Sisters Under the Skin

“But it’s also troubling that my genuine gratitude implicitly accepts that casual sexism or sexual predation in the workplace aren’t really serious until a man notices. ”

My take on this is just a little different – I’d say instead that one’s gratitude simply acknowledges that casual sexism or predation in the workplace aren’t taken seriously until a man notices and speaks up. It’s unfortunate but generally true that it takes someone from without one’s own group to point out bad behavior before it can be acknowledged as a real issue.

I’m most impressed that Berryhill so precisely put into words the heart of the issue. Too often women are not in a position to act (or are not willing to bear the consequences – personal and professional – of acting). Few women in a male-dominated profession haven’t experienced at least some form of predation. The most egregious example that I’ve faced came from someone who was in a position to affect my professional life for better or worse. While I was able to extract myself from the situation with my dignity and career in tact, years later I still replay the interaction and wish I’d responded more directly, and in a way that might have caused him to think twice before trying again with someone else.

Personally, I’m grateful to those who do so, regardless of gender. This applies in this situation to Berryhill for his comments, and to you for your post on the topic.

Oh, please, J. Otto Pohl. Don’t trivialize what’s important.

As awkward as it may be, men calling out other men is absolutely necessary. I’m glad you have positive feelings about it, that’s cool. But men shouldn’t be advocating for good behavior because women will be grateful, we should be doing so because it’s the right thing to do.

It seems so obvious, yet…

“As awkward as it may be, men calling out other men is absolutely necessary”

From my experience ‘men call out men’ constantly, despite caricature, though perhaps often in private. Its never struck me as awkward. Maybe you meant publicly….

Maria, Thanks for calling this out. John has earned more than the token “cookie” precisely because he took the time to explain what’s at the heart of such casual sexism and why women don’t always make it a primary issue in a meeting.

I think there’s a difference between the giddy happiness one feels from seeing someone who’s not directly affected actually use a teaching moment around an “ism”, and the grateful feeling one has when someone stands as a comrade in a potentially hostile setting. In the first case, it’s great to see that you are not the only one to bear the work of education and that men calling out men on sexism is a very powerful tool. Not so much because men only listen to men, but because it shows men who do this that not all males act that way or think that way, and there’s a strong correlation between public expressions of sexism and the men who express those ideas thinking that every man thinks that way. This is only overcome by men standing up and saying, quite publicly, that such expressions are inappropriate.

In the second case, it’s more a feeling of comradery and not having to stand alone. In those cases I do think it would be inappropriate to valorize a man’s support of your view, but I would understand it anyway.

Don’t be so hard on yourself, it’s fun to see others take up the cudgel from time to time.

@3

I was under the impression from reading CT …

I’m sorry, are we to understand that you’re proud of being stupid or that you think that the subject of date rape is an opportunity for comedy?

Jaimie: “We can’t get rid of sex”

I’d rather not try, honestly.

@JM, #10:

May I suggest a corollary to Godwin’s Law:

“As an online discussion about sexism grows longer, the probability of intellectually dubious allegations of rape apologetics approaches 1.”

Don’t trivialize rape by using accusations of rape apologetics as a verbal club to beat down trollish posts.

I now await the inevitable and predictable accusation of tone trolling.

Curmudgeon, there is a big distance between poor social skills and saying that one of the attractions of the coming conference is the possibility of casual sex.

I’m sure there are many men in the tech fields who *claim* to be on the autism spectrum in order to excuse their social ineptness. “It’s not that I never put in the effort to learn how to interact with different kinds of people, it’s just my biology. Nothing to be done (by me, anyway), so you’ll just have to cope.” I remember when you couldn’t swing a dead cat without hitting three self-diagnosed Asperger’s Syndrome sufferers.

I am now going to walk down the subway tunnel and await the inevitable and predictable shouts of “GET OFF THE TRACKS YOU IDIOT!”

I’m here to whine about this wording:

Of course there’s a continuum of risk when a woman manouevres herself out of the power of a <b predator, going all the way from a clumsy pass to attempted rape.

I’m going to try very hard to phrase this as descriptions of my response, and not assume that I know what you really meant.

I got sad and worried when I read this, because:

I am sure that I’ve made “passes at” women in clumsy ways.

“Sexual predator” sounds to me like a description of behavior that one might reasonably demand never happen. Behavior that is never OK or excusable.

I want it to be OK for people like me to initiate contact with women.

It’s almost certain that if people initiate contact, they will sometimes be clumsy about it.

21: Yes. I meant indicating that I’m interested in someone sexually. (Which in my case happens to be women, and also that’s the case that’s directly relevant to the OP.)

It sounds like you’re saying that these conferences in particular have higher standards of decorum than ordinary life; Am I reading you right? Is it because it’s a professional event?

15: I don’t think you’re a moron. I do think the “autism spectrum” is far too often pressed into service as a convenient excuse for nerdy men who are just flat-out being rude to women. That this is out of “lack of social skills” tells us relatively little, because by and large people tend to develop the social skills they think they need to develop to get ahead. (Many of the supposedly-“autistic” men who use this excuse show relatively little such discomfort or inability when interacting with male geeks.) That such social skills are not valued in a field is, IMO, a lot likelier to tell us how prevalent male chauvinism remains therein than it is to tell us how many of the constituents are actually on the autism spectrum.

I also think that useful social solutions to “inadvertent sexism” as opposed to “sexual predation” may not actually differ that much. Those behaviours, too, are after all on a continuum; it’s recognizably the case (at least from where I’m sitting) that much of the most ardent market for the recently-birthed “Pick-Up Artist” self-help paradigm is socially challenged, nerdy males, for instance.

25: The line is a grey one. Clumsy passes that would cross the line of what most men would put up with in a similar situation* — including attempted groping, rude intrusion into personal space, persisting in unwanted and suggestive remarks or attempted conversation, assuming the woman is a hooker and proposing to pay her for sex** — are disturbingly “normal” male behaviours in lots of places. (I’d say probably, but conjecturally, most places.) There are clumsy passes that are more merely annoying, but add up to a kind of socially-aggregated harassment on account of their sheer frequency (my favourite example is complete strangers walking up to women and telling them to “smile” — I don’t understand why anybody does this, but they do, often). There are also clumsy passes that are more just awkwardness: trying desperately and failing to make innocuous conversation, for example, like poor Ralph Wiggum and “So, do you like… stuff?”

If you fall toward the latter end of the spectrum, you likely needn’t worry as much about being accused of sexual predation, although overreaction in the opposite direction are possible and do happen (I’ve seen a guy kicked out of a bar for supposedly looking at a woman the wrong way, which I’d say is excessive and wrong). But in context — when the jumping-off point is conference organizers essentially saying “so, maybe we could all go out and chase some tail [after we’ve pretended to listen to our female colleagues]?” in a “joke” survey — I would say it’s really not what’s being discussed.

* I hate to say this, but unfortunately it does illuminate the example: if you’re a hard-up straight male and honestly can’t think of any advance being unwelcome from a woman, try mentally substituting a gay man into the example instead. Granted even saying this is fucking horrible and offensive, like the “now imagine she’s white” scene from A Time to Kill, but it genuinely does help to make obvious what needs to be obvious but which certain perspectives find difficult to focus on.

** Yes, that happens… most often reported by black women in my own anecdotal experience, which doesn’t surprise me admittedly, but it’s a category of behaviour whose extent I don’t remotely pretend to fully know.

There’s also the situation of a woman politely and respectfully refusing an advance, and being treated to a tirade of abuse along the lines of ‘Fncking frigid lesbian bltch, been wasting my time talking to you then, etc etc’, making it crystal clear that the preceding conversation was utterly fraudulent. That’s a fun one.

And Arwen? Awesome comment.

I hate to say this, but unfortunately it does illuminate the example: if you’re a hard-up straight male and honestly can’t think of any advance being unwelcome from a woman, try mentally substituting a gay man into the example instead.

Thanks. My attempts to use “look, try imagining a woman who you find really unattractive” inevitably into brick walls of empty-set claims often enough for this to be a useful backup suggestion. (What seems to be the case is that such men will claim they would accept any offer of sex from any female, but would put far less effort into treating the unattractive person as a person, not just a sextoy machine to use/abuse/discard. Somewhat distressing.)

Yes. I meant indicating that I’m interested in someone sexually.

…are you not aware how inappropriate it is to do this?

Also, you’re not interested in someone sexually. They’re a stranger. You don’t know who that someone is, you know hardly anything about them. You’re interested in borrowing someone’s body because it appeals to you sexually. Very different thing, that. It’s also different from finding someone intriguing, and wanting to go talk to them and get to know them better. That is infinitely much more appropriate, and it certainly might lead to a friendship, a sexual relationship or encounter, etc.

It sounds like you’re saying that these conferences in particular have higher standards of decorum than ordinary life; Am I reading you right?

…but do you really go around indicating sexual interest in strangers in ordinary life? Like, at a grocery store? At an insta-care clinic? In an elevator? Walking along the sidewalk? Waiting for the bus? Do you spend a good deal of your time in public spaces looking at every female primarily as a potential sex partner, and trying to angle for ways to proposition them? If someone does that, that is a huge and horrible problem. At the very least, try doing a mental self-check, Is it reasonable to assume this person that I am about to talk to came here to this location primarily in order to meet casual sex partners?

Is it because it’s a professional event?

Maybe it is correct to say, propositions are even more inappropriate because it’s a professional event. But the idea that it’s generally appropriate to make a pass on a stranger is a huge problem. That’s what we mean when we use the word ‘predation’ — treating or thinking of social encounters as antagonisms or trials that stand in the way of the body you want to use.

I do think the “autism spectrum” is far too often pressed into service as a convenient excuse for nerdy men who are just flat-out being rude to women.

Yes. It is also unkind to those on the autism spectrum, who get the “spectrum” part because the range of behaviours is so goddamned wide, not because there’s some handy single characteristic to fall back on.

Arwen: I think that the big step in feminism is identifying that women’s real-world lived experience gets affected to the worse in contexts OTHER than sex and dating, in a dynamic created by sex and dating.

Oh, I would agree. But conceding it theoretically and actually implementing and living it practically are extremely different things. While the original impetus to this thinking inarguably comes through feminism, I don’t think men are liable to be able to really internalize that as a problem until that same kind of insight is built into their masculinism. I think the root difference in experience inherently infects the whole process, thinking about professional and business settings, about statistics and the feminization of poverty, the implications of birth control and divorce statistics: the whole, as it were, shebang. If I could contend otherwise with a clear conscience, I’d be much more comfortable describing myself as a feminist instead of as, say, feminist-positive. But I can’t get there.

I don’t think it’s just a semantic point, either. Many men suspect self-declared “feminist” men of performing an identification with ulterior motives. One of the vexed questions is the extent to which this is merely a silencing tactic, and the extent to which it’s actually true, a description of a kind of doublethink. Undoubtedly there are plentiful instances of both, but there are enough real instances of the latter to give pause. (Hugo Schwyzer is an example, exposed in part — arguably — because he just wasn’t good enough at the duplicity.)

37 is well put.

and have in fact been yelled at for not having sex with a guy – because he was feminist, doncha know.

Sigh.

(Although, with less goofy nighttime silliness, I can say that I’m anti-racist and pro-social-justice, but I also get your point in that I’m clearly white and the understanding of my whiteness as being an ethnicity and not just the default is pretty important to me being a good ally. So right. Any term that appeared to suggest I could support another lived experience from that same vantage point would almost be at fundamental odds with the work I need to do to get myself clear – I have met those white folks who’ve gone to a potlatch and now are cringing examples of co-opting experience, and being a real ally means NOT going there, because it can’t be done.)

(that aside was to Dr. Slack.)

It should also be clear that the issue isn’t just flirting, it’s about taking other people seriously. If somebody else is talking to you about issues of general importance and you’re wondering how she’d be in the sack, you’re not giving her the same attention you’d give to someone of your own gender. Although there’s a conceptual possibility of sexual symmetry, that’s not the society we inherited, and only a clod could fail to acknowledge that we’re still struggling and mostly failing to get women into a position of rough parity.

I think it would help if our dress clothing wasn’t so rigidly gendered. Guys wear suits & ties and they’re nearly indistinguishable, and gals wear … whatever, but whatever it is will be closely examined. How is this defensible?

(I’d say t-shirts and jeans or shorts for everyone, but in my old company, which issued t-shirts regularly, the women clamored for more feminine shirts, and some people ignored the dress code and wore respectable things instead. Chacun à son goût said Katy as she kissed the cow.)

Doctor Slack: “That such social skills are not valued in a field is, IMO, a lot likelier to tell us how prevalent male chauvinism remains therein than it is to tell us how many of the constituents are actually on the autism spectrum.”

How many autistic truck drivers do you know, Dr. Slack?

The gender balance of a field is the best predictor of chauvinism, and not just male chauvinism (go ask a male nurse, or even a male primary school teacher these days). Aspies don’t make raunchy jokes about women in Prague.

If it was the social norm for women to initiate romantic contact and risk rejection, you bet there would be stands like that asking the question with the genders reversed. It’s a bit rich to speak about gender equality, when Curmudgeon demands that men who fail to pick up difficult social skills which for women are strictly optional, should just give up any attempts to find companionship in life.

My experience in IT was that the more seriously introverted – of which I don’t consider myself one – were in rather awe of women, and ideologically feminists. People with mild Apergers’ (or what you want to call it) are acutely aware of their lack of understanding of social relationships and the problems it causes for them, so they often eargerly accept a feminist interpretation – even when that interpretation comes with a strong negative attitude to people like them.

Sometimes this even causes them to reject the autistic/aspergers designation for themselves – preferring, in essence, to see themselves as bad people rather than face the accusation of retreating behind a label. Even when they haven’t brushed their teeth for three years (that’s an actual example I know of).

I think it says a lot too that I am irrationally happy and grateful that this thread has not devolved into accusations of feminist over-sensitivity and defences of “it was just lighthearted!”. Given the Elevatorgate furore, I (rationally) fear to tread in comment threads about stuff like this.

re: “pervs”

Uh, probably[1] yes. I don’t know if you read through the comments to see the demands for “pics” in a post about blatant sexism, but perverted is a pretty good definition. Kinda like hearing a story about sexual harrassment and having your first response be “but was teh victim hawt?”

[1] “probably” because I don’t know anything about domainincite or it’s commentariat. It’s possible that this kind of humour is acceptable there – a kind of sick and twisted, gallows-type, ironic sort of humour. Actually, in this case, the term “pervs” still applies and probably has it’s own contextual meaning there (i.e. not an insult).

re: clumsy passes

As has been pointed out, context has a lot to do with it. I don’t know what industry you (Benquo) are in, but generally a professional conference is not an appropriate setting to attempt even a non-clumsy pass. And it’s not that conferences have a higher standard of behaviour – just a different one. The second quoted paragraph in the original post explains it quite well.

Maybe this is one of the problems with conferences. You get to assume everyone attending shares a specific interest. This makes it a lot easier to talk to strangers. It’s a lot more acceptable to introduce yourself to a fellow conference attendee than to anyone else you’ve never met before. But this particular nuance does not carry through to any aspects not directly related to the conference.

And there are in fact, plenty of contexts where making passes at strangers is acceptable. The term “meet market” didn’t spring out of nowhere. Heck, even some professional conferences have singles mixer type events. Sometimes even sanctioned.

re: pretend it’s an ugly chick or a gay dude

Here’s an alternate suggestion for Doctor Slack and Salient. You don’t need to play into looksist misogyny or homophobia to get them to understand. Tell them instead to imagine the unwanted advances coming from their moms. This can be especially effective because a lot of those guys have moms that will hit on everyone.

@Curmudgeon 14

I didn’t raise the issue. Please read the original post and try again.

29: There’s no real way to learn without being clumsy and awkward sometimes.

@ Dragon-King Wangchuck 52

I still don’t get the idea of “perversion” in the context of wanting to see someone attractive. Maybe it’s because it’s such a loaded and archaic term. Or maybe this is some internet slang that’s new to me, referring to desire for visual gratification as somehow diseased or wrong in an ironic way?

You kids and your fashionable hangups!

52: In my industry professional conferences generally mean professional stuff by day, and parties at night. Mostly they are opportunities to network or make friends with colleagues, very few people go to learn or get work done.

Perhaps ICANN is much more work, less play, in which case I can see why passes of any kind might be less welcome. Certainly I wouldn’t ever have considered making passes of any kind in a normal work environment.

@ Salient 21

For the love of God, there’s a pretty huge problem with conflating ‘initiate contact’ (being social) and ‘indicate one’s sexual interest’ (predation). It’s like conflating nodding hello with catcalling.

And here I thought that conflating “indicat[ing] one’s sexual interest” with “predation” was pretty weird.

Professional conferences often include social events, not to mention lots of alcohol. The main north American medievalists’ conference, for instance, includes a notorious dance. When did exploring sexual opportunities at these affairs become “red-line inappropriate”?

When did exploring sexual opportunities at these affairs become “red-line inappropriate”?

When it violates the conditions I outlined @61- especially the second one. When no thought whatsoever has been taken regarding the issues outlined by bad Jim @46.

I mean, obviously if I’m someone’s boss they’re 100% don’t-even-think-about it off limits. Or if they are asking for my help with something, that is NOT the right time.

But I can’t help being a man, and white, and being a member of other assorted privileged classes. How do I know when those may be relevant enough to make an interaction an exploitation of privilege?

@ LaBonne 64

Yes, I think that “as a human being” is a difficult concept for anyone who doesn’t think that sex is icky.

As to 46 I’m glad you reminded me of that one, because I found this part pretty loaded:

If somebody else is talking to you about issues of general importance and you’re wondering how she’d be in the sack, you’re not giving her the same attention you’d give to someone of your own gender.

First, it assumes that thinking about someone sexually detracts from thinking about them professionally. So, again with the sex=icky? Really? But I can’t be the only person on the planet who thinks that brilliance is attractive. Second, I’m bisexual, so the assumption in the second half of the sentence was laughably heterocentric. The last time I was hit on at a conference was by another male (from a very conservative Southern, Christian institution, I might add).

But, since he’d sat through my paper, we can be pretty sure he didn’t think I was something other than “a human being.”

Yes, I think that “as a human being” is a difficult concept for anyone who doesn’t think that sex is icky.

I think you win the Missing the Point Award for today. Try re-reading the OP and a large number of the responses, only with comprehension this time.

Well, Steve, you were perfectly happy to be specific previously, but now you’ve gone all wobbly. I find similarly loaded but incoherent language and unsupported generalizations from Salient at 32, and you at 51, and nothing in the OP.

@ Dragon-King Wangchuck 71

The pics were of a postcard, according to the post, that included a line-drawing of a supposedly Czech woman. But as pornography goes, that’s pretty tame. Or maybe I’ve been on the internet too long?

For more than one reason, I wish there really had been an ‘equivalent “boys” option’. Since the rules of the conference are ‘Treat all members of the ICANN community equally, irrespective of nationality, gender, racial or ethnic origin, religion or beliefs, disability, age, or sexual orientation‘ I can imagine many a gay attendee felt left out.

Oh, dear. Steve is somehow ‘noting’ my inability to view his spectral evidence.

I am undone.

I am a bit confused: what is the relationship between a postcard advertising Prague for its prostitutes, and the stuff commenters are talking about (unwanted advances)?

Perhaps a look at the very first sentence of the OP might just provide a clue: “Here at ICANN Costa Rica, a debate has erupted about the casual sexism women experience at technology conferences. “

So, let me reformulate: what is the relationship between the postcard and the OP, then?
Is it that assuming that a few of the (male) people going to Prague for work might want go with prostitutes in the free time is sexist?

75: I agree. I wish more women felt safe enough to give immediate, clear feedback when something makes them feel uncomfortable.

What upset me was the idea that being awkward and clumsy at times made me a predator. But if Maria agrees with Steve & others, then she meant to apply the word “predator” to something a bit worse than mere awkwardness.

JM, Manta1976: please knock it off. Nobody, including you, is confused about any issue of importance. This is getting close to thread derailing, which I know you would hate to be accused of.

JM,

The postcard didn’t need to have any pics. The issue is that when presented with a situation where clearly offensive sexist behaviour was being reported, the immediate replies were basically “but where are teh b00bies!” That’s kinda perverted.

Look, I am definitely pro-b00bies. I am a big fan. But there are situations where even I can recognize that “show us the tits” is kinda offensive. Say, when talking about how suggestions for combining sex tourism with a conference for a group of technical professionals where women are a small minority.

That said, the very inappropriateness of it lends itself to humour. I don’t know if domainincite regularly participates in that kind of humour. And if they do, I don’t know if it’s done with the enlightened self-deprecating attitude where it’s recognized that yes – objectifying women is clearly wrong. The whole pretending to be an ignorant chauvinist to highlight how pathetic they are.

So, let me reformulate: what is the relationship between the postcard and the OP, then? Is it that assuming that a few of the (male) people going to Prague for work might want go with prostitutes in the free time is sexist?

Do you have sufficient empathy to put yourself in the place of a female attendee already struggling with the casual sexism rife in male-dominated tech fields? If you are capable of performing this thought experiment, how do you suppose it would make her feel? How do you suppose such an atmosphere affects attempts to move such fields in the direction of gender equality? Do you care about that, and if not, why not?

@ Benquo 83

I’ve never disagreed with that part of it, and have already indicated another way (@ 74) that the display was discriminatory. There was simply no excuse for not including ‘boys’ (or ‘guys’ or something).

Instead, it’s the unexamined, 1970’s-style heterophobia in this discussion that I could do without.

DKW, Steve: please stop contributing your half of JM’s project to derail this thread.

@ dsquared 84

Please note that the following concerns something specifically cited (and linked to) in the OP, i.e., the comments on the relevant thread.

@ Dragon-King Wangchuck 86

As much as I’m inclined to agree with you, you’re still using that word, “perverted.”

Also, perhaps we disagree on how seriously to take the first comment and its reply, as well as some of the sequels. The headline of the article is “Hot girls land CZ.nic in hot water,” but the article goes on to decry sexism. I thought some of the ‘pervs’ were actually poking fun at the tension between headline and tone (i.e., “where are the hot girls your headline promised”), which are intended to point up either an oversight or a hypocrisy, depending on your perspective.

People who want a serious debate ask these questions in a forum that is open to all, and where all are allowed to participate without fear of being banned.

People who want a circle jerk ask a question like this in a place like this one.

92: That feels condescending to me, and does not help me become better. To be better means to be better in some actual, specific situation.

I have tried treating women just as I’d like to be treated and the results were not good. In fact, for me this has been a poor strategy in figuring out how to treat anyone.

So instead I try to listen to what actual existing people say they want and do not want.

The OP suggests that there are lots of cases where this is an inadequate heuristic, because women in particular are often subjected to situations where they feel uncomfortable/exploited/unsafe and don’t feel like they can tell the person who’s put them in that situation.

I think it’s reasonable to ask for some specific examples and guidelines, when the whole point is that these are situations where women are not clearly expressing their preferences on an individual basis.

96: I have been fortunate to have women who are good friends. Generally they have been kind enough to tell me if I ever did something that made them feel uncomfortable.

But interacting with women who are my friends is different from interacting with women who are strangers, which is – I now have learned – what the OP seems to be about.

You’re right that this is probably not the best place for me to learn, though.

@ Benquo 97

With reference to Maria’s third para, a quick search on ‘elevatorgate’ will give you plenty of material, although I’m not sure that a consensus ever emerged. I’d give you my own summary, but I’m not sure it’s sufficiently on-topic.

101: I did find the ‘elevatorgate’ discussions helpful.

DKW: “You don’t need to play into looksist misogyny or homophobia to get them to understand. Tell them instead to imagine the unwanted advances coming from their moms.”

Love this.

I mean Benquo, with respect, its really very difficult to buy this ‘earnestly trying to find true love’ shtick. I think a good starting point would be to live by the maxim that if I have to ask myself if my ‘game’ could be described as sexual predation, then its probably time to put it away.
Reductionist and simplistic as a premise, sure, and people make mistakes, overstep the mark so on so forth, such is life etc but your enquiries strike me more as post hoc justifications than an open mind on how to treat people. Of course all of this is subjective and context is important, but you wont have people here to walk you through it, so perhaps a conservative approach would be the best option

“Clumsy pass” = getting hit on by a beta male. Passes from alpha are welcome at professional events. I know because I pick-up at such events without getting complaints.

Benquo sounds like more of an “omega”–I can probably only help a beta become a lesser alpha.

One of the worst aspects of political correctness is the superior moral posturing that it assumes and that it indiscriminately inflicts upon others. In fact, its really a sublimated form of puritanism , which is why it is found mainly , at the private level in the anglo-saxon world (in France , we have a public form of puritanism called “droit de l’hommisme”, but that’s another matter). When confronted to intimidation when political correctness is invoked , the only attitude, to avoid being outcast, as our czechs have realized, is retreat. Note that in the original post “Dan” is anointed a “gentleman” , in recognition of his docility. The master/slave transaction is complete.

Note that in the original post “Dan” is anointed a “gentleman” , in recognition of his docility

Hee hee.

Benquo, you sound hopelessly naive. Look at “Chateau Heartiste”‘s blog to learn some dark truths.

Thank you, to both you and John, for writing about this. The things we put up with range from irritating to outrageous. I’ve been lucky not to receive some of the violent treatment several of my friends have, but we’ve all been treated as “potential playmates” rather than as colleagues.

I wrote about my experiences with this a few months ago. I hope you don’t mind me sharing the link here: http://janecopland.co.uk/2011/12/women-as-entertainment-in-the-seo-industry/. The “do you go to Prague for the girls” bit is also relevant to what I wrote. I realise the SEO community doesn’t have the best reputation in some circles, but I’d also expect to be able to go to one of their events and maintain a decent level of safety and dignity.

This post of course leaves out all the “clumsy passes” that go on. They’re unnecessary and tiring. I don’t go to marketing or tech events to find dates.

People don’t seem to realise the number of times women have to wiggle their way out of being hit on or otherwise pestered at these kinds of events. Some women like it; the majority don’t. Err on the side of general appropriateness and don’t go looking for hook-ups at professional events.

What disturbed me the most in recent months was the number of men and women who came to me with horror stories of things that had happened to them, their colleagues and partners, at tech gatherings and conferences. Most of these things went unreported. Most of the time, they were unreported because the victim was scared they’d ruin their reputation by getting involved in a “sex scandal.”

That horrifies me. A culture of silence is what lets these things continue, as John has said.

I made myself a few enemies by writing what I wrote, but I’m really glad I did it. I’m glad all of these posts get written, even if some may say we’re now beating the topic to death. Good – the reason the topic exists needs to die.

Thanks again for the great post.

Show me an alpha male and I’ll show you a monkey.

“Belgian Observer”, wind your neck in. I do not accept that there is any good-faith chain of reasoning that could lead someone to believe that it was on topic for this thread to boast about how much tail you get.

geo, I really don’t get what is wrong with what essentially amount to casual sex with strangers (well, as long as you use protection).

Nothing at all is wrong with it. What’s wrong is treating women, not as fully human beings (and in a professional context, colleagues), but as largely a parade of walking opportunities for sex. How many ways does this need to be said before it begins to sink in? Surely it’s not a terribly abstruse concept?

I mean, are some of you guys so lacking in empathy that you can’t grasp the effect that it has on female professionals in a male-dominated field to be regarded by many of their male peers as primarily the latter rather than the former? And to have this fact rubbed in constantly?

Steve, first, that is NOT what geo said (but of course I might have misread him).

Second, I think you (and the OP) are conflating 2 very different things: how women (and people in general, for that matter) should treated in a professional context, and how they should be treated in a non-professional context.

In particular, I think that advertisement for prostitutes for extra-work entertainment should not be considered sexist, only because women are not interested in it (in the same way, say, as advertisement for beer should not be considered anti-Muslim). I hope that my objection is a bit clearer now.

I hope that my objection is a bit clearer now

It is, but unfortunately it is only “a bit clearer” in the sense that it is now crystal clear that you are either being a fool for the sake of it, or are genuinely unable to see completely obvious things. Please find a different line of conversation to pursue as this one has led you to a dead end.

Wow, when I referenced “PUA” creeps earlier on, I have to admit I didn’t actually expect one to show up in the thread. CT never ceases to amaze.

You going to call me a slut next Steve?

Heh. Seriously though, in what is still a very sexist society, casual sex is, inescapably, a lot less politically problematic (outside braindead conservative / misogynist circles, and who cares about them) when actively sought by women than by men. I would hope that men would take this as a good incentive to fight sexism.

“Heh. Seriously though, in what is still a very sexist society, casual sex is, inescapably, a lot less politically problematic (outside braindead conservative / misogynist circles, and who cares about them) when actively sought by women than by men. I would hope that men would take this as a good incentive to fight sexism.”

Can’t we let those “braindead conservative / misogynist circles” be the anti sex ones? Nothing wrong with casual sex as long as both parties are willing. I agree that it is good practice to be respectful and careful of boundaries, however I do not see it, casual sex, as problematic in and of itself. Even at professional conferences.

I agree that it is good practice to be respectful and careful of boundaries, however I do not see it, casual sex, as problematic in and of itself. Even at professional conferences.

It is NOT problematic in and of itself. As we’ve been discussing for 140 comments now (feel free to review as needed), it can be problematic in the context of the way our society treats women. And particularly so in professional contexts where women are still struggling to establish themselves as equals. Tread cautiously and with due regard for possibly unexamined privilege, is all I’m saying. Is that so hard?

I thought 126 was pretty clear.

What’s pretty clear is that thinking is rather difficult for you, so try not to trouble your pretty little alpha-male head.

“It is NOT problematic in and of itself. As we’ve been discussing for 140 comments now (feel free to review as needed), it can be problematic in the context of the way our society treats women. And particularly so in professional contexts where women are still struggling to establish themselves as equals. Tread cautiously and with due regard for possibly unexamined privilege, is all I’m saying. Is that so hard?”

I understand that is what you are saying now (I agree with you by the way) however it is not the same thing as what you were saying earlier. You wrote:

“OK is making sure you have some level of real acquaintance with a person as a human being who is congenial to you and vice versa, and not just as an attractive body that has happened to come into your sight, before propositioning them”

I guess MPAVictoria is also too alpha-male to grasp your divine truths, Steve?

JM in fairness “Women may initiate casual sex. Men may not. In this way, sexism is defeated.” wasnt really a fair minded summation of what was said at 126. (whether I agree ot not, and Im not sure I do)
Why do you think your entitled to be taken seriously when you wont respond to the point reasonably?

@ rf 150

Comments have shifted, perhaps because something came out of moderation.

@ 133, Steve referred to his comments at 125 and 126. They are now at 126 and 127 (125 is now Manta1976).

I cited the passage in question at 145.

But the drive-by cobaggery suggests something else.

It would be interesting to know if this is really drive-by behaviour. Could they be the secret superhero identities of regulars?

“In that comment I was addressing somebody who reported significant issues with his interactions with women and asked for guidance in improving them. In such a case, I don’t think looking for casual sex is a good starting point. Do you?”

Ah so it was intended as specific rather than general advice? Okay fair enough. I do not actually think we are too far apart on our views about this. Though I am much less willing to tell people to forget about finding love/companionship/sex just because they are at a conference. Lots of people hook up at conferences, it is part of the fun. I agree that people need to be respectful of power inbalances though.

@ MPAVictoria 156:

If anyone has mentioned the following, I haven’t come across it: regardless of the degree (or nature) of the professionalism that is expected from participants at a professional conference, they are also the place one would most expect to meet like-minded people. For those looking to hook up, a lot of the usual preliminaries aren’t necessary. It’s like band camp for grownups.

Conferences aren’t unique, however. Lots of hooking up goes on at archeological digs.

“This is a particularly shabby argumentative move when the whole point of the OP and overall argument is to distinguish situations in which pass-making is acceptable from situations where it’s not.”

Yes but not everyone is going to agree which situations are acceptable and which aren’t.

@ MPAVictoria 160

Yes but not everyone is going to agree which situations are acceptable and which aren’t.

The debate, such as it is on this thread, does not appear to be about which situations are or aren’t acceptable, but between those who wish to define which situations are acceptable for everyone else and those of us who think the issue is a bit more complicated than that.

between those who wish to define which situations are acceptable for everyone elsethat men would pay attention to what lots of women are constantly trying to explain to you about this topic.

FTFY. HTH. HAND.

If you still think Steve is the soul of civility, please see his comment at 144 for a bizarre bit of misandry.

Oh yeah, I’m one of those self-hating men. [rolls eyes] Strangely enough, I don’t perceive that it’s guys like me who have issues around masculinity…

Dragon and I seem to get along fine, and we can’t even agree on words.

Well that might be perverting the nature of our disagreement a little bit.

I don’t think anyone’s claiming that no man should be able to proposition a woman EVAR, anywhere, especially at conferences. Just that individuals with a history of making women feel creeped out should probably do less propositioning. And that perhaps on the trade show floor might be a suboptimal location. And that connecting your professional conference to sex tourism is a bit over the line. Unless your profession is related to the sex tourism industry that is. These seem relatively non-controversial.

I suspect that you don’t think it’s unreasonable that some women would respond to unwanted advances by feeling very threatened. Not that it matters if you think it’s reasonable or not. The fact is that some women so feel that way. And being in a situation were there is pressure to go along to get along for the sake of your professional reputation and career – kinda makes it really crappy.

I suppose the question then comes down to – what about the guys who don’t know that they are creeps? Well that’s where the third party calling-out comes into play.

Just that individuals with a history of making women feel creeped out should probably do less propositioning.

Sorry, “individuals” or “individuals belonging to a group with a history …”?

Individuals. We were speaking to someone who self-admitted this problem.

Here’s the thing though – it’s women who get final say on whether you are in this group or not. By definition.

“it’s women who get final say on whether you are in this group or not”

Competely agree. If you have a history of making women feel uncomfortable unintentionally with your advances it behooves you to tread EXTRA carefully.

I think I should report that I have a longish comment for this thread which I put off posting for day, further updated, and still don’t think I will submit. Partly because I don’t want it to be misinterpreted, partly because it’s embarrassingly autobiographical and I’m not sure I want to share such matters with the internet. I’m pretty sure I’m not alone in this.

Maybe the term “people” would be better than any gendered term?

No, it wouldn’t, because it would obscure- and would be (and is) used deliberately to obscure- the actual state of gender relations, and gender-related power disparities, in our society.

Girls absolutely can engage in the sort of behavior that we’re treating as characteristically male, and it is very possible to make signals by accident. (dancing with someone twice at a large contra dance is a pretty notable one: I didn’t know what it actually ment, and was quite shocked to find out) The social signals around sex are ambiguous.

But there is a huge difference between people being occasionally bluntly propositioned when they didn’t realize that that was a possibility, and a constant stream of comments and behaviors aimed entirely at viewing women as solely sexual beings, whose expressions of thoughts are only of interest insofar as feigned interest is required to obtain sex. That’s something that never happens to men, but that women have to put up with constantly, and it renders their participation in things like ICANN tenuous. (cis) Men, would you want to go to meetings where comments were exchanged about the dimensions of the members’ members?

“#beingirishmeans going to Mass just to check out the talent – Charlotte Ryan”

Also the definition of joining the clergy?

122: That sounds like it was very unpleasant. I’m sorry that happened to you. Thanks for sharing an example of “what not to do.”

{OK then, my third amendment has been to make all of the below hypothetical, thus being free to change some or all details. Sorry if this makes it read rather – very – oddly. I’m not sure that there’s much left that’s new either at this point.}

(The below written when the comments stood at 14, and left lying around among the tabs of my browser for the best part of a day, as I wasn’t sure I wanted the hassle of answering responses or fending off denunciations.

Maybe I should add that medical diagnoses like autism don’t come into it, and also that men who aren’t really the kind of person women want spontaneous recreational sex with should be able to realise this fact and accept that this particular pleasure is not for them. Also, I’m not (or more to the point was not in the relevant time period) in the habit of going out in search of sex, nor constantly on the look out for it – though I should think that neither of those is necessarily either sexist or otherwise unacceptable, if it’s done in a respectful, power-symmetric, sensitive, good-humoured way.

Oh yeah, and one might well ‘call out’ other men for being sexist or disrespectful of women, one obvious example being use of terms like ‘slag’ or ‘slut’ which one may consider intolerable – it might even be necessary sometimes to ‘call out’ women on that, too. And a person may also not be interested in the competition to be near the beginning of the greek alphabet or any of that shit, I certainly agree with dsquared there.)

Here goes, anyway:)

I don’t usually comment on sexual politics threads since I normally have nothing clearly useful to add and it would be very easy to make a really bad impression to no purpose, but I think if there is debate to be had on this among those who are (or aspire to be) non-sexist, it is in the region of the comment of slacker @ 1.

Let’s suppose that a man and a woman (neither, as a matter of fact, being exclusively homosexual or celibate) are colleagues of some kind and are having a drink in the evening, on a social basis rather than as part of an official work function: perhaps they have just moved on from such a work function, or there is some overarching work event like a conference. We further specify that the two parties are of equal/incommensurable status.

Presumably they are relaxed, chatting and getting on well, having a few drinks perhaps. He has the hots for her and would like to get it on with her, and is certain she reciprocates. Can he (a) suggest going back to his place for some coffee, (b) invade her personal space (e.g. by unnecessarily sitting very close to her) enough to manoeuvre into position for a kiss, (c – I may as well add) grab her?

We specify also that the man in question remains highly alert for the slightest sign of reluctance or discomfort on the woman’s part, and is disposed to be highly embarrassed and genuinely apologetic and do everything he can to make amends should his advances prove unwelcome.

A person might do any or all of these, but only given utter certainty (cautiously attained, and always subsequently vindicated) that the woman in question was up for it. And TBH, I can’t really imagine that I (or indeed my present self transplanted into the same circumstances) would heed any advice that says one shouldn’t do these, since (though I would not conceptualised it in these terms because that would not be tremendously romantic/erotic) I would have sufficent faith in my ability to tell the difference and leave sufficient margin of error. Which is not to say that the ‘being alert for signs of discomfort or reluntance’ bit has no role – far from it. For one thing, it’s always possible one’s made a terrible mistake; for another, people can – gasp! – change their minds! Especially about this kind of thing. At any time, and without having to give any explanation.

(I should perhaps also add that I’m talking about this possibly happening only on a small number of occasions, and note that one might expect to far more often refrained from attempting to take things down that gently inclining path at all – instead either keeping things either entirely platonic or allowing them to be somewhat ambiguous/non-committal and perhaps asking for a phone number on parting – even though though one might have been fairly sure that one’s feelings were reciprocated. After all, it’s not as if there is some right to or overriding need for -casual- spontaneous sex, as opposed to taking things at a more leisurely pace – and most cases of initially potentially ‘casual’ sex might well tend not to end up being just ‘one-night-stands’ in any case: utterly anonymous, impersonal couplings might not be someone’s cup of tea at all. Having said that, I’m now talking in general rather than just about work colleagues: I imagine one might well avoid attempting to start an ongoing romantic attachment to a work colleague.

And of course it is possible to fancy someone and still treat – and regard – them as a human being, to allow the possibility of a romantic and/or erotic relationship to be present in the background without subordinating normal interpersonal relations to that end.)

(update: I don’ really agree with Steve LaBonne that making sure you have some level of real acquaintance with a person as a human being who is congenial to you and vice versa, and not just as an attractive body that has happened to come into your sight, before propositioning them. is a necessary for behaviour to be ‘OK’. While I would certainly generally expect and probably want to have some such ‘real acquaintance’ I don’t think it’s a requirement. The expression ‘propositioning them’ is rather prejudicial; makes me think of the cinema scene in Taxi Driver. The requirement is really just mutual respect and mutual desire. Mutuality.)

(another update: Benquo – I think you’re being entirely honest and bona fide, and you’ve perhaps been treated a touch dismissively by some, but this is surely the key point – that picking up strangers or near-strangers is not the standard way of finding a sexual partner and not something you should just assume you will or should be able to attempt without causing some serious upset.

If you really want advice, without pretending I’m particularly well-qualified to give it, I’d have thought it’s pretty simple – you can talk, have a laugh, try and connect, ask for a phone number, arrange a date, take it slowly, get to know her, you know. Among many other advantages of this normal way of doing things, you don’t have to make any sudden moves or do anything that isn’t acceptable in the context. With any luck, if you actually like each other, things will just progress, almost without you having to do too much in the way of worrying or calculating. See also: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uDoQFcQEpOQ#t=3m8s
)

And of course ‘utter certainty’ that a woman is either coming onto one or waiting for one to make a move is not something plucked out of thin air or an overactive ego (one might be rather reserved where these matters are concerned actually, and even if one had say been something of a massive pisshead in the past and thus decidedly unreserved, it is still possible that sexual aggression could be one of the very few forms of bad behaviour one didn’t perpetrate.) – it’s based on unambiguous signals that arise in the advanced stages of the (possibly highly accelerated) process of flirtation – well I suppose it would be the stage after flirtation, which is of its nature non-committal.

A couple of issues, relating to the evaluative and the practical functions of morality respectively.

1. Is it sexist? Even a failed attempt at ‘making a pass’ (I think this expression has failure written into it, actually, especially the clumsy kind) under these circumstances need not be actually sexist, it seems to me. But of course it could be (perhaps even normally is, I have no way of knowing).

The kind of pillock who seems to think he is more attractive/charming/etc to women than he is (possibly by a grossly enormous margin) seems to betray a certain disrespect for women in general. The one who is largely indifferent to the feelings of his companion and is just trying his luck is a more straightforward case, especially if he is relying on the woman being reluctant to ’cause a fuss’ about it. Then there is presumably a range of characters who don’t satisfy the ‘disposed to be highly embarassed, etc’ condition, about whom comment is unnecessary (update – the foulmouthed tirade triggered by rejection, as described by Emma in Sidney is a particularly vile example).

(Since I’m finding this pretty uncomfortable, a break for some apposite comedy)

2. What are the rules? It could certainly be argued that a man never really knows until he has made improper advances. I don’t think this is plausible – when the conversation takes an increasingly flirtatious turn and all kinds of signals are obviously being given off, at some point it becomes about as clear as anything ever gets. But evidently some people (for reasons that may or may not involve sexism) are not reliably able to determine whether they have a ‘green light’ (and who am I to say I’m not one of them, perhaps one who’s just been lucky, you may ask). It’s not really enough just to say ‘do it at your own risk’ since another person is involved, who may be irritated, creeped out, or traumatised. So I dunno. I suppose in a sense that’s all one can do – lay down stringent rules to cover everyone, while being aware that some people will be in a position to break them, not only with impunity but blamelessly, harmlessly and to the satisfaction of all concerned.

This is part of a more general phenomenon: ‘you’ll recognise it when you see it’ (in this case reciprocated desire) is not useful advice, since it leaves open the possibility that you’ll think you recognise it when in fact you don’t see it. (Hadn’t really expected to be discussing Type I/Type II errors here. Has something gone awry?)

(I’m trying to be constructive and thoughtful here, but I have a nasty feeling that this will not read well. My prose ‘style’ isn’t really suited to this kind of thing so I probably sound creepy, sexist or otherwise repellent. I at least know I’m neither inclined nor capable of treating people with the kind of contempt that’s being discussed here, and I can only hope that comes across. Ho hum. Thanks to slacker anyway, for, er, making the first move.)

BTW it strikes me that it would be interesting, and might be illuminating, to hear peoples’ opinions or observations about this kind of issue as it relates to same-sex pairs, male or female.

{Update – parse @184 is coincidental}

The debate, such as it is on this thread, does not appear to be about which situations are or aren’t acceptable, but between those who wish to define which situations are acceptable for everyone else and those of us who think the issue is a bit more complicated than that.

Seconded.

I found the example about recruitment for Church groups etc to be the best on the thread. It actually makes an attempt to explain the issues for people who are new to it (such as me). I found it persuasive, too.

I find OP’s commene risible – here’s a chap (Benquo) who upon reading this starts wondering exactly what OP thinks of as appropriate and inapproriate – and all she does is condescendingly declare that it’s not her job to tell him. I notice that she intends to provide an “illustration” rather than actually laying out the rules.

That’s because there aren’t any rules. Notice that throughout the thread, the test of whether a man is doing it right or wrong is simply how he makes the woman “feel”. JM is saying that perhaps more slack ought be cut given that no one knows what’s right and wrong – untill after the fact. I’ll go further – it’s not WHAT you say but how you say. An adequately “creepy” guy can make the most innocent looking words seem inappropriate. I’ve gotten away with obnoxious behavior with little in terms of long term results because I do it in very good humour.

I’ll add this: I’ve read the PUA stuff (although I don’t practice it – I’ve been in a comfortable relationship for two years now). One standard piece of advice given is in fact “don’t make women uncomfortable” – the standard being touted here. The difference between here and those texts is interesting – they actually contain advice on how to go about not doing this rather than random, boundary examples. Don’t telegraph your sexual interest too blatantly, don’t make her feel like a slut (by inviting a woman to your room for coffee at 4 am, for example) etc. And they recognise the limits of such advice – it’s hard to tell when is too early (and too late) – it’s a matter of practice and calibration and context. Credit where it’s due.

188: I did specifically ask for examples, not rules. So if someone’s to blame for that, it’s me, not Maria.

I did so because I don’t think it’s feasible to draw bright-line rules that prohibit all truly not-OK behavior and also permit a reasonable freedom of action. And because general statements – no matter how detailed – get filled in by different listeners with different imagined specific situations.

191 makes a great deal of sense to me. Were the problem cases you were thinking about mostly examples of someone trying to jump several steps at once?

If so, then I am no longer that worried; it seems like there’s a lot of distance between the mild, awkward flirting I’ve done and the clumsy passes you were talking about.

Feminism is about equal rights.

I don’t think men or women have the right to not be propositioned or flirted with, so this is not really feminism, but some sort of puritanism, as Antoine 116 said. Sometimes beggars ask me for money on the streets. They are almost always polite, but it still makes me uncomfortable. Hey, that’s life, it’s full of discomfort.

I can probably confess this low down in the thread that I am a massive hypocrite here – I did once make a clumsy pass at a woman at a Bank of England offsite training course and it was unforgiveable and unprofessional and my only hint of an excuse is that at least I had the decency to be married to her for 18 years, so far.

Since I am a massive sceptic about the possibility of widespread social change, and also about the possibility of someone discovering a foolproof method to meet sexual partners without embarrassment or awkwardness, I think that the only real solution is to a) accept that the current rather unsatisfactory situation of women having to do all the work of smoothing over social awkwardness in these events is probably going to persist, b) crack down like a ton of fucking bricks on men who abuse that social convention in the way described, c) crack down like a half-ton of bricks on people who produce stupid and sexist marketing material or casual remarks that have the effect of marginalising or discouraging professional women from contexts that are usually abysmally male-dominated anyway (more than one junior banker has felt the rough side of my usually docile personality for offending on this score). And d) making a constant affirmative effort to try and do all you can to promote the interests of professional women, on the base that this is probably an appropriate use of all the free time and energy you have going spare due to women taking on all the burden of facilitating and negotiating the delicate dance of courtship.

“Since I am a massive sceptic about the possibility of widespread social change”

This line stood out to me dsquared. There are so many examples of widespread social change, particularly in the last 50 years, that I cannot agree with you at all. Think about homosexuals living together openly as just one of many examples.

but that doesn’t make this behavior OK

Yeah, I’m sure it’s unpleasant, although I personally wouldn’t mind if reasonably attractive women did it to me. Often.

Hey, look on the bright side: it could be worse, no one could be hitting on you at all; wouldn’t that be depressing.

Just wanted to weigh in on the issue of male feminism, which was briefly addressed in the post and a few comments way earlier in the thread (before it derailed).

I’m male and I’ve considered myself a feminist for a long time, and I understand how some can perceive that as an awkward stance to take. Myself, I prefer to think of Feminism as a set of practices that have the conscious aim of eliminating patriarchy, respecting women, and all the rest of it. Espousing a feminist identity (“I am a feminist”) is but one of many feminist practices and, like all practices, will be appropriate in some situations and not in others. I totally agree that identity-wise, men will never be feminists in the same way as women because they have a totally different set of experiences that may in fact be incommensurable, and the same goes for issues such as race, class, and all the rest of it. Plus there’s the whole problem at issue here of speaking for women rather than letting women do the speaking. But feminist identity and feminist beliefs are, in my opinion, much less salient than feminist practices.

So, to sum up: I think that when you think of feminism as a set of practices, instead of an identity or even a coherent ethos as such, it becomes much less problematic to be a male feminist. Sometimes proper male feminist practice will involve speaking out, and other times it will involve shutting the heck up and letting women do the speaking. The less worried one is about one’s identity as a male feminist, and the more concerned one is with proper feminist practice in the situation you’re in, the easier the whole thing becomes. I’m not worried at all whether someone thinks I’m a proper feminist or not (one too quickly gets into No True Scotsman territory with that one), but I do try my fumbling best to make sure that I behave in a feminist way.

Or is that a cop-out?

Tim Wilkinson: Other women will no doubt have their own takes, but here’s mine. Your situations to consider aren’t very interesting. They seem like the kind of thing that reasonable people can work out and decide where their comfort boundaries are. Meanwhile, we’ve got the situation in the original post, and the various bits of brutishness on display in the comments, and the fact is that a lot of women aren’t going to be be comfortably relaxing, secure that our choices will be respected and therefore free to to engage on the terms that suit us.

As a thought experiment, it’s perfectly fine. And there are women who get the liberty of dealing with it, it’s not as unreal as a lot of classic thought experiments. But it is a wished-for luxury for a lot of us, and if I were tireder and grumpier I’d probably rant about it. Fortunately for someone, possibly me, since I like myself better when I’m not ranting a lot, I can write this out calmly. If we were both standing at the scene of a terrible flood, I wouldn’t want to talk to you just then about drought issues.

I was talking about this topic with a colleague, who reminded me of a point that a lot of guys get as soon as it’s pointed out but aren’t so likely to think of when trying to imagine power reversals or whatever. It’s not true in every profession, but in many professional gatherings, there are a lot more men than women.

Starting with some totally bogus numbers…say that women are 10% of the attendees, and that 1 man in 10 will make a threatening or harassing advance (intentionally or obliviously, doesn’t matter for this purpose). That’s a bit of harassment for every single woman there.

In practice it’s much more complicated than that. A lot of the abuse comes from relatively few men, each of whom imposes on several women. What makes it so much of a grind for so many women isn’t just the actual incidents but the surrounding atmosphere, full of men who think that our complaints aren’t really all that significant, who don’t see any connection between their objectifying humor and stuff that’s shading from intrusion toward sexual assault, and otherwise just not getting it.

But even if men and women were precisely as likely to make unwanted intrusive advances, the distribution of sexes in so many professional gatherings means that each woman is likely to get a lot more of it than any of the men around her.

@Turkle:
I totally agree that identity-wise, men will never be feminists in the same way as women because they have a totally different set of experiences that may in fact be incommensurable

Someone else made a similar point upthread, but I don’t really find it persuasive. Doesn’t it rest on the assumption that there is some one ‘way’ for women to be feminists that rests on some “set of experiences” that all women have in common? But surely professional women have different sets of experience than working class women, American women have different experiences than European women who have different experiences from South American women, transgendered women have different experiences from cisgendered women, etc. And that’s to say nothing of the different experiences of individual women who fall into the same general demographic categories. We shouldn’t be in the business of identifying an essential set of experiences that all and only women share, so, a fortiori, we shouldn’t be defining feminism in terms of such experiences.

On the topic of the original post: Maria, you’re right to feel conflicted about the feeling of gratitude. Just as no one should have to feel grateful not to be assaulted, no one should have to feel grateful for hearing someone else announce that they shouldn’t be assaulted. It reminds me of a quote I’ve seen attributed to Susan B. Anthony:

“Our Job is not to make young women grateful. It is to make them ungrateful so they keep going. ”

I don’t think gratitude for resistance is quite as tightly connected to normalization of the status quo as this quote (and the OP) suggest, but it seems they’re also not entirely separable.

I’m kind of surprised that anyone finds the “male feminist” self- designation strange. On the other hand, I’ve hesitated to declare myself one in a lot of situations because I felt like it would come off almost as bragging, because really, “male feminist” is something you have to show with your behavior, not just by applying a label to yourself. Maybe I should reconsider that.

Also, count me in as somebody who doesn’t think it’s at all strange to specially recognize men who take public stands against stuff like sexist professional environments. I mean, there could be such thing as overdoing it, but this isn’t it. I think a lot of men don’t speak out on sexual harassment in a lot of contexts because we feel like we’d be speaking for somebody else/appropriating somebody else’s voice. In general, issues confronted by a subset of society in their interactions with the rest of society should be seen as issues that concern the whole society (or to put it another way, the population as a whole shouldn’t be seen as, by default, white and male, or lacking ethnicity and gender, which in practice amounts to white and male…), and not the proprietary domain of the subset of society directly ‘called out’ by that issue. (I would say “directly affected”, as in “directly affected by sexism”, but men are directly, if less dramatically, affected by sexism too, so…)

This is a more general paradigm shift that needs to happen in how we conceive of social issues. Feminism is definitely something men should be concerned about (not that men are equally entitled to define it, but it’s very much our concern, too). Just like we talk about white privilege, and I think that is a reasonable thing for white people to discuss this without being specially authorized in every instance by some person of color, we should talk freely about male privilege.

Veblen @188 I’ll go further – it’s not WHAT you say but how you say. An adequately “creepy” guy can make the most innocent looking words seem inappropriate. I’ve gotten away with obnoxious behavior with little in terms of long term results because I do it in very good humour.

Which is to say, it’s not just how you say it but who you are. There’s a long history of non-white men being less entitled to bend the rules of what counts as socially-acceptable flirtatious behavior. This is less a matter of men of color being deprived/excluded than white men being able to bend/break certain rules with impunity. BUT the ‘rule bending’ seems to be enough of an accepted part of the culture, including being accepted by many women. In that vein, “de-sexing” (heaven forbid) professional events really isn’t such a bad idea. At least to whatever extent professional culture is likely to be de-sexed.

re the old issue of “awkward passes”, I don’t think it’s unreasonable for commenters way up top to have conflated what that meant in the OP with how the phrase is used elsewhere. I just don’t see how it’s helpful to automatically assume somebody who does this, esp. early in the conversation, is aggressively missing the point.

“Still, it’s much easier for me to do so at my advanced age and far remove from the singles scene than it would have been for, say, my desperately horny 28-year-old self”

I actually would be really interested in knowing the respective ages of the “anti” and “pro” sex posters. My bet is the “anti” sex posters would skew much older.

because really, “male feminist” is something you have to show with your behavior, not just by applying a label to yourself.

This. (Out of context, I know.)

Plus there’s the whole problem at issue here of speaking for women rather than letting women do the speaking.

True. But, here’s one thing to do. Say less; ask questions; let women say more; let them answer your questions; listen to them. Generally works. (And I’m not making light—I agree that solidarity from a male position poses real problems, as it does in other cases.)

related thing that might be of interest: http://www.salon.com/2012/03/14/nerd_culture_still_white_male/

It’s about the SXSW conference. This paragraph struck me:
At my first experience of the conference last year, it became clear to me how even nerd culture’s recent mainstream dominance — and these guys’ privileged place within it, in attending or presenting at the conference — hadn’t rid them of their feeling of social marginalization. How could they be oppressors, the thinking seemed to be, if they felt like such outsiders?

This phenomenon of the mainstreaming of nerd culture may be a fad, might play itself out without reaching more than superficial consequences, but I’m willing to bet that the more general phenomenon of groups who could reasonably have called themselves outsiders attaining real power is something we will see continued and repeated. It will make less and less sense to think of social problems in terms of a ‘majority’ (white, male) and decisively marginalized outsider groups/minorities who wield minimal, tenuous power (at most). And the minorities/majority paradigm of social structure (deeply concerned with the hermeneutics of representation, with questions of when/how it’s appropriate to represent Others) becomes increasingly inappropriate.

Instead, what we really have (though maybe not what we admit we have) is a congeries of subgroups with their own types of privilege, forms of social control, experiences of exclusion and marginalization, &c. This really should be seen as, above all else, an opportunity for feminism and related movements.

Kaveh: The mainstreaming of the nerd, and the phenomenon of nerds who become insiders but never cease to regard themselves as insurgents fighting an establishment, has arguably been going on for a very long time. The North American conservative movement has thrived on it for decades: it’s what people like Nixon and Kissinger and Spiro Agnew were. It’s what current wannabe-Republican Canadian PM Stephen Harper is. (One can see it in other contexts, too, like the career of Andreotti in Italy.) Heck, go back a bit further and you have Germany under the sway of a failed art student turned propagandist. The major difference is that there is a set of shared reference points called “nerd culture” now as opposed to the more disparate and variegated miseries inhabited by the nerds of yesteryear, but it’s still a late instance of a long-term trend.

And one of its most important lessons should be that the nerd, either as outsider or as insider, does not always (or even very often) function in the aggregate to break down the “majority” vs. “minority” structure of whatever society they are in. A common sense of grievance and alienation, and simultaneous yearning for belonging, can and does easily allow the constituents of “nerd culture” to simply refuse to think about themselves as having any kind of privilege even when they plainly do — and instead to experience the social narrative as being about how they are hard done by and insufficiently accommodated — and will at the same time desperately want to participate in and even push the boundaries of what they think is the language of the powerful. This is why the online forums of “nerd culture” are very often swamps of unreflective racism and misogyny (a more likely outcome the less carefully they’re managed), challenged intermittently by a minority of voices who often find themselves drowned out in the general noise. It’s why so many chairbound male geeks worship war and violence from afar, become easy cheerleaders for militarism and machismo, function as the soil from which people like Frank Miller sprout, or dream of becoming the slick, misogynistically manipulative “Pick-Up Artists” that they frequently imagine more sexually successful men to be.

If there is to be a story of how the minorities/majority paradigm of social structure loses potency, “nerd culture” is not likely to be a big part of it. Indeed experience shows that “nerd culture” is just as likely, or even likelier, to fight tooth and nail against the deterioration of that paradigm.

Hey, look on the bright side: it could be worse, no one could be hitting on you at all; wouldn’t that be depressing.

Great point. Every time I leave the house and I return home with nobody having hit on me, I become horribly depressed.

Every woman all the time is constantly looking for validation from men. Again, GREAT POINT.

Much of this thread has a flavor of “put yourself in her shoes” or “but I can’t put myself in her shoes, because I’m male.” May I offer a modest, and somewhat tongue-in-cheek, proposal that might help those in the latter group? The next time you go to a conference, wear your name tag dangling around your waist, with the tag positioned at the bulge. (Or, if you are brave, pin the tag to one side of the bulge.) Count how many times someone stares at your name tag twice as long as it should take any literate person to read your name and affiliation. Register how this makes you feel, as a person and as a professional.

(Yes, I realize that this exercise would work best if all the men at the conference wore their nametags around their waists. Maybe at the next ICANN meeting…)

Guys for what it is worth I think romantic or sexual relationships with women who you come into contact professionally is a big mistake. It is particularly a mistake if you are an academic. The old saying that you do not “sh*t where you eat” exists for a reason. It is asking for trouble. My personal advice and feel free to ignore it is to find a woman with no university education. More often than not if you let it known you are single they will make the pass at you and avoid all the messy problems listed above.

The old saying that you do not “sh*t where you eat” exists for a reason

And yet, I do actually do most of my eating in the same house in which I do most of my shitting and I bet you do too.

My personal advice and feel free to ignore it

Guys, I would advise this.

More often than not if you let it known you are single they will make the pass at you and avoid all the messy problems listed above.

You women and your messy problems!

By this standard, significant areas of gay male behavior are “not OK.”

Again, please review the specific context in which the quoted statement was made. It was not intended to apply universally.

Upon further reflection, I’d like to propose a second rule: you (no matter who “you” are) never have a right to be offended by the fact of rejection. If the rejection is made in a particularly malicious, designed-to-be-humiliating, etc., way, then you might be offended by *that*, but never by the rejection itself. People have a right to not be interested and that right must be respected, by everyone, all the time.

If you think that this rule is perfectly reasonable in general but doesn’t apply to *you*, you might be an asshole. If you express your offense at rejection by retaliating in practically any way, you are almost certainly an asshole.

MPAVictoria
Well I’m 27, (so this posts lack of insight should represent that) and am closer to the views you’ve expressed than Steve, though I’ll take on board what’s being said. I have to admit I wouldn’t have noticed, (good bad or indifferent), the situation mentioned in the OP. I’m not saying that’s right, and realise now that I should probably be more aware of these things, but it’s the truth.
Our group of friends growing up was packed with women, which appears to be common for my generation, that partook in everything the men did; days in the pub, walks up the mountains weeklong speed binges etc (there wasn’t much to do in my hometown). Pretty much all have gone on to ‘better’ jobs than the men I know.
In other words they’re friends, and friends girlfriends became friends independent of the relationship. So, honestly, before I started reading Crooked Timber I thought feminism was largely a con, and workplace sexual harassment a myth until it happened to a friend (And, she said, the men of her own age were the ones most adamant that she report it. Makes you think?) I have little doubt now I was wrong.
But I couldn’t lend any support to this campaign against casual sex, there really is no alternative! Trying to get laid at the checkout at Tesco? No of course not. But what’s wrong with two people coming to a decision they want to sleep together and never see each-other again? (Apart from the long term affects’ of leaving you without a soul)
Feel free to abuse or ignore this nonsense. I live to learn

But I couldn’t lend any support to this campaign against casual sex

Good thing none has been proposed, then.

Who would claim to have a right to be offended? Your rule is vacuous.

Oh please, certain subgroups of men act like that all the time. The mere act of rejection is followed by anger and ridicule. You’re ugly, they didn’t want you anyway, why are you such an uppity bitch.

You haven’t followed the “input – pleasant (in their mind) overture – into slot B – woman – payout – vagina” dialogue like all good women/sexbots are supposed to, therefore you are malfunctioning in some way and must be “fixed”.

Steve I would point you out to Salient’s comment at 225 as an example of why some here are interpreting others as being against casual sex.

Salient, sorry about the term “anti” sex. I was trying to use short hand and a really should have explained it better. No offence intended. I do think that rf’s comments at 242 demonstrate why this is more of a problem for the older posters.

chris at 240:

I like that rule as well.

@tax, that cant be generaliced quite that way. Work/private life seperation in general is a lot stricter in some European countries – my homecountry Germany being the most extreme example. Americans just have this extra layer of puritan social norms that exceed even German standards regarding that particular subject. The Czech Republic however has a very low degree of private/professional life seperation and those who attend a conference dominated by Czech culture without attending the informal part in the evening will miss everything important.

In general, this is definitly a cultural and not an opression of woman issue. A Brasilian, a French or a Russian women would most likely get offended if she where not threated in some way that would be considered very offensive if not sexual harrasment by most Americans, including very conservative man. The fact that something makes most Americans feal very uncomfortable does not mean the behaviour is universally wrong by some god given standard or has any evil/sexual intention (both apperently the same…).

In general, this is definitly a cultural and not an opression of woman issue.

Well, yes. It’s true that in many countries disrespectful treatment of women is more acceptable.

Steve@253, why don’t you simply own that you made the (quite understandable!) mistake of not having read/noticed the posts other people were referring to, and let it drop, instead of making insinuations?
It would make a much better impression, and it might even make people more sympathetic to your point of view.

“… while the Saudi Arabians take a different point of view altogether?” I have no idea how Saudia Arabians treat the different between the professional and private spheres.

“Some “cultural differences” are just reflections of the fact that it’s easier to get away with being an arsehole in particular ways in some cultures.”

Okay, I’ll fix it for you. The Anglo-Saxons consider the continentals arseholds, and the continentals consider the Anglo-Saxons to be prudes. Happy now?

manta and MPA, 253.

The Czech Republic however has a very low degree of private/professional life seperation and those who attend a conference dominated by Czech culture without attending the informal part in the evening will miss everything important.

In general, this is definitly a cultural and not an opression of woman issue

What? In Czech culture it is impossible to benefit from a conference without also doing a load of socialising in a male-dominated environment, and this is not an oppression of women issue?

A Brasilian, a French or a Russian women would most likely get offended if she where not threated in some way that would be considered very offensive if not sexual harrasment by most Americans, including very conservative man

Please don’t comment any more on this thread (unless specifically asked to by Maria). Henri can tell you why.

On the topic of age: yeah, I’m older (56) than many of the commenters- old enough, in fact, to have a 19 year old daughter. She is studying chemical engineering- another male-dominated technical field. I would be a pretty crap parent if I weren’t concerned with the sort of thing discussed in the OP. Having a daughter does wonders for one’s consciousness of gender privilege, if one is paying any attention at all.

I don’t think people have a choice in whether they’re offended or not.

I’m also not trying to suggest we’ve struck gold with the generation following yours, just that male/female friendships have (maybe?) become more complex and intimate.

The numerous and primarily youthful hate contingent in the Elevatorgate flap suggests that this is wishful thinking, at least among the geeks. And anyway, you shouldn’t even listen so much to me, but to all the women trying to tell you about the everyday sexism professional women have to deal with. To ignore them and continue posting what sound like excuses and evasions is… questionable.

The Anglo-Saxons consider the continentals arseholds, and the continentals consider the Anglo-Saxons to be prudes.

The recent flap about the attempted rape by a certain French technocrat in New York demonstrated that French women have a very different take on this than men. VERY DIFFERENT.

This isn’t about different attitudes on affairs, or fidelity. Its about women having to exist in a culture where they routinely have to fight off seduction-rapes, where men stare openly at their tits and make sexual comments in professional environments. French women don’t seem to like this any more than American, or British, women do.

And as for Italy…

[sarcasm]Hey the Southern states just had a different culture in the 1950s. Blacks were offended if they weren’t treated like stupid children, or slaves.[/sarcasm]

I have no idea if I’m a feminist male, or not – nor do I really care. I do care about whether I’m a decent human being who isn’t completely self-obsessed and selfish, and I’m depressed by how many of the male commentators on this thread apparently don’t.

I don’t think I missed the point, Cian: I quite remember how the American newspapers and blogs (including, I think, CT, but commenters here can correct me ) reviled the French press and society for defending SK.

It turned out that the American press was (mostly) wrong about the actual facts, and the French were (mostly) right, but we wouldn’t want to let small things like that get in the way of self-righteous indignation…