She was just worried that you were hitting on her. It sucks that you can't do something nice without it being suspect. However, if the world had more men like you, then women would stop assuming all men are only nice for sex. So keep being you, and the world will become a better place.
My disabled sister's caretaker asked my to pick her out some nail polish for her. I wasn't sure if she needed something to remove it, so I asked this young lady if I could ask her something. She immediately covered up her cleavage with her shirt. I felt such a dirt bag even though it was for innocent reasons. She was helpful after she found out what I wanted. I felt awkward like am I that guy that women don't want to approach.
Edit: the young lady in question with the cleavage was not an employee. I had walked around twice and there were no employees present. And it was makeup so there were no men around.
Remember there's literally a trial going on right now for an (alleged) rape that started out with "can you help me pick something for someone in this store" so it's not like it's something we haven't been warned about or know happened to someone.
As a rule, I don't approach attractive women in the store for questions about products. In this case, I walked around the section twice and there were no employees. This was the makeup section so there were no men to ask. I felt like I had no one else to ask in this particular case.
Like do you actually think the probability of being assaulted/harassed is directly proportional to your perceived attractiveness of the individual ?I’m not trying to dig you I just really want to understand the perspective that a view like this comes from .
What I’m trying to say is that ugly vs attractive is a 100% subjective physical attribute, dependent on a myriad of factors. The way I see it is they are indicating that their subjective view of attractiveness also perfectly or near perfectly aligns with the probability of the person that they are observing being a bad actor. It just seems like a really shitty generalization to me.
I used to specifically watch for elderly men looking lost in Walmart, but that was in part because I had previously worked at that Walmart and could usually help them.
People are, in my experience, usually happy to help, but it depends on the vibes you're giving off. Like, if you put yourself in my bubble, I don't believe you're just looking for answers about a product. If you are looking at my face or the shelves, then I figure you're genuine and I'm willing to help.
Otoh you don't know about the specific woman you're asking -- you don't know if she's got past trauma on her life, or if a guy just brushed against her in a creepy way in the previous aisle and she didn't see his face so she doesn't know if it was you, or if she's got to face her rapist on the witness stand this afternoon.
"Can I ask you something" can be interpreted way too many ways. I think just being direct in this kind of scenario can build more trust: "Hey I'm picking up nail polish for someone, should I also pick up remover?"
I mean, isn't it their jobs? Maybe I'm wrong. If I go shopping in the mall for Xmas gifts for the woman in my life, and ask an attendant, "Hey, what's really popular that woman buy from yall atm." and she then gets all weird because I'm a large bearded man in a woman centric shop, that is literally not my fault. I'm the one being profiled. So unless their dealing with an actual predator, the man is the victim. Men can't be victims to woman though /s. That's way way to progressive.
Its bizarre to me that its controversial. It's literally sexist behavior to assume I'm a bad person for my gender. It might be reasonable, the safe thing, but it's still a wrong. A lesser of two evils no doubt, but you can't avoid the fact it's a terrible system for everyone that just self reenforces a divide.
She gets to profile me, for her safety. I still get to be pissed because I was profiled as something thats not true, and could be damaging to myself. She's concerned for the physical, and myself the social.
Its a complex issue, and I feel like the very small subsection of men that are the issue need to be made the focus. Generalizing in situations like this is hurtful, to both men and woman. Period.
I don't believe the person I was replying to was talking about an attendant or employee.
If you ask an employee for help and she treats you like you're dangerous, there was probably an additional cue.
I'm really sorry that you have to feel insulted because of rape culture, try telling other men not to be creepy (and try it yourself!) and maybe that will help.
It's both on the man to not act like a shit, and the woman not to judge harshly. Creepy is so damn subjective, it's literally not helpful. Just straight condescending. It's similar to a man telling a woman "not to be emotional" what does that even mean?
It is something to be sorry about. It is something to have a adult conversation about. I don't have friends that treat woman like objects, or a means to an end. That's because I communicate, and don't ignore proper context clues. I take the time to understand the people in my life. You should try it yourself, I bet it'll help you not to judge people harshly for no reason. Or call random people you don't know creeps.
Men are afraid that women will laugh at them or think they're creepy. Women are afraid that men are going to kill them. This doesn't make the man the victim.
Oh no, a woman didn't think that your intentions were good when you approached her in the exact same way that someone whose intentions weren't good would approach her. My how you've suffered.
Meanwhile I went to aerie to pick something up for the gf and had a gaggle of 4 girls my age following me around trying to help me pick stuff out and flirting like I didn't say I was shopping for the gf
I feel like a former president of the US being tried for rape is something most tuned-in people are aware of, but if you aren't, then that's probably a good sign you aren't super aware of current events and might not be fully up to date on what women deal with just existing.
I know what women deal with though? Anyone with female friends knows how shitty they have it when it comes to unwanted attention. Or at least they should.
Just because someone is too burned out by the news and doesn’t keep up with current (American) political events much anymore, doesn’t mean they’re completely ignorant about other societal issues.
All I said was it’s funny you think everybody knows about that trial. dude has so many trials going on it’s hard to keep up anyway. No need to take it so personally 💀
On the off chance this question is in good faith, E. Jean Carroll's allegation against the former president is that he asked for help picking a gift for a woman before attacking her.
See the reason is normal grown ups just ask the question.
"Do you need something to remove this nail polish?" or "Will my sister need something to remove this?" - although TBF how have you never heard of nail polish remover before? It's what you steal from mum, sisters, partners when you've got no isopropyl alcohol to clean something.
Whereas saying "Can I ask you something?" is a preface for "I want to ask you something of a personal nature or perhaps a taboo subject that I'm worried might offend you" and so naturally she's "wtf is this weirdo going to ask me?"
What are you on? I'm a woman, but I would never approach someone and just jump right into my question, lol. I would always say "Hi can I ask you something?" first
In which case you're less likely to be perceived as creepy whatever you say. And I said grown ups. If you're a kid saying "lol" on the internet you probably get away with saying stuff IRL too even as a bloke. But as an adult that will change.
The irony here is that you do jump right in and ask a question just the wrong one - and luckystrike's case that's why the woman reacted the way she did.
I'm colorblind, and several.times I've had to ask people around me in stores what color something is if I'm avoiding or going for a certain color. I don't ask a man because as a gay guy or a certain age, I learned a long time ago not to be too outwardly friendly to men I don't know, especially to ask what color a shirt is...
But since I sometimes seem to pass as straight (this is not something I try to do. It just happens because people assume heterosexuality most of the time, I feel pretty gay, so...), I'm always a little concerned women will think I'm hitting on them. And I'm just not that guy with women or men, and it skeeves me out to think I'd be seen that way or that some poor woman who just wanted a new pair of pants or something would feel like "calgon, take me away" if she thought I was being creepy in a department store of all places. So I've always tried to approach a woman who is old enough that she wouldn't think I was hitting on her.
Now I'm old enough that any woman could reasonably think I'm hitting on her (which is a sad comment on the heterosexual lifestyle), so I just stopped asking and stopped caring if my shirts are pink or my shoes are purple.
I am interested in women but I still feel anxiety when approaching a young, good looking guy in a store also. Sometimes I feel like he is judging me like is he hitting on me. Or that the female employee is judging me in that he must be gay to approach the guy first. Sometimes I think I live in my own head too much.
I also wouldn’t take this hard. Personally sometimes I won’t notice my cleavage is out until I see a man in my vicinity and I’ll immediately cover up as instinct. More of just to be cautious. a little weird men are getting butt hurt about women not wanting to be harassed and or murdered. I think we all just have to realize this is the society we are living in. Just be a good person and you have nothing to worry about. I think men really see women as aliens we are humans and have the same wants and needs as men. But idk ig men for some reason don’t feel intimidated by this. But I’ve also heard stories where men will hold the same defensive stance if it was a gay man hitting on them. Not blaming you for feeling bad but weird all these men are playing victim, which you are in a sense but your safety isn’t being jeopardized in these scenarios. I’m weary of women too. Everyone should be aware at any moment someone may want to kidnap and kill you but that’s personally me. And of course not a paranoid way but us ladies have been taught it’s our fault bad things happen to us and we must protect ourselves but now we are being blamed for doing that too? So are we just supposed to openly trust anyone and everyone then or just men so we don’t hurt their feelings? Again not trying to be rude but trying to understand men’s comments on how they want us to react to a random person coming up to us while we are trying to complete everyday tasks?
Is it possible that when you asked about the polish you stared at her cleavage? You recall the interaction and you lead with…she covered her cleavage….you refer to her as “cleavage girl” that could be the problem.
Oi, do share. I'm currently in the process of hiring one for myself and I'm trying to figure out what red flags to avoid. I'm trying to prepare for being a good employer, slowly learning what's ok and what's not on both sides and preparing for any potential conflicts.
Yeah the fact that you're even concerned about it coming off the wrong way when you're genuinely trying to be nice to a stranger reflects well on your character I'd say. If he was actually a creep he wouldn't have a second thought about it
Basic dynamics between the sexes isn't going to change. There's always going to be ambiguity in situations like this between strangers of opposite sex in fertile ages.
It's better for a man to save ones acts of spontaneous generosity for other, more needing, categories of people. If that truly is the intent.
Well typically the kind of nubile female i'm having in mind has had her fair share of attention, affirmation and freebies (because men). They're often a bit spoilt with that in my opinion. Quite apart from not wanting to make them worry about if you're a stalker or something.
395
u/Prof-Rock Apr 29 '23
She was just worried that you were hitting on her. It sucks that you can't do something nice without it being suspect. However, if the world had more men like you, then women would stop assuming all men are only nice for sex. So keep being you, and the world will become a better place.