***TW*** Sexual intimidation - To think that this is what almost every woman goes through.

Agree, OP.

I really don't think men get why we are so wary of them.

Every woman has at least one story to tell.

Even now, in my mid 50s, it's something I have to think about. Recently I had to wait for DS doing sports training for an hour, and I had to pass the time. I considered sitting in a local pub, but realised it was the sort of place where if I sat alone, some random bloke would probably come and talk to me, and would be hard to get rid of. So I sat in my car instead.

Tbh, this is the sort of adjustment I refuse to make.

I'm nearly 50. And it does still happen but not as often. I was recently approached by a lad in the pub who was 27. I know this because he told me. He approached to ask if I had a light. And then told me I had great tits. Bloody furious I was!

But if I want to go and sit in a pub on my own I will do. Tbh, I find men approach less if you're in the pub in recent years. I think it's because they see you as being quite ballsy if you are in a pub on your own and don't want to incur your wrath!

And, at my age, I'm more than happy to tell them what I think of them.

But then I'm also quite happy to just have a chat with anyone, male or female, who strikes up a (respectful) conversation.

I said exactly this when I was watching it OP. This is just life for women. When they were talking about him running up against them all I could think was 'welcome to my every day experience on the tube'.

Every woman I know have experienced this type of behaviour and abuse from men. But it’s funny how most people say “oh my lovely DH and DS would never do such a thing”. Wake up, they would. And probably have.

I often think that too.

I was standing outside a pub with my friend about 10 years ago. We could hear that we were being addressed by a man behind us making suggestive comments.

It was the husband of one of our other friends! We'd only met him a couple of times amd he clearly hadn't recognised us from behind, in the dark with his beer goggles on.

Most of these men are someone's trusted partner or lovely dad. And they are definitely all someone's son!

My partner was stood at a urinal in a pub a few months ago. He came out visibly shaken because a man had walked past him and drawn his fingers down my partner's arm and across his back as he did so.

He said he just froze and had no idea whether to react or how to respond.

His next comment was that he supposed he now how a small insight in what it could feel like to be a woman.

I said I don't go around scared of men. I don't avoid walking in the dark or police my clothing because I know, from personal experience of being raped in bed wearing fluffy BHS teddy bear pjs, that you are raped because you've encountered a rapist not because of where you are or what you are doing.

But I said I am also always aware of men around me, who they are with, where they are looking, and their general demeanour.

He said he had no idea he'd feel that vulnerable. 59 years of blissful ignorance he'd lived in. A lot of girls don't get out of their first decade before it starts

11yo - Walking home from secondary school for the first time by myself (obviously wearing school uniform) a van with 3 men followed me shouting “get your rat out”.

Teenager - received multiple ‘dick pics’ on MSN and MySpace from boys in my school. Always asked “are you still a Virgin?” Cars and vans beeping at me and shouting stuff at me whilst walking the street.

18yo - First time in a club, slapped on the arse by a much older man. And he got aggressive when I challenged him.

19yo - Sexually assaulted.

All throughout my 20’s this sort of stuff continued.

I’m in my 30’s now and still experience it. It’s relentless.

Every woman I know have experienced this type of behaviour and abuse from men. But it’s funny how most people say “oh my lovely DH and DS would never do such a thing”. Wake up, they would. And probably have.

Yup. The 'dead eyes' they mention. Watching the guys saying "there's no way this guy is rubbing one out..." yeah, it's inexplicable and unexpected, always. At least they explain they don't punch him in the face and it's not a reaction even men have. The whole idea women don't react properly is clear because the men do the same. Freeze.

Cat calls and wolf whistles as a teenager in school uniform. Grown men trying to grope any chance they got. Men being far too pushy in any club. Being groped at work and my manager tell me to.smile and keep the customers happy - I walked out. Random men trying to come onto me and not wanting to take no for answer. Insults being called a prick tease and frigid when I refused their advances.

There's stuff going on at the moment and my partner is horrified and angry watching it happen, we've had to thrash out the no I'm not doing anything to encourage it but now he's alert to it he's seeing how I'm actually quite incidental to it and its pretty random that its me. Its a handful of men behaving how they want because they think they can.

To answer the points you raise:
No one says all men do that.

Lucky you, not being traumatised.

The world has certainly not changed for the better. Some of the examples here, eg blatant sexism in the workplace, might be less likely now, thanks to decades of feminism changing UK society’s view of what’s acceptable.
But look at the effects of eg widespread porn use training girls to accept violence including strangulation by sex partners. Overall women and girls are suffering as much abuse as ever, if not more.

In my 30s I broke up with my boyfriend, fairly amicably but he did not want to get married and that was not working for me. After we split he decided to explore his attraction to men. At one point he got very angry with me for the split, and shouted at me that I did not know what it was like to walk into a bar and have men sizing me up and only wanting to have sex with me. I dont feel good about it, but I actually laughed out loud, because the level of cluelessness was staggering. Even though he had witnessed me being harassed or heard about my experiences while I was with him.

Men have no clue. But sometimes it is willful.

That is so true, Misty! What a good description.

As I read OP’s list I realised she was counting things I hadn’t even realised were sexual abuse — eg boys at junior school lifting girls’ skirts, or intimidating ‘banter’. As you say, it’s the air we breathe.

Edited to add I’ve had many worse experiences, starting when I was about 7 or 8. Those I mentioned were just so much ‘the water we swim in’ that I didn’t even recognise them.

And we used to be told flashers were just harmless inadequates who never moved on to worse offences. That’s presumably why Wayne Couzens wasn’t stopped before he went on to murder.

I had a dad, have dp and 2 sons who would never behave like this

After telling my then sister in law some of what her brother had done to me I said to her it must be quite shocking to hear. She said "It's not the XXXX I know".

No one knows their abuser like their victim.

I've been at various points on the attractiveness scale during my life, and I can't say it's made any difference. It's about power and humiliation, whether they're telling you you've got 'nice tits' or are 'ugly as fuck'. A certain type of man just gets off on this kind of power play.

Agree OP. I was first sexually harassed when I was about 12, I remember it was before I started my periods.

When I was 16 I had a man opposite me on the train masturbating and was terrified. In much more minor ways I've been called 'commando' because apparently you couldn't see my underwear through my trousers. Amongst other things.

One of my friends says I should take the 'compliment' and it happened because I am naturally friendly and chatty and attractive. Apparently that's also a compliment.
FFS

For me the first instance was a flasher in the local park, aged about 10. Then escaping through the front sash window (& a 4' drop!) to get away from a creepy friend of my parents.Sadly as a teen in the 80s & starting work in the late 80s / early 90s it was par for the course - even to the point of having stockings and heels as part of the work uniform (male manager)

I don't tend to get it now thankfully, but the girls at DD's school all refused to wear skirts&blouses due to how prevalent upskirting & down-blousing was. She also won't go to clubs any more after she was assaulted at one (hands up skirt & tried to get past her knicks), police were AWSOME that time, unlike when she got spiked 18 months later at the same venue.

I can't work out if it's more prevalent or if methods have got far more dangerous.

Firstly both her and JLo looked bloody amazing! Although most beautiful was a toss up between Pamela Anderson or Gigi Hadid but I digress ...

I think and especially at an event like that if you dress like that you accept you will get people of both sexes looking. And that's ok.

Excessive staring however is different and the way men look when leering is different still. But it's unwanted and they should just have some fucking manners and respect.

It's quite unusual for a woman to look at a man in quite the same sexual fashion so if we can keep those thoughts in our head so should men be able to.

I would have just listened / read but for the assertion that this was universal and the implication from another poster that I was lying. I'm not going to "just read / listen" if my truthfulness is questioned.

I find posts like this fascinating but sad. 💐 to all those who have had horrible experiences.

I can only speak about my own experiences so please no one feel that I'm questioning their own accounts. That's not my intention.

If you'd have asked me 20 years ago had I experienced sexual harassed I'd have said no. It wasn't true though. I wasn't lying or in denial or anything but because I'd never felt scared or harassed then I didn't recognise my experiences as being harassment. However, by the age of 25 I'd been flashed several times, been cat called, invited to sit on various men's faces/dicks, had men push their clearly erect penis into my back when on crowded public transport or a gig, etc. The difference was that because I didn't feel scared by any of this it just became background noise to me.

Im not recommending this as an approach btw but I was brought up to see men who did this as social inadequates who I should laugh at or occasionally to take it as a compliment. The flasher was a "saddo", the cat calls etc validation that I was attractive, the men on the bus slightly more persistent saddos who I should turn round and shame, which I did. What I know now is that I was incredibly lucky that none of these incidents where I laughed or called it out resulted in retaliation from those men. Instead, because they slunk off it reinforced my lack of fear.

Where my eyes were opened was when I became a victim of domestic abuse. It amazed me how many people say domestic abuse is wrong and yet in the same breath make excuses for the men who perpetrate it (yes I know women do too but this isn't about that). They certainly didn't want to hold those men to a high standard of accountability. Yes it's wrong he hit you, refused to let you take the baby's clothes when you left and won't pay any maintenance, but hey he's a good dad who loves his kids and you should just fit your life around his (abusive and controlling) whims because children need their dad, etc. Once I saw this, I just couldn't unsee it. And then I started to see it in other behaviours, too. From outright sexual harassment to manspreading. In my own past as well as the present.

I think there is definitely something in not raising our girls to be so terrified of men that they limit their own life chances. My youthful lack of fear led to many opportunities which have enhanced my life. (The older me is now motivated by belligerence tempered by caution.) However, the bigger effort has to be on men becoming more aware and changing their behaviour. With the exception of a few pockets (e.g Andrew Tate followers) I think much progress has been made on this. I know a lot of lovely enlightened young men who are quick to call this out. One of the biggest threats imo though is the easy access to violent porn.

People may not have said it outright, but too many posts are saying they "find it hard to believe" or that "we must have experienced it but be so used to it that we don't consider it harassment."

Everyone should be allowed to share their experiences, both good and bad.

I also never said it hadn't happened to me, but it's also not my experience that it happens all the time. The two occasions I've experienced it stand out in my mind because (for me) they were exceptionally unusual and rare.

I'm just struggling to believe that nearly all women/girls have been sexually assaulted/harassed by scummy men.
I and my friends when growing up must have lived under a rock.
Just sick of all men being portrayed as pervy/creepy cretins
I had a dad, have dp and 2 sons who would never behave like this

Sorry if this is clumsily worded, but what do we think about the women at the Met Gala, for example Rita Ora, who are pretty much naked? I'm not saying they are inviting any sexual intimidation but men, and women, are human, and are going to maybe look a little longer at them because of how they're dressed and potentially give them unwanted attention. Or do they want as much attention of any kind as possible? I wouldn't dream of showing excessive flesh in public as I would hate to be stared at in that way.

Happened to my 14 year old recently on a bus 😢😢.Grim man said “really disgusting” things to her. Another young woman stepped in and the driver threw him off.

So want my teens to be independent and get buses by themselves etc but then this happens. Her best friends mum drives them everywhere and I used to internally eye roll at this but maybe she is right after all.

YANBU.
🤮

If the topic of the thread is, “Am I being unreasonable to think almost every woman [fill-in-the-blank],” you’re opening the floor for women to share their experiences, whatever those experiences are.

@zendeveloper
Not sure if I've misunderstood you ... hoping your saying you absolutely consider it harassment? But some wouldn't. I was gobsmacked some wouldn't.