Sexist and dangerous Samaritans ad

The guy in the advert had the kind of facial expression I associate with "angry" not "miserable". There's no fricking way I'd go anywhere near a strange male with that frown on.

Hmmm. Alone with a man who could be suicidal, certainly looks in a bad mood, also it tends to be men who like pushing people off train platforms, if I was the lone female in this situation and there was no staff around personally I'd let the man jump in front of the train.

We're going to ignore this and continue discussing the advert through a white lens.

It's shit to use a woman as an emotional support for a man, whatever colour she is.

On a British forum, you're going to have majority of posters being white, so we aren't exactly going to feel qualified to unpack the racial aspect of this.

How many times do people have to point out that coffee has a coded sexual meaning?

Exactly. I cannot imagine a scenario in which a young woman on a station platform, presumably waiting for a train, decides she needs to leave the station for a coffee - because that's more important than catching the train, right - and that the best way to find a place she can get a coffee is to ask a lone man. No sane woman would do this. The only reason a woman would go up to a lone man and ask about where to get a coffee is if she's attempting to pick him up.

And so now we have a man thinking, "An attractive young woman is asking me where to get a coffee." Seriously, where does the conversation go from here? Does he say "Sorry, no idea" or "Yes, I'll come with you" or "Yes, there's one down the road?" In which case presumably she buggers off and he gets on with the business of throwing himself under the train.

I wonder how many possible scenarios the ad's makers went through:

1. Suicidal man, helpful woman
2. Suicidal man, helpful man
3. Suicidal woman, helpful woman
4. Suicidal woman, helpful man

The dynamic would have been different in each. Incidentally, number 4 would have been a particular challenge, because the suicidal woman would probably have been creeped out by the man asking about where to get a coffee.

@VitoCorleoneOfMNMafia - yeah, as I said above to someone else that wasn't exactly my point. A bunch of people seemed to be saying earlier on that these kind of interventions aren't even useful/the Samaritans should be campaigning for better MH services/you can't stop someone who wants to kill themselves etx and I disagree with that.

Small interventions are super effective. And, of course, if you don't feel safe, then don't do it. Much as you don't jump into the river to save someone drowning if you can't swim. I'm just saying that doesn't meant you should then say nobody should ever jump in the river because that's never going to work and the focus should be on providing swimming lessons because if someone doesn't teach themselves to swim they can never be saved.

In your case, a man approached a woman. Can you see how there's a considerable difference in terms of personal safety and perceived intent?

How many times do people have to point out that coffee has a coded sexual meaning?

Well, you guys can feel free to ask random men about coffee.

The rest of us won't and are a lot less likely to intervene as a result of this ad. We're not service humans.

And yes agree with PP it's racist as well as sexist.

FFS "coffee" was code for a shag in Brassed Off back in the nineties. It's irresponsible to encourage women to use that term towards strange men.

It's a crazy set up. "Hello, you look like you're about to jump. Just before you do, I'm gasping for a coffee. Do you know where I can get one? Just, you know, not the best time, I see that, but there's literally no one else to ask. Otherwise, I'll be forced to get crisps. Ok, tnx, bye".

I agree with you.

Yes, this, my bet would be that the statistics would back up that this approach is more likely to end up with creepy behaviour / harm to the woman than any benefit to the man.

Also agree with the way they've totally ignored other people's lived realities and things like picking up children. If I put myself in a position where I'm even going to be delayed my kids won't get picked up or my elderly parents won't get to a vital medical appointment. Why am I putting some random stranger over those people I'm actually responsible for?

It reminds me a lot of something I read - somewhere not sure where - that when planners plan for things like local traffic schemes they assume a single point to point commute, not the myriad school / childcare drop offs / pick ups that women typically have.

This ad has made me very angry and has made me a lot less likely to talk to some random distressed man from having to think through possible consequences!

"When does coffee mean coffee?" asked Dr Carly Jones MBE at a seminar I went to about autistic women.

Well that’s good that Samaritans are acknowledging it. Maybe next time they can address women helping women then we have balance.

There is one. And it's been around for years.

The Campaign Against Living Miserably was set up for men who have suicidal thoughts, and for their friends to be helped to know what to say to them.

Okay, I haven't followed their SM enough to know if they've aimed their work at total strangers on a train platform, but I'd be mildly surprised of they hadn't talked about similar situations.

https://www.thecalmzone.net/anyone-can-feel-suicidal

Oh isn't she just. But we're not going to unpick this (aside from a small comment about how "a black woman was only used to tick the diversity box"). We're going to ignore this and continue discussing the advert through a white lens. "Oh yes, she's black, but that's by the by".

If using a woman is problematic and worth discussing, then there is a double layer of problematic in using a black woman.

If it just so happens that a black woman was used, then it maybe it just so happens that a woman was used.

Wouldn’t it be lovely to see a campaign about chaps checking in on chaps?

Striking up conversations with sad men?

Just asking “are you alright, mate?”

Men smiling at each other in a “it’s ok mate” kind of way.

I mean, I feel like I’m sealioning at this point but wouldn’t that campaign be good?

"The thing is, as much as I sympathise with men struggling with their MH (as my son does) you really do have to proceed with

Absolutely this. I'm an ex copper and it was all well and good me with my uniform / radio and potential backup. Now, I'm afraid as a disabled 50 odd year old, I have to think what's I'm my own best interests too.

There was a lot of "Ladies, look after your Man" type stuff shared on social media. It shared that stats on male suicide. There was also a lot shared a couple of years ago about checking in on 'the quiet ones' Yes, men's MH is important, but as a single woman I found to my cost in previous relationships that some men think their MH trumps your own.
That's what I told my last partner when I walked away. "Your mental health does not trump mine" because I realised it was totally one sided.

Are women not already doing all the checking in? Are women not already doing enough for others? Often looking after kids, partners, elderly parents. The wife work. The life admin. Women often put themselves last ro start with. Why are we bombarded with ever more things considered to be our moral selfless responsibility.

@SamuelDJackson

I’ll guarantee they wouldn’t have had the man asking another man if he knew where he could get a coffee!

The thing is, as much as I sympathise with men struggling with their MH (as my son does) you really do have to proceed with caution. Once, many years ago, my friend was minding her own business when an unknown man came up to her and slapped her across the face - because she reminded him of his wife! A man who very obviously was not in a stable frame of mind.

The second incident I witnessed first hand on a train. A man was behaving in a strange manner, a woman spoke to him (not loud or anything, woman seemed very civilised) and he too slapped her round the face and started screaming obscenities (this stayed with me a long time, it really freaked me out, this man was scary!)

To encourage women to go up to possibly disturbed men who are an unknown quantity to her seems very foolhardy to me.

Frankly I don’t know what I would do in each individual situation

That's it isn't it, you assess each situation and know what feels "right" - trust your instincts type thing. So I'd probably do the same here, which is just common sense I think as small talk can definitely help if you're feeling in a bad place. Only you'd know if the situation felt "right" to do so

I suspect this advert has caused so much comment because 'uptight nervy cardigan woman' speaks to many people much more than 'cool lipstick girl.' We are not meant to empathize with the crisp eating frump but we do.

Shes sitting there, hair scraped up, old cardie, no time for lipstick, eating a bag of crisps because she hasn't had time for lunch = limited time for self care , the bag on her lap symbolic of all the burdens shes juggling in her own life, physical, mental, financial, caring. Her defensive body posture, trying not to draw attention to herself as a lone woman on a near deserted train platform, her face worried - why? we don't know anything about her, who she is, where shes traveling to or from, what emotions or situations shes balancing, what memories or instincts the sight of the man who is behaving erratically awaken in her.
(It would be interesting to find out the instinctive response people have to that character - is it sympathy with his vulnerability or wariness over his disturbed emotional state? - I wonder if they asked this while doing market research on their ad?)

She sees him, recognizes his distress because she is fundamentally empathic and weighs up what she can do. Her instinct is to help, but she also is balancing that with her own safety and all the other responsibilities she has on her shoulders - what happens if she puts herself in danger and he reacts with aggression? what happens if she ends up engaged in something prolonged and no one picks the kids up from school? what support has she to give at the moment when shes in the middle of her own emotional crisis? - and shes understandably wary of helping. She weighs it up - of course 'someone should do something' but feels that she cannot be that 'someone' in this situation.

I am sure this is the 'bystander effect' they want to tackle but this advert it focuses on the wrong problem - and its here that the add shifts the story, and segues into a weird world where she overcomes all that and puts all other considerations out of her head to approach a distressed stranger with a lame line that could certainly be mistaken as sexual interest by the wrong disturbed person, - so completely misses the mark.

The barriers that prevent her intervening are not so much fear of getting it wrong as fear of what might happen next and the potential cost and harm to her - and this advert doesn't recognize any of that. It would be good if they showed an action she could take to help without putting herself in danger eg contact a staff member? or perhaps she could start an action while protecting herself - eg approach him as part of a group/ pair, and use something better as an intro line like - do you know if this is the train til x? that could not be misconstrued.

I wonder if they considered or have made the same advert with a man approaching another man? or if they thought that would be too unrealistic to expect that level of empathy and engagement with a stranger - or perhaps they recognized that many men would with good justification fear violence from an unsolicited approach in the situation

FFS.

As someone who has had more than my fair share of stalkers, perverts, flashers etc simply by virtue of living next door to a park in London I am amazed that so many women can't see that any interaction with any strange man is inviting danger.

Judging from my experience it's far more likely that instead of saving a nice man from suicide, the woman in the advert would instead have a creepy man hassling her on the train all the way to her destination, and then possibly following her home. If not worse.

I think the statistic is that one in three women have been sexually assaulted. This is just yet another example of (at best) nice but dim people putting men first. See also mixed sex changing rooms, pretending that TWAW etc etc.

And yes as PP said - better to look at your watch and say something loudly, but not directed to anyone in particular, about the unreliability of trains and you wonder how delayed the next one is going to be and if there's an alternative rather than asking about coffee which is honestly rather strange.