I was sexually abused as a child and had very sexualized behavior and poor boundaries when I was in my teens and twenties. In my twenties, I might have been one

I was sexually abused as a child and had very sexualized behavior and poor boundaries when I was in my teens and twenties. In my twenties, I might have been one of the people going "Gosh, I don't see why this is a problem." But I knew I had serious personal issues and I got married at 19 and did the full time homemaker thing and got therapy. I actively chose to live a very private life and get my crap sorted. I was much clearer about such things by the time I got a corporate job during my divorce. I was able to very quietly handle problems with men at my corporate job. We need to say things like this and keep saying it so that the people who didn't get the memo before they started their careers have some hope of getting the memo before it is another scandal in the headlines. It isn't constructive to just let people mess up that bad and then hang them high while making zero effort to clue them before it goes that far. Some people will still take it too far. We can't stop all of it. But only giving attention to the matter when things go wrong and then having a public shit show is actively harmful to the goal of opening doors for women. For one thing, it creates the impression that there are no good guys, that sexual predators are the norm and it creates a very threatening atmosphere. To some degree, it does so unnecessarily. Yes, I deal routinely with the issue that a lot of men are only talking to me because they are hoping for a hook up and that is problematic. But, for me, a better solution is to know there are men I can connect with professionally than to get the message that "ALL businessmen are wolves in sheep's clothing and you just have to expect to be groped and to put up with lewd remarks. That's just par for the course." It has been hard for me to make those connections, and I can't help but wonder if part of the problem is that having heard so much negativity, I was being suspicious at times when it wasn't warranted and thereby cutting my own throat simply because all that I was hearing was "ALL men are just like that." And that isn't a problem that gets solved by the good guys remaining silent and the ugly incidents getting all the press. It is a problem that gets solved by having positive examples to follow so I can more effectively recognize when I need to worry and when I don't. Being on guard all the time is not a good way to win friends and influence people. It is counterproductive if you are trying to establish business connections.