Nice Tits!

fwiw I've also put this episode in Legal for any advice about anti-social behaviour interventions.

This is rather timely. A couple of weeks ago member of my team at work came to me to complain she had "Nice tits!" said to her by a bunch of teenager boys outside the office. I went out to 'challenge' them and they all denied it. Still gave them a bit of a lecture about respect etc Later that day a rather aggressive dad and his boy came to see me. Yesterday my line manager tells me the dad has made a formal complaint and I am to be 'investigated' for harassing a child. Which in my position is a massive thing.
Nope, you just can't make it up.

"Advising someone to ignore it is understandable, but that doesn't tackle the underlying problem of a lack of respect for others."

Yes, completely agree, which is why it's good that on MN, bald advice to "ignore it" is less common than on the rest of the internet.

However, ignoring as a decision (not ignoring the hurt and fear of the target) may well be the safest one in many situTions. - if the catcallers are on a building site etc you can report them but if it's a drive by shouting, there's rarely an obvious line of recourse.

Getting back to the OP, teenage boys are not known for their sensitivity towards others, especially when they are in a group and start behaving as a pack. They have absolutely no idea of the effect their behaviour is having on others, in fact it probably never enters their heads that shouting a comment at a complete stranger is intimidating, and five seconds later they'll have forgotten all about it and moved on to whatever other mindless entertainment is going to amuse them, as they drive around with no particular purpose.

It's all just funny to them, until someone challenges them on their behaviour, when they'l either laugh it off and move away, or become more aggressive towards the challenger, and if they've had a few beers it can escalate into violence, which they'll probably regret later, when they're sober. Incidentally, I have seen similar behaviour from groups of females out for the night in town, after a few drinks, when usually the majority of others around them are in a similar state, and I have felt intimidated if I've been on my own, just by their inebriated behaviour.

But whoever' doing it, it IS intimidating, whether it's a comment about a member of the opposite sex's appearance, accent, skin colour, or anything else. Advising someone to ignore it is understandable, but that doesn't tackle the underlying problem of a lack of respect for others.

You know what's nice? Having this 'conversation' without someone saying 'Oh, but I quite enjoy it, you know? It's nice to get the validation!'

I always feel like throwing things when that happens. It assumes that enjoyment is something that isn't conditioned by social mores. I tend to go into explanations that involve Pavlov's dog at that point and then the other person gets offended .

"I hope my daughter doesn't have to put up with this when she grows up."

Or sons contribute to it,

I will be be talking to my son about it, as my parents didn't seem to give any direction in this.

It's just an exercise in humiliation, isn't it? I still remember how the table of blokes laughed their heads off.

Ugh, memories of being 18 and working in a pub.

I was wearing trousers and leaned across a table to pick up some glasses. A male customer (20s or 30s) pushed his finger against my trousers right into where my arsehole was and said "boop!". I ran away crying, but my manager (male) and the other bar server (female) said "it's part of the job" as I stood there sobbing. I even felt embarrassed because I was wearing a sanitary pad and thought the man might have felt it, it seemed to make it worse somehow that's he'd know something so intimate about me through his assault. Does that make sense?

I'm shaking just writing this. I wish I'd slapped him away, it would have been worth losing my job over.

A couple of guys in our office made some comments about a new girl on a different floor (not in her earshot)...how she was fit etc...

Myself and some female co-workers spent the rest of the day commenting on the blokes in the office - what we'd rate them out of 10, what their bums were like etc.

Funnily enough, said males didn't like being objectified and no further comments have been made about anyones appearance or how fit they are....

That should be group of blokes surrounded me.

I'm 52, and, while all this crap generally stopped a long time ago for me, I still occasionally gets some dickhead/group of dickheads accidentally checking me out then insulting me when they realise I shouldn't be on ther radar.
I suppose it's quite funny in a way (they're disappointed so ha!), but it didn't feel funny when I stopped to look in a shop window on a Saturday afternoon and four or five blokes (in their thirties) me, with one saying 'no, ugly' several times when I turned to move on.
Makes me wish my hair would hurry up and turn all grey so I'm more obviously 'aged' from a distance.

Oh the anger is useful. That it's worse now, that makes me angry.

I remember being out in a pub with some older girlfriends when I was 17. Oh I was a slim leggy thing then....I was messing about flirting with the lads (who we knew) who were playing pool and one of them came up behind me and put the pool cue horizontally up between my legs. I can't remember what he said but I remember the burning red faced mortification and running off. More searingly I remember being told, you can't wear a short skirt and boots like that and not expect them to have some fun with you. That's twenty years ago and it makes me red with anger rather than embarrassment now.

If a bunch of schoolgirls asked for 90% of the playing field to be turned over to picnic tables or reading areas, they'd be laughed out of the heads office.

Same with playgrounds and football games, whirlpool.

Oh yes, that happens doesn't it, weallfloat.

How odd that when I read it I immediately knew exactly what you were talking about, but I never actually noticed before, I just thought oh those people over there are using all that beach for their cricket and those people there are playing frisbee and I don't want to get hit in the face so I'll steer clear and ditto those ones playing football and so on and so on...

This stuff is weird. How did I not notice the obvious factor there!

I also totally agree it's about claiming a space too. I was at the beach the other week, and entire swathes of the coast were taken up by men, either playing ball games that took up entire stretches between groynes, flying huge kites that could knock a child over easily (and they were violently swishing them down to ground level!) and just doing shit that required all the space. then the entire sea was filled with men on jet skis making the water a no go zone too. Literally no women were doing this. God, there were even men standing up beach lobbing rocks accross the rest of the sand to the sea, could they move to the surf and do this....thus freeing up the whole bit of beach!?!? No! It did provide a perfect backdrop to point this phenomena out to my dh, who I think might not have agreed without the ridiculous amount of examples that day.

It's a slightly different dynamic if it's a group of girls as safety in numbers feelings. When you're by yourself it can make you feel very vulnerable and depending on situations maybe intimidated or scared. Or just annoyed or angry or bored or whatever.

WeAllFloat yes I stopped reacting when I hear a car horn or a shout when I was in my teens! The ones who want a reaction any reaction will do and so it's preferable not to give it to them Some of course get annoyed by the lack of reaction and so up the ante to make you notice them / pay attention etc and it can get a bit nasty.

The other consequence of this is the amount of times I've had "oh I saw you on the high street and I beeped / shouted but you didn't hear me / completely ignored me" well yes I've learned not to react (if possible) to these sudden things and so that's how it is. What happens if the beep is a warning about something well tough, loads of women and girls don't turn around when cars beep because they have learnt not to.

And the other thing is when they beep right next to you it can make you jump out of your skin it's really loud, and then you can't help but jump, do they do this because so many women don't react and that forces them too? That was something I really disliked as it was the general intrusiveness + getting a sudden big fright.

Whole thing's shit really.

Whirlpool I would say overtime its probably more ashamed, when i specifically did it, i was with peers and it was not to single women it was to groups of girls of similar age who appeared to be going out. They appeared to laugh and wave seemed all part of a game.

The womens experience we hardly heard about, well I didn't when i was younger, and there was no real talk about consent either, loads on environmentalism and drugs but nothing on people and relationships. Perhaps thing shave changed now?

"The Romancing vs Stalking line can be lost on people". I mean men tbh not people sorry.

Yes ninokuni I would agree with that.

I've perfected an air of total oblivion, that really takes the wind out of their sails. I like to add things like picking gunk out of the corner of my eye, and other little details which makes THEM feel invisible. I've made them jump before when I've suddenly turned to look at them before walking away because I'm so good at it. I love to hear their brazen yells turn into feeble and embarrassed token efforts before they finally shut up. I like to think it makes them feel powerless, even just a tiny bit when faced with an un effected target.