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If you think that flirting can be mistaken as sexual harassment then that tells me you have no idea how to flirt.

by nkrisc 9y ago

nojvek 9y ago
Any sort of flirting in a workplace can backfire on your face. Just takes one person to take it the wrong way and you’re shown the door. That’s why there is a famous saying “Don’t shit where you eat”. Workplace relationships seldom end well.
- _jal 9y ago
  Well, yeah, context is a thing. Flirting in criminal court and at funerals are also probably bad ideas.
- nkrisc 9y ago
  Well, yes, you're right. Knowing when it's ok to flirt is part of knowing how to flirt. I'm not sure what your point is beyond the obvious: people go to work to get paid, not to find dates. Flirt elsewhere.
StellarTabi 9y ago
It is harassment when 30 random guys are constantly piling on unwanted flirt after unwanted flirt.
- freeflight 9y ago
  It's not like these 30 random guys have organized themselves to make their approaches as harassing as possible. These 30 don't and can't know if you've been approached before or how often. Intent matters a whole lot and their intent is not to harass you but rather to reach out and probe for your potential interest. Accusing people of harassment, for simply trying to approach you, is imho a seriously crappy thing to do and very unreasonable.
  - StellarTabi 9y ago
    So that's it? 30 people "interest probe" a woman at work, in the street, at the grocery store, etc. and as long as they didn't intend to be one part of the endless steam of harassment, the harassment doesn't exist?
    - freeflight 9y ago
      That situation isn't actual harassment, at least not in the legal definition of the term as long as you are talking about an out of work context and these guys just approached you once. Is being approached by a beggar harassment? Is it these individual guys fault that many little annoyances add up to be a big headache/borderline harassment? It's not like clairvoyance is an actual thing, so what are you actually blaming them individually for? And what could they, individually, ever do to prevent that situation? The expectation you are having here is that all males should instead always be passive and never approach a female of interest because she might or might not have been approached before and thus feel harassed. Doing this "equal" would mean females should also never approach males, where would that leave us? Tbh there is no easy solution to this because there are issues for both sides: Females getting dogpiled and males usually getting nowhere without taking opportunities leading to said dogpiling. On a more practical note: There are subtle ways to prevent at least some approaches from happening and deflecting them somewhat effectively. Like wearing visible headphones when in public, instantly, but politely, declining the approach with body language by keeping a steady pace of urgency and slightly shaking the head. With time this is bound to get better, at least if eroding of societal role expectations happens equally for all genders and females actively approaching males becomes something that isn't considered "out of the ordinary" due to its sheer rarity of happening. Imho that's something that very likely will require a multigenerational effort.
forgottenpass 9y ago
It doesn't work like that. Every assumption from a reasonable person that hasn't had cynicism seared into them through experience would make the same conclusion about the world as you do, but, well, here's a reddit comment that explains it better than I ever could: https://www.reddit.com/r/OneY/comments/7elhvu/men_at_work_wonder_if_they_overstepped_with_women/dq5wsak/ https://www.reddit.com/r/OneY/comments/7elhvu/men_at_work_wo... > Men, most men, arent afraid that they dont know how to treat women with respect. Which every single comment to the article suggests men dont...every fucking one. [...] > What men are worried about is how can they interact with women and KNOW that there is no way they are going to have to defend against a sexual harassment accusation and lose their careers. Thats the question men want answers to and thats why suddenly even crack-pot [Vice President] Pence makes some fucking sense. > Which is what the NYT couldnt bring itself to say. Because even if it did, it knows theres no answer.
- nkrisc 9y ago
  If that's what you're worried about you might as well just never leave your house. I worry about dying in car crash but that doesn't mean I never get in a car.

If you think that flirting can be mistaken as sexual harassment then that tells me you have no idea how to flirt.

by nkrisc 9y ago

If you think that flirting can be mistaken as sexual harassment then that tells me you have no idea how to flirt.

Any sort of flirting in a workplace can backfire on your face. Just takes one person to take it the wrong way and you’re shown the door. That’s why there is a famous saying “Don’t shit where you eat”. Workplace relationships seldom end well.

_jal 9y ago
Well, yeah, context is a thing. Flirting in criminal court and at funerals are also probably bad ideas.
nkrisc 9y ago
Well, yes, you're right. Knowing when it's ok to flirt is part of knowing how to flirt. I'm not sure what your point is beyond the obvious: people go to work to get paid, not to find dates. Flirt elsewhere.

StellarTabi 9y ago

It is harassment when 30 random guys are constantly piling on unwanted flirt after unwanted flirt.

freeflight 9y ago
It's not like these 30 random guys have organized themselves to make their approaches as harassing as possible. These 30 don't and can't know if you've been approached before or how often. Intent matters a whole lot and their intent is not to harass you but rather to reach out and probe for your potential interest. Accusing people of harassment, for simply trying to approach you, is imho a seriously crappy thing to do and very unreasonable.
- StellarTabi 9y ago
  So that's it? 30 people "interest probe" a woman at work, in the street, at the grocery store, etc. and as long as they didn't intend to be one part of the endless steam of harassment, the harassment doesn't exist?
  - freeflight 9y ago
    That situation isn't actual harassment, at least not in the legal definition of the term as long as you are talking about an out of work context and these guys just approached you once. Is being approached by a beggar harassment? Is it these individual guys fault that many little annoyances add up to be a big headache/borderline harassment? It's not like clairvoyance is an actual thing, so what are you actually blaming them individually for? And what could they, individually, ever do to prevent that situation? The expectation you are having here is that all males should instead always be passive and never approach a female of interest because she might or might not have been approached before and thus feel harassed. Doing this "equal" would mean females should also never approach males, where would that leave us? Tbh there is no easy solution to this because there are issues for both sides: Females getting dogpiled and males usually getting nowhere without taking opportunities leading to said dogpiling. On a more practical note: There are subtle ways to prevent at least some approaches from happening and deflecting them somewhat effectively. Like wearing visible headphones when in public, instantly, but politely, declining the approach with body language by keeping a steady pace of urgency and slightly shaking the head. With time this is bound to get better, at least if eroding of societal role expectations happens equally for all genders and females actively approaching males becomes something that isn't considered "out of the ordinary" due to its sheer rarity of happening. Imho that's something that very likely will require a multigenerational effort.

forgottenpass 9y ago

It doesn't work like that. Every assumption from a reasonable person that hasn't had cynicism seared into them through experience would make the same conclusion about the world as you do, but, well, here's a reddit comment that explains it better than I ever could: https://www.reddit.com/r/OneY/comments/7elhvu/men_at_work_wonder_if_they_overstepped_with_women/dq5wsak/ https://www.reddit.com/r/OneY/comments/7elhvu/men_at_work_wo... > Men, most men, arent afraid that they dont know how to treat women with respect. Which every single comment to the article suggests men dont...every fucking one. [...] > What men are worried about is how can they interact with women and KNOW that there is no way they are going to have to defend against a sexual harassment accusation and lose their careers. Thats the question men want answers to and thats why suddenly even crack-pot [Vice President] Pence makes some fucking sense. > Which is what the NYT couldnt bring itself to say. Because even if it did, it knows theres no answer.

nkrisc 9y ago
If that's what you're worried about you might as well just never leave your house. I worry about dying in car crash but that doesn't mean I never get in a car.