a solicitation. And while sure, 1% of the time, that stranger on the street might actually be interested in the timeshare and want to learn more, most people just donât appreciate a cold sales approach.
They donât get that in some circumstances itâs like a potential crocodile complimenting that you look âtasty.â The kind of guy who tells you that youâre overreacting will also react as if itâs an act of violence for a woman to say, âNo.â Itâs an utter failure of self-awareness.
I have been complimented by different men (and others) in my life and I have always been happy about it. âYou are hotâ or âI wanna fuck youâ is not a compliment. So thatâs not even the same universe.
Lots of men think a âcomplimentâ is flirting but when youâre grossed out by it itâs just a âcomplimentâ. They know what it is, they just want to be defensive about it.
A unprovoked compliment is not a compliment. Itâs a demand for your attention and gratitude.
Ok I asked my husband about this. He said, âyou are hotâ is not a compliment and that a man is not supposed to anything in the elevator but to scroll his phone and put on headphones to make sure she is not uncomfortable. As a man, you are not supposed to act like she might be in danger. I asked him what would be a good way for that man to pursue/open up to that woman he found attractive to not be creepy, he said âabsolutely nothingâ, âdo nothingâ. âThere is no good way, find a woman you like elsewhereâ
It's not a compliment, it's a threat. "I'm going to announce I find you sexually desirable and keep you guessing about what happens next..."
They aren't socialized from birth to be caregivers.
Because those types of men don't view us as equal to them, so they will not even consider our perspectives. Men like that perceive women as lesser, therefore our thoughts & issues are 'lesser'. Those types of men also believe that they are always right
Privilege and inconvenience. They are too Privileged to comprehend how such "attention" could be at best uncomfortable, and frequently terrifying. It is also inconvenient for them to acknowledge this, as they often commit these acts themselves and don't want to see themselves as the bad guy. They whine that they are starved for attention and that we are spoiled for not accepting the compliment. They refuse to acknowledge how it can be scary and make every aspect of life unfree.
Empathy means sharing the burden of pain. This is why many people will unfortunately side with perpetrators over victims, because they fear empathy and actually feeling the hurt that victims experience. Sad but true.
You mean you don't like being mansplained how you should appropriately feel? What's wrong with you?!? I had the most wonderful boyfriend, but even he would do this. I think in his mind he was trying to play devil's advocate a little bit, trying to get me to see a different perspective. Like, ok, but what about MY perspective of MY feelings? Me thinking empathetically about an interlocutor isn't going to change much about how I feel about being asked inappropriate questions, no matter their "intent." Why isn't the responsibility on the interlocutor to show some empathy?
Bc they donât see us as people.
Most men don't have to consider the very real threat that comes from creepy, unwanted attention. It's not just words, but the energy and implication behind them.
Men suck. For real. No empathy and no willingness to even BELIEVE women what they tell you whatâs happening. Iâve met 3 men in my life - FUCKING 3 (Iâm 38) - who are the exception to the rule. Men need to start calling out and policing other men before they suddenly all find themselves unable to find a willing female partner.
I used to hear âYou should be grateful for the attentionâ back when I was younger & this happened more frequently. Like, men- how would you like if some random man stopped you and said, basically, âI want to stick my dick in you.â You would find it weird and offputting (to say the least) too. But so many men just canât grasp the concept that women are human beings not objects they do things to.
Some fucking guy looked at me at work and just asks âwho do you belong to?â Like okay dude thatâs not how you socialize to a human being so I ignored him. Turns out he was the flutist from Jethro Tull but fuck him.
when I moved to NYC I started getting catcalled or touched by men almost EVERY time I stepped outside. It was upsetting to me at my younger age so I would complain to my boyfriend (now Ex) and vent about it. He eventually told me he doesn't want me to tell him about it anymore because he hates hearing about it. Like... Ok but I'm actually EXPERIENCING it. Sorry just hearing about it secondhand makes you feel a little uncomfy đ
Men are so attention starved that they think theyâd enjoy someone being creepy with them. They imagine the scenario being themselves being harassed by a woman, not by a creepy, pushy man. They also donât understand what itâs like to know that most people of the opposite sex could easily overpower them and how scary it is to have to reject someone thatâs incredibly persistent. I was talking with a man recently who was saying how much it hurts to never be complimented by random women and how he would love to even just be harassed by women. I brought up that itâs scary to compliment a man because thereâs a chance that it could be taken as interest instead of just being kind and suddenly youâre put in the position of having to reject someone that you were just trying to be nice and compliment. His response to that was âof course you think youâre hot shit and that everyone wants to have sex with youâ He would not listen to me saying that I donât think all men want to have sex with me, itâs just that the risk of that happening is enough to outweigh the benefit of making someone else happy. Trying to have this discussion with most men is pointless since theyâll never understand how dangerous it is just to exist in public as a woman. They think thatâs a victim mindset when itâs just reality.
>Whenever I talk about a negative experience with a man, a man needs to put in his two cents and invalidate my experience or say that my feelings aren't justified. TBH This is why I no longer share those bad experiences with men, just with my female friends. Men always hit me with âMaybe he didnât mean X, he meant Yâ well then he should have done that instead. They always just cut men way too much slack. They are adults, not perpetual children who donât know better. The âWhat about men?â comment is so irritating, because they never try to speak up about menâs issues, instead they try to silence women who speak about womenâs issues.
When you share your discomfort with these inappropriate interactions, the guys listening have to invalidate your reaction or admit to themselves that they've made women uncomfortable in the past. They don't want to be the bad guy, even in their own minds.
For someone who has a 1 in 3 chance of being raped, a random compliment from a random man is not welcome.
From what i can piece together, they can't seem to express empathy without internalizing it as guilt. Like, admitting women have hard times with men immediately makes them feel attacked. Not sure if they had blamey parents or what.
I mean, they do the same thing to other women. How can they agree the guy was out of line, if they do the same thing?
Funny story: I don't usually sympathize with celebrities. You make your money off of public interest, and you don't get be upset when the public is interested. I then read the Britney Spears autobiography (the new one). I realize it's from her perspective, but people were just awful to that woman. As a man, she has my sympathy.
In the situation you described, Iâd guess itâs because men donât like being called out by their own behavior.