#MeToo has caught on, good thing or bad thing ?

In all seriousness though it seems Men can do nothing right, On the one hand we have women saying that they can't get man and on the other you have women, probably the same ones, saying men are not to look at me or talk to me or approach me anyway. Yes there are men out there who believe they are god's gift and cannot understand why a woman can reject them, Why they are like that who knows? What can be done about, well I suppose there mates tell them to cop onto themselves and stop being an ars*ho*e? That might work, it may not. Ostracize them from society.

Then there are men like me out there, probably the vast majority, that respect women, actually I would say now I am more nervous now around women that I have ever been. It's impossible to know what to do, I have been situations in bars where I am buying a drink for myself (I don't drink so I am not drunk) and I say hello to the woman next to me to be polite, and I get told to F**k Off, I wasn't even hitting on them. Was I wrong? Should I have just turned my back on her and be rude? Now I wont even approach a woman in a bar for fear of what could happen, and I think this is what this campaign is doing. You have the nice respectful guys that wont approach women now for fear of what they could be accused off, So that leaves the women with the Men that don't give a flying F**k what women think, they only care about what they think of themselves and what they are worthy of.

I read on her that someone said why do men not go into gay bars, I have been in gay bars and I can tell you I have never ever been assaulted like I have been in "straight bars", yes I was approached, chatted up and all advances were rejected politely and firmly and I didn't feel threatened. Compare that to when I worked in a bar and there I was subjected to not just having my bum pinched, which didn't bother me, but my arms were felt, crotch was grabbed painfully, chest felt, women coming up behind and wrapping their arms around me to feel my chest and I was suppose to just laugh at this. Where as if I did that I could be reported for sexual harassment or worse sexual assault.

__..__ wrote: »

I wonder if she tweeted #METOO
But was it about the driver whondid nothing wrong except probably save a life, or me, who she didn't see at all looking at her hotpants thinking jesus they look very tight for jogging.

By the way I have to declare here that she was in no way attractive. It was.ourely that someone would jog in hotpants that distracted me.

Those jogging hot pants are the devil.

Floppybits wrote: »

In all seriousness though it seems Men can do nothing right, On the one hand we have women saying that they can't get man and on the other you have women, probably the same ones, saying men are not to look at me or talk to me or approach me anyway. Yes there are men out there who believe they are god's gift and cannot understand why a woman can reject them, Why they are like that who knows? What can be done about, well I suppose there mates tell them to cop onto themselves and stop being an ars*ho*e? That might work, it may not. Ostracize them from society.

Then there are men like me out there, probably the vast majority, that respect women, actually I would say now I am more nervous now around women that I have ever been. It's impossible to know what to do, I have been situations in bars where I am buying a drink for myself (I don't drink so I am not drunk) and I say hello to the woman next to me to be polite, and I get told to F**k Off, I wasn't even hitting on them. Was I wrong? Should I have just turned my back on her and be rude? Now I wont even approach a woman in a bar for fear of what could happen, and I think this is what this campaign is doing. You have the nice respectful guys that wont approach women now for fear of what they could be accused off, So that leaves the women with the Men that don't give a flying F**k what women think, they only care about what they think of themselves and what they are worthy of.

I read on her that someone said why do men not go into gay bars, I have been in gay bars and I can tell you I have never ever been assaulted like I have been in "straight bars", yes I was approached, chatted up and all advances were rejected politely and firmly and I didn't feel threatened. Compare that to when I worked in a bar and there I was subjected to not just having my bum pinched, which didn't bother me, but my arms were felt, crotch was grabbed painfully, chest felt, women coming up behind and wrapping their arms around me to feel my chest and I was suppose to just laugh at this. Where as if I did that I could be reported for sexual harassment or worse sexual assault.

Being told "Do you want to f**king get up on me altogether" by a woman sitting down at a table beside the dance floor where I was dancing with my back to her and hadn't even seen she was there was a recent "pleasant" experience I had. Maybe "sorry but you are bumping into me" would have been more appropriate. If she can't get a man then I'm not surprised. Although there seemed to be a guy with her with a "kill me now" expression on his face so I don't know. And I'm sure people will say "maybe she was having a bad day" etc etc ... but men are not allowed bad days.

Men can't "wear what they want" the way women can.

In an office environment there is a VERY LIMITED range of clothing which is acceptable for men to wear. Women have far more latitude.

Tech companies being the obvious exception to this.

[Deleted User]

A Little Pony wrote: »

Another pointless social media nonsense which will be forgotten about in a few days time. Pretty much like #prayfor rubbish.

#prayformojo

BrownFinger wrote: »

A Little Pony wrote: »

Another pointless social media nonsense which will be forgotten about in a few days time. Pretty much like #prayfor rubbish.

#prayformojo

Mojo is boxed and can only come out by appointment.

seamus

professore wrote: »

Men can't "wear what they want" the way women can.

In an office environment there is a VERY LIMITED range of clothing which is acceptable for men to wear. Women have far more latitude.

Men don't fight for it.

Male office fashion is also far more restrained than women's. There are hundreds of variants of women's styles, and a wide range of colours.

Men's by comparison are pretty much "flat". With the exception of wearing a shirt which may be a little bit bright, it's a darkish suit with a plain shirt and a matching tie.

A man who wanted to, could easily take the cue from women and go to work in a bright white or mustard suit with a patterned shirt. It's within any dress code. This would be perfectly normal for a woman to do, but men choose not to. Fear of rocking the boat, or whatever.

And yes, one could argue social pressure makes men not wear a flamboyant suit. But back in the 70's, the only acceptable office wear for women was a skirt and heels. It's only by pushing against social pressure that you can invoke change. Women have a wider variety of what's acceptable to wear, because women pushed back and constantly pushed the boundaries.

Men haven't.

[Deleted User]

professore wrote: »

https://m.independent.ie/style/celebrity/celebrity-news/i-was-sexually-harassed-says-rt-weather-presenter-joanna-donnelly-36249564.html

This kind of thing is what pisses people off. I'm not referring to the anonymous letter, I'm referring to the "sexual harrassment" of some guy asking her out a few times and she saying no to him. Nothing more. Who has this not happened to, male or female, someone you don't fancy chasing you?

Calls into question the credibility of her whole narrative. Then a mention of her book at the end. Makes a mockery of genuine cases.

First of all, Joanna Donnelly has not written a book. She was making a semi-serious point, ridiculing the fact that if she ever writes about these and other experiences, she'll have to change the names to protect the guilty parties.

Second of all, her experience with a colleague does seem to have been harassment ... by the legal definition of that term, as well as its dictionary definition.

If Joanna Donnelly's recounting this persistent experience *in the workplace*, which sounds pretty awkward and stressful, bothers you so much, you might want to ask yourself 'what is it about her experience that bothers me so much?'

Floppybits wrote: »

In all seriousness though it seems Men can do nothing right,

I think it's important to listen to the reasonable male voices on this thread too, it can be easy to get exasperated and distracted by the others.

This thread is no more representative of men, IME, than random nutters on Twitter are representative of the people posting #MeToo.

Boards in general would have you convinced there's a literal gender war going on out there. With grenades and stuf.

Benildus

Seeing all of these #metoo posts from women that have been sexually abused or assaulted that have been popping up on social media has got me feeling a lot. Mostly sadness.

I’ve felt like I wanted to share something on the topic and couldn’t quite figure out exactly what, or even if it was my place to do so, and then I saw my sister share a #metoo post and even though it wasn’t very serious it’s prompted me to share. It was also partly inspired by a beautiful post from my bro Adam

To all women, on behalf of all men, I’m Sorry. We’re going to do better. We’re going to be better.

Working in the transformational space over the last few years has bought to my awareness just how much physical, mental, emotional and sexual abuse actually occurs in our society. Both male and female victims. It’s shocking. This post is more about the healing of the wounds inflicted on to so many women.

What’s happened to women collectively over the course of history is pretty painful to think about. The years of oppression, abuse, harassment, inequality.. We don’t have any excuses for what we’ve done. When we actually sit with it. We’re ****ing embarrassed about it and we’re carrying a lot of guilt - often subconsciously.

Young boys not shown how to become men.

Young boys with hurt hearts that weren’t held. Young boys with anger that wasn’t expressed. Scared young boys who weren’t shown how to create safety. Young boys that were hurt and abused when they were suppose to be loved. Not shown how to be with their emotions (and desires), not shown how to express things, bottling it all up.

Bottling it all up only works for so long. Eventually - one way or another it all comes out. If it can’t be expressed consciously in a healthy way it’s going to come out unconsciously in an unhealthy and harmful way. That’s why so often drugs and alcohol are involved.

There’s one phrase that keeps popping into my head. It’s that hurt people hurt people. What must a human have endured to be able to do these kinds of things to another human? Often the abuser has been abused - and the cycle goes on. In no way, shape or form is this an excuse for the abuse and pain that has been inflicted. But it does create some context for how a man could do such a thing. It’s time to break this cycle. It’s time to change the story.

The wounded masculine has a lot to answer for, no doubt. He also needs a lot of love and nurturing if he’s going to be able to grow and develop into the sacred masculine that women and the world needs so desperately right now.

Anger won’t fix anger. Abuse won’t fix abuse. Love might help though.

It’s amazing to see so many women being vulnerable enough to share, and create space for others to do the same. Thank you. Raising awareness and bringing it into the light is the only way to move forward.

…

So what do can we do now?

Right now there’s a generation of boys not being guided into manhood and girls not being guided into womanhood. Boys that don’t know what it means to be a man. And girls that don’t know how to be women. Boys that aren’t learning to respect themselves or their counterpart, women not learning how to say no and respect themselves. A generation where the primary education around sex is from the pornography industry, and so they don’t know any different.

Let’s keep working on our own **** so we don’t carry it forward. So we can start to guide some of these young people into the next phase of their life in a healthy and empowering way. Let’s keep the conversation open and keep creating space for people to own, integrate and love all parts of themselves.

To share a positive light on this painful topic, there are so many guys right now who are battling their demons and working on themselves so they can show up better for the world and the women their life. The shift has started, maybe we just need to add a bit more fuel to the fire and get this train really moving.

And so, to all women, on behalf of all men, I’m Sorry. We’re going to do better. We’re going to be better.

**since posting this the wording of a few aspects of it have been bought to my attention. The first was referring to my sisters post as "not that serious", this was the general vibe/wording she had when discussing it with me but I agree with the people who pointed out that every incident like this is serious and needs to be treated accordingly.
The second was that "women aren't being taught how to say no and respect themselves". Definitely a better word would have been "honour themselves". I included this part not because of assumptions I'd made but because of direct conversations with multiple women (mainly younger - under 25) who bought it to my attention. In no way was this to lay any of the blame for these events on the women that are victims to them. Hope this gives some clarity.

TL;DR: Bellend posted the above on FB

Floppybits wrote: »

In all seriousness though it seems Men can do nothing right,

Why is it, that anytime people raise the serious topics of sexual harassment and sexual assault, people immediately criticise the victims by turning themselves into victims?

I'm a man, I've never gotten the impression from a woman that I can 'do nothing right'. Neither does a hashtag (which, by the way, men are using too) give me that impression.

There's a bizarre amount of insecurity on this thread, and on social media, in response to those who have experienced sexual harassment/ abuse. "
I don't think it is insecurity at all, I think it is confusion as to what is acceptable and what is not? If I approach a woman in a bar and say "hi how are you? how is the night going?" and she reponds "great thanks, how is yours? and conversation starts" all well and good but I do that on another night to another woman and that woman could perceive that as sexual harassment, now as far as I am concerned I wouldn't see it as such but it is not about how I perceive it is it about how the other person does? Now people on here may think the second woman is a bit too sensitive and needs to take a look at herself, where as other people may take the view that it was sexual harassment, and this why I said "Men can do nothing right", it is a minefield, one approach is seen as ok by one person and not by the other, what are you to do?
Also you can see on here some women get offended at cat calling or wolf whistling and some take it as compliment and other wish that they would get a wolf whistle or cat called every now and then. I think cat calling and wolf whistling is a bit juvenile really and any male doing above the age of 21 needs to grow up.

seamus

Floppybits wrote: »

I don't think it is insecurity at all, I think it is confusion as to what is acceptable and what is not? If I approach a woman in a bar and say "hi how are you? how is the night going?" and she reponds "great thanks, how is yours? and conversation starts" all well and good but I do that on another night to another woman and that woman could perceive that as sexual harassment, now as far as I am concerned I wouldn't see it as such but it is not about how I perceive it is it about how the other person does? Now people on here may think the second woman is a bit too sensitive and needs to take a look at herself, where as other people may take the view that it was sexual harassment, and this why I said "Men can do nothing right", it is a minefield, one approach is seen as ok by one person and not by the other, what are you to do?

Context. It's all about context.

If a person cannot read the behavioural or social cues that give you an idea that someone is open to being "chatted up", then you should probably not do it.

A woman at the bar, who seems relaxed and is with friends, will probably be open for a conversation. She's out for a bit of craic, she knows why you're coming up to talk to her. "Maybe meet a nice guy" is part of her agenda for the night, so you're already a few steps up.

If that's not part of her agenda and she just wants to chat to her mates, then one should be capable of reading the cues. Saying "Hi, how are you", is never going to be sexual harassment. It becomes harassment when one continues pushing the conversation despite her clear disinterest in having a conversation. Or worse, coming up to her later on. And again. And again.

A woman standing at a bus stop, or in line at Tesco, or in work, or going through airport security, or any other of a million other places that are mundane daily things, does probably not have "maybe meet a nice guy" top of their agenda for that day. So a guy coming up and talking to her is going to get a more guarded response by default. "Hi, how are you?" will never be sexual harassment, but she will think - just like you would - "Ugh, what do you want? I'm in no mood for making smalltalk, just go away. Please".

Again, context. Some social awareness, don't go chatting up women who are clearly in no mood for a chat, even if you think you're most charming motherfncker in the world. Don't keep trying to have a conversation with someone who is clearly not "conversing". This is the easy one; single-word responses or forced smiles are a pretty good "that's nice, please stop talking to me" indicator. Sometimes you will encounter a woman who is open to the conversation. And that's cool.

If you want to turn it into a male-positive message - have some respect for yourself. Pushing a conversation on a woman who's not interested, is sad and pathetic. There's a school of thought which tells men to "chase", that woman need convincing and that they play "hard to get" by default. The men who subscribe to this message clearly have no respect for themselves, they will bend over backwards to to plead with a woman who is not interested. If she's not interested, drop it. To do anything else disrespects you and the woman that you're annoying. And that applies in all scenarios, whether it's on the street or in a bar. Chatting up women at random in the street? Sad. Constantly throwing shapes at a woman in a bar who's clearly not interested? Pathetic.

Like literally every other human interaction, people are going to react to an approach differently depending on a million different things. Their mood, their character, their culture, the fact that you remind them of someone, their previous experiences, how long they've been queueing for a pint. Same as if you crack a joke, ask for directions, start talking about politics, swear casually. You'll piss some people off, delight some people, some people will forget about it two seconds later. There is no absolute right way to approach women because women are different from each other. Women are different from each other. Women. Are different. From each other.

Negotiating being approached, which most women have been doing since early adolescence, is also a minefield. You don't know how someone will react to rejection, you don't want to wrongly assume someone's chatting you up when they're being friendly, nor do you want to get landed with the "I'm just being friendly" guy all night. There are some men who will miss or ignore every social cue up to you saying "I don't want to talk to you, sorry, bye" and then call you every name under the sun for being rude.

And there is no one answer or strategy any man can give for how to deal with the situation because men are different from each other. And yes it can simetimes feel like you can't do anything right. All you can do is read the interaction based on your previous interactions, intuition and so on. Take each one as it comes and accept that you're going to annoy and upset some people and that you're going to meet some gobshítes.

server down

XiJinping wrote: »

I did it purely as an exercise to increase confidence a few times, never imagined it would actually go well

You got a video out soon, don’t you? Or a YouTube channel?

server down

What Seamas says sounds great, until you realise that he is reducing the opportunities to meet people to a bar or pub. Maybe a dating app.

0ph0rce0

I see Harry Styles was sexually assaulted

https://www.joe.ie/music/footage-emerged-fan-groping-harry-styles-performed-stage-604546

What a ****ing joke of a world we live in now.

Look at the comments on twitter. Madness

0ph0rce0 wrote: »

I see Harry Styles was sexually assaulted

https://www.joe.ie/music/footage-emerged-fan-groping-harry-styles-performed-stage-604546

What a ****ing joke of a world we live in now.

Look at the comments on twitter. Madness

What, the joke of a world where you're not supposed to grab strangers by the d1ck?

0ph0rce0

Greta Uneven Termite wrote: »

What, the joke of a world where you're not supposed to grab strangers by the d1ck?

He got down to the crowd, he's a celebrity, Hands are everywhere. Not like anyone pulled his knob out and wanked him off.

A load of oul bollocks

server down wrote: »

What Seamas says sounds great, until you realise that he is reducing the opportunities to meet people to a bar or pub. Maybe a dating app.

Soon it will be dating by appointment only.

seamus

server down wrote: »

What Seamas says sounds great, until you realise that he is reducing the opportunities to meet people to a bar or pub. Maybe a dating app.

Yes. That's pretty much it. Opportunities to meet strangers, that is. Because, believe it or not, most people don't really want strangers talking to them in public, never mind chatting them up. How many couples have a story that starts with, "Well, I was going through airport security and he asked me for my number, and the rest is history". There's one of them for every 1,000 stories that start with, "We met in school/college/work/through friends".

By a massive margin, people still "meet people" through social activities which build familiarity rather than assume sexual tension - socialising with friends, working, shared hobbies, school/college/training courses.

Where the two people were previously strangers, a bar or other "sexualised" social setting is the preferred venue by a country mile, because, again, people just want to go about their ordinary day without being chatted up or having to chat up.

Online and dating apps are a huge source now because they remove the guesswork. The only people involved are those who want to be. As much as people complain about them being sausagefests, they've massively improved the hit ratio for the majority of men. The guy who manages to land one "date" a month, even if it's just a short-lived drink with a woman, is probably doing 10-20 times better than he would have 20 twenty years ago trying to chat up random women at the bus stop.

Pac1Man

0ph0rce0 wrote: »

He got down to the crowd, he's a celebrity, Hands are everywhere. Not like anyone pulled his knob out and wanked him off.

A load of oul bollocks

That's what the fan said.

0ph0rce0 wrote: »

He got down to the crowd, he's a celebrity, Hands are everywhere. Not like anyone pulled his knob out and wanked him off.

A load of oul bollocks

Looking at the video it seems like a deliberate, very intimate grope, and he pushes the person's hand off and moves away.

Just because someone's in public, in arms reach and you like the look of them doesn't mean you get to grab their bits. "He's a celebrity" isn't any better of an excuse than "she was wearing a short skirt"

0ph0rce0

Greta Uneven Termite wrote: »

Looking at the video it seems like a deliberate, very intimate grope, and he pushes the person's hand off and moves away.

Just because someone's in public, in arms reach and you like the look of them doesn't mean you get to grab their bits. "He's a celebrity" isn't any better of an excuse than "she was wearing a short skirt"

The chap got down on his knees crotch first to peoples heads into a crowd of fan girls, hands went everywhere. I highly doubt anyone girl was thinking GRAB HIS DICK in that moment. Just looking for a touch of Harry.

A loAd of bollocks I said.

server down

seamus wrote: »

Yes. That's pretty much it. Opportunities to meet strangers, that is. Because, believe it or not, most people don't really want strangers talking to them in public, never mind chatting them up. How many couples have a story that starts with, "Well, I was going through airport security and he asked me for my number, and the rest is history". There's one of them for every 1,000 stories that start with, "We met in school/college/work/through friends".

By a massive margin, people still "meet people" through social activities which build familiarity rather than assume sexual tension - socialising with friends, working, shared hobbies, school/college/training courses.

Where the two people were previously strangers, a bar or other "sexualised" social setting is the preferred venue by a country mile, because, again, people just want to go about their ordinary day without being chatted up or having to chat up.

Online and dating apps are a huge source now because they remove the guesswork. The only people involved are those who want to be. As much as people complain about them being sausagefests, they've massively improved the hit ratio for the majority of men. The guy who manages to land one "date" a month, even if it's just a short-lived drink with a woman, is probably doing 10-20 times better than he would have 20 twenty years ago trying to chat up random women at the bus stop.

Actually not that many people meet their spouse in colllege and very few people I know are married to their high school sweet heart. That leaves work - which could be male or female dominated and “through friends” which can be a lottery.

I met a gf in an airport. We were both delayed.

seamus wrote: »

Men don't fight for it.

Male office fashion is also far more restrained than women's. There are hundreds of variants of women's styles, and a wide range of colours.

Men's by comparison are pretty much "flat". With the exception of wearing a shirt which may be a little bit bright, it's a darkish suit with a plain shirt and a matching tie.

A man who wanted to, could easily take the cue from women and go to work in a bright white or mustard suit with a patterned shirt. It's within any dress code. This would be perfectly normal for a woman to do, but men choose not to. Fear of rocking the boat, or whatever.

And yes, one could argue social pressure makes men not wear a flamboyant suit. But back in the 70's, the only acceptable office wear for women was a skirt and heels. It's only by pushing against social pressure that you can invoke change. Women have a wider variety of what's acceptable to wear, because women pushed back and constantly pushed the boundaries.

Men haven't.

So it's fine because men don't "fight" for it. Hmmmm. So men are not the violent macho types and women are not the shrinking helpless violets you would have us believe?

hatrickpatrick

professore wrote: »

https://m.independent.ie/style/celebrity/celebrity-news/i-was-sexually-harassed-says-rt-weather-presenter-joanna-donnelly-36249564.html

This kind of thing is what pisses people off. I'm not referring to the anonymous letter, I'm referring to the "sexual harrassment" of some guy asking her out a few times and she saying no to him. Nothing more. Who has this not happened to, male or female, someone you don't fancy chasing you?

Calls into question the credibility of her whole narrative. Then a mention of her book at the end. Makes a mockery of genuine cases.

In my view, this article describes *EXACTLY* what should be meant by sexual harassment.

"The problem was with this one particular person who just wouldn't take no for an answer. They were making things really uncomfortable, constantly asking me out. It wasn't physically dangerous but it was harassment. He would ask me out and I would say 'no' and then he would ask me out again and I would say 'No, I'm not interested' and he would say 'well you're leading me on' and that I had smiled at him in a particular way."

In what universe is this not harassment? If someone tells you they're not interested, back the f*ck off. Failing or refusing to do so is indeed harassment, and on top of that it's just being an unimaginably pathetic human being.

seamus wrote: »

Yes. That's pretty much it. Opportunities to meet strangers, that is. Because, believe it or not, most people don't really want strangers talking to them in public, never mind chatting them up. How many couples have a story that starts with, "Well, I was going through airport security and he asked me for my number, and the rest is history". There's one of them for every 1,000 stories that start with, "We met in school/college/work/through friends".

By a massive margin, people still "meet people" through social activities which build familiarity rather than assume sexual tension - socialising with friends, working, shared hobbies, school/college/training courses.

Where the two people were previously strangers, a bar or other "sexualised" social setting is the preferred venue by a country mile, because, again, people just want to go about their ordinary day without being chatted up or having to chat up.

Online and dating apps are a huge source now because they remove the guesswork. The only people involved are those who want to be. As much as people complain about them being sausagefests, they've massively improved the hit ratio for the majority of men. The guy who manages to land one "date" a month, even if it's just a short-lived drink with a woman, is probably doing 10-20 times better than he would have 20 twenty years ago trying to chat up random women at the bus stop.

Are people really being hit on all the time? Really? Is it that much of a thing? I'm friends with some truly beautiful women and outside of bars they are not being hit on 24/7.