Sexist and dangerous Samaritans ad

Good point. That's my experience too must be what they want

Compared to women, men consistently perceive a greater degree of sexual intent in women's behavior.

Men appear to interpret people’s behaviors more sexually than do women. This finding, which has been replicated in scores of studies using a variety of methodological approaches, has been linked to important social concerns, including sexual assault and sexual harassment.

Why doesn't she wolf-whistle at him and say "cheer up love, might never happen"?

That's what men have tended to do to me when I've dared to looked distressed in public, I can only assume they are modeling the behaviour they would appreciate at such a time.

Is that because you are a woman?

You do know that some men would see this as a come on sign, yes?

I can already see the incels using this like a pua. Look broody and irritable and slightly sad, let the hordes of young pretty women come talk to you, ask if you want a coffee.

The obvious person to ask if there's a station cafe or another cafe nearby is the station worker who's standing right next to the distressed-looking man.

Why would you ask the distressed man instead? If you decide to ask him it must be because you want to talk to him, not because you want the information.

Not acceptable. Wrong for all the ways people have pointed out.

In a similar situation, if it looked like someone was thinking of suicide, I would tell them about the aftermath for the poor train driver. (I have in fact stopped people from thinking this is a good way to off themselves by telling them this, though not while they were actively suicidal.)

A few decades ago I had a friend who'd been in the Samaritans, who said that they were trained to do nothing except listen to people ringing in - obviously they can't offer advice, but it sounded like you might as well have rung the Speaking Clock (shows age) and tell it your problems. I don't know what the service is like nowadays, though.

Men think women shop assistants are coming on to them if they ask if they need any help! "Where can I get a coffee?" Could 100% be misconstrued. Why isn't she saying "is this the platform for the Doncaster train?" Or better yet "hey Mr train station staff member I'm a bit worried about that chap over there could you maybe use your suicide prevention training that I have no doubt you have had to go and check in with him".

Again, I don't agree. But this is all arguing around the edges.

Unfortunately a lot of men aren't going to get the nuance of the slight difference in language. Hell some men can think you are coming on to them if you ask them if they want something to drink whilst they unblock your drains, so there is a high chance that question could be misread in what could possibly be a volatile/ reaction unknown situation. So you would be better with your do you know when the next train to Darlington is? question and it was unfortunate that the ad agency made such a bad choice (of many things) in the thing she said to him.

What can I say? I don't agree. I think it's worded well, and carefully.

But anyway, my main point from my first post remains the same. I don't think the ad should even show a woman approaching a man, certainly not a woman who we are led to believe is 'good' and better than another woman because of the way she dresses and looks.

I would never walk up to a man and ask where I could get a coffee as he could reply with "I'd like one actually, I'll show you where".

Surely the fact that a very large number of posters on this thread have misinterpreted it tells you that maybe we're not wrong?

As I said before my DP, who is quite honestly dimmer than Joey from Friends with this sort of stuff, even he immediately jumped to "yea that sounds like flirting".

This is the one thing in the ad I can't take exception to and which I think is being misinterpreted here.

Well it's an ad and ads should be clear. Moreover her body language is very come hither.

This is the one thing in the ad I can't take exception to and which I think is being misinterpreted here. She says 'Do you know where I can get a coffee?' Not 'Where do you get a coffee round here?' (which I can imagine taking as a chat-up line). And she definitely doesn't say 'let's go for coffee' or 'ask him for a coffee' or any of the similar things people on here are inferring from it.

The ad is ridiculous. She should have offered tea. It's more British and a well known sinicure for all maladies. Also offer of tea can never be mistaken for a chat up.

Of course you would. I'm amazed at all the people on here saying they wouldn't interpret it as a come-on. It makes me wonder if they've been missing out on exciting romantic opportunities all their lives because they've been taking people's coffee-related chat-up lines literally.

It's also a particularly bizarre question to ask someone on a station platform. Either there's a coffee shop in the station, in which case it would be obvious, or you have to walk out of the station to get a coffee, in which case you'd probably miss your train. Perhaps the idea is to confuse the suicidal man sufficiently that he forgets to kill himself.

TBF I don't think asking where you can get a coffee sounds like a chat-up line. But they could have avoided all accusations by having her say e.g. 'Do you know if I've missed the train to Darlington?'

It is really odd that there's clearly a member of staff there but the message isn't 'report it to them'.
And the presentation of the two women, one with tiny pearl earrings/scraped-back hair/no make-up and the other with bouncy loose hair/red lippy/'boho' hoops) is stereotyped and offensive as all get-out.
I'll be contacting Samaritans.

VitoCorleoneOfMNMafia

Thanks so much for your trouble! will have a read this evening.

If I saw a disturbed man near the tracks, I would stay the hell away!
Report to a large looking staff member and leave it at that. Maybe they can call reinforcements. DO NOT approach dodgy men on your own! Bloody hell

Fucking stupid advert. But I was told by a Samaritan's phone answerer to "buck up" and "it sounds like you're very well off really, perhaps you should just calm down" or words to that effect when I called up once, deeply distressed in an ASD meltdown that was scaring me... I didn't know it was a meltdown at the time, pre-diagnosis.

So wouldn't expect anything better from them.

Trust your instincts women, don't approach angry looking strange men on train platforms. "What if I say the wrong thing?" Yeah, what if you do and he takes it as a come on and feels entitled to rape you or he just gets angry and aggressive and is bigger and stronger than you are.

You can still act with compassion towards someone giving you concern without compromising your own safety.

Tired of the "women, you must save men" trope. No. They can fuck off and look out for each other. They've taken too much from us already.

The fact that there are so many other people there makes it even more absurd that they're suggesting that it's this woman's duty to save a man who seems to be having a mental health crisis. Why should she take risks to help a stranger who might behave unpredictably?

Having watched the longer video there are quite a few other people there, including the station worker who is seen cheerfully helping people. Why not make the ad about her asking him to talk to the troubled-looking man? It's part of his job to make sure that everyone's safe.

I also think there's a contradiction in the statistics in the training and the message about intervention. There's been a huge increase in suicide risk for under 30 women - well part of that is male hatred of / violence against women and the toxic pornographic environment young women have to navigate.

Given that statistic - where's the care for young women (facing a huge increase in suicide risk) in the Samaritans ad?

Lots of women suffer from stalkers / creepy male behaviour and the police rarely do anything - remember they didn't even investigate Couzens for flashing despite lots of evidence provided by McDonalds staff - and this behaviour can make someone suicidal. Why would you invite a man with clear mental health problems into your life? Insane.

I have watched that training. There's some useful things there, particularly in relation to interactions with family and friends but I still think that exhorting random strangers to take the risk of approaching a stranger without fully considering the risks to them is not right.

I am not surprised suicide is increasing - but there are so many things which are broken in society, and the chances that any given random stranger has the mental wellbeing and resilience to intervene I think must be at an all time low. And as a random stranger you have no ability to intervene in the factors making someone suicidal - e.g. no money, lack of support for caring responsibilities, broken healthcare / social care etc Yes you can disrupt their train of thought right then but there is a high risk to you - it is quite likely an agitated man may take his anger out on you.

And encouraging single women to approach strange men is just flat wrong.

Good point about the man who jumped off a bridge after seriously harming a women and girls too.

Adding my strong support to the Zero suicide alliance free online training mentioned by other posters upthread. It takes about 20 minutes to click through their presentation and I have had cause to use it three times now - I'm fairly sure that at least one of those times the person would have gone through with it and killed herself if nobody had have had a chat. If you've got time to scroll mumsnet for a bit, please just this one time go browse the free training over at ZSA instead. You honestly never know when you might save a life.

https://zsa.frank-cdn.uk/scorm/full-training/story.html

And yes, depicting a black woman having to overcome her own mind (concerns, gut instinct) to approach and service/ save an agitated white man isn't without multiple glaring problems. For me the problem with the make up wasn't that "you too can be sexier if you do this" but that a woman without make up is portrayed as less confident. Enough of that BS already.

Norwich football club handled the whole thing better.

(But seriously, go do the ZSA online training now, before you scroll and more of mumsnet. Please. https://zsa.frank-cdn.uk/scorm/full-training/story.html)

If a stranger of the opposite sex asked me where to get a coffee, I’d assume it was a come on. Depending on the circumstances, I might think the same if it were another woman too.

The thing is that any social overture with a stranger is wide open to misinterpretation and sometimes wilful misinterpretation, especially by a man with poor boundaries. I haven't seen the ad but but just looking at the picture I identify myself with the badly dressed uptight lady.

I'm not messing with an unknown bloke in an unpredictable mental state. The chances that talking him is going to get me in to trouble are higher than the chances that he is suicidal. In fact he could be suicidal and that question could still get me in trouble if he decides that I'm the one to rescue him.

I travel on public transport a lot and I keep myself to myself. Good to get the suggestion to speak to a member of staff if I have a real concern about someone. Maybe a campaign to make sure stations are staffed would be more useful against suicide than advertising for passengers to put ourselves at risk.