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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

See all MNHQ comments on this thread

Original poster

to think that "sexual harassment" is a bit strong to describe this event?

614 replies

BartiiMus · 14/09/2012 10:22

At a training session with work. 3 days, 2 nights on-site.

Around midnight (not long after the people concerned have left the bar), man A rings woman B and asks for a code to connect to the internet (we use password tokens and he'd forgotten his).

Woman says fine, come to my room. Man goes to room, then confesses he didn't come for that at all and tries to kiss her. She refuses. Man is confused saying he thought they had a "connection" earlier in the evening but she denies it. He leaves the room.

A few days later woman B tells my colleague about it. She was half-laughing about it and said she wasn't going to report it.

Last night at a party my colleague told us that there'd been "sexual harassment" during the training this summer but refused to say who had been involved. After a bit of coaxing and lots of clues from him we worked out who the man had been, and our colleague confirmed it.

I know him, I've worked with him before and he's a nice bloke. I'm not saying he didn't do this but he tried it on, was refused and left. Is that really "sexual harassment"?

To be honest, I'm a bit pissed off with the gossip colleague who told us all because it's a bit of a non-event (man tries to pull woman, woman refuses, man leaves) but he's usually highly emotive language like "sexual harassment" to describe it. She's not even reporting it. The man isn't her boss or anything and they don't work together.

I know I probably don't have all the story but I do know the gossip well and he does love to exagerate and I don't think it's very fair to man A to have people slinging mud at him like this.

So, deep breath AIBU?

OP posts:
Midgetm · 15/09/2012 15:28

What FlimFlammery says. That is all. No really, that is all.

atacareercrossroads · 15/09/2012 15:29

I dont think anyone would judge her for not saying anything in the first instance if it happened again if it happened as the OP said it did (someone being knocked back for a kiss or to put it another way "a total non event").

If they did judge a woman for initially sorting out a situation like this on her own because she is confident enough to do so then they are the ones with the problem, not the woman.

atacareercrossroads · 15/09/2012 15:31

"And surely it isn't straight from chatting over a drink in a group to kissing is it?"

Yes, sometimes, why not? Confused

BonnieBumble · 15/09/2012 15:36

My God if some bloke came to my room under false pretences and tried to kiss me I would be terrified. Of course it is sexual harassment. It might have been a one off due to drinking too much but it doesn't change the fact that he chose to sexually harass her.

squeakytoy · 15/09/2012 15:39

he tried to kiss her... KISS.... nothing else... he didnt make her feel threatened, he didnt terrify her, and she didnt deem it worthy of reporting because she found it funny...

has nobody ever tried to come on to you Bonnie?

atacareercrossroads · 15/09/2012 15:42

Id be terrified if it was a stranger who tricked their way into my room and just lunged at me.

I wouldnt be terrified if it was a work colleague who I had invited up, leabed in for a bit of a kiss and then accepted it when told no.

If someone leaning in for a hopeful kiss terrifies you I suggest you do not ever stay in a club when the last song is being played Grin

seeker · 15/09/2012 15:45

If somebody posted the following "My dh was on a business trip and after a few drinks at the bar he went to room. Five minute later a colleague rang say he's forgotten the Internet code. My dh told him to come up and get it, butbwhen this man arrived he told my dh that he didn't really want the code, it was only a ruse. And then he tried to kiss him. AIBU to think this wasn't on?" I wonder what the response would be?

BonnieBumble · 15/09/2012 15:46

Squeakytoy. Yes sometimes men have come on to me. A man trying to kiss you in your hotel room is not the same as a guy flirting with you in a bar.

I was in a similar situation years ago and I felt very threatened. I had to knee him in the balls before he backed off. He knocked on my hotel room door and told me that I had been flirting with him outrageously in the bar. He tried to kiss me, put his hands around my neck and I had to physically assault him to get rid of him.

squeakytoy · 15/09/2012 15:47

My response would have been the same Seeker. It was misread signals, no harm done, probably much embarassment to both parties. End of it.

AuntieMaggie · 15/09/2012 15:47

Agree Bonnie.

No nobody has lied to come to my hotel room on a work trip so they could make a pass at me.

DP agrees and he's a union rep who has dealt with harrassment cases. It was unwanted sexual attention.

I met DP through work but thankfully he treated me with more respect than that or we wouldn't have got together.

squeakytoy · 15/09/2012 15:49

Then I am sorry that happened to you Bonnie, but that isnt the same as what happened to the OPs colleague. In the situation you describe, you were assaulted, and threatened.

atacareercrossroads · 15/09/2012 15:51

Seeker my response to that would honestly be "yanbu to be a bit Hmm but as long as the guy backed off there is no problem, bet DH was a bit flustered Grin"

Bonnie - that is appalling what happened to you, hope you kicked him hard Angry

BonnieBumble · 15/09/2012 15:51

But because of my experience I would feel sexually harassed if a colleague came onto me in the way the OP describes.

squeakytoy · 15/09/2012 15:51

"It was unwanted sexual attention"

And as soon as the man was told his attention was unwanted, he left.

It could just as easily been him reading the signals correctly and the couple could have now been planning their wedding... all relationships have to start somewhere.

This was a case of him reading it (whatever "it" was) wrong, and he backed off immediately.

BonnieBumble · 15/09/2012 15:56

But he lied to get himself into her room and then kissed her without encouragement. In my book that is sexual harassment.

If they were still in the bar and she was responding to his flirting and he then tried to kiss her I wouldn't regard that as sexual harassment.

atacareercrossroads · 15/09/2012 15:56

Squeaky - Amen to that, me and DP wouldnt have got together if he hadnt leaned in for our first kiss, and it was unwanted at first because I was shy and wanted a few more G&Ts to pluck up the courage Smile

AuntieMaggie · 15/09/2012 16:06

Its not that he tried to kiss her its the circumstances around it as Bonnie says.

squeakytoy · 15/09/2012 16:07

No Bonnie, he TRIED to kiss her. She didnt allow him to, he apologised and left.

squeakytoy · 15/09/2012 16:11

Maybe he was shy Maggie. Perhaps he had wanted to take it further all evening but didnt have the courage to do it in front of an audience and this was the only way he could think of to chat to her alone. Unless we are going to subscribe to the "all men are potential rapists" way of thinking, he just made an error, was put right, and immediately left. He quite probably feels a bit of a fool now too, but would be mortified if he read this thread and saw himself being described as a creepy predator who terrified a poor helpless woman.

BonnieBumble · 15/09/2012 16:11

He was in her room and had lied to get there. I'm not saying that he is a sexual
deviant and he may well have been mortified the next morning. However his behaviour could be described as harassment. That probably wasn't his intention but the person on the receiving end may feel differently.

AuntieMaggie · 15/09/2012 16:12

Are you really telling me you don't see anything wrong with the way he went about it? Lying to get her on her own at that time of night?

AuntieMaggie · 15/09/2012 16:13

But he didn't chat to her did he?

squeakytoy · 15/09/2012 16:23

he didnt know for sure that she was going to ask him to come to her room... he could have easily knocked on the room door to ask her too, but he rang..

I find it hard to believe that there are so many shrinking violets on this thread who would feel so upset that a man who fancied them had told a white lie just to get an opportunity to take something further, and who when got rebuffed, did not argue but simply left again..

Also "at that time of night" was midnight, just after they had both left the bar, not 4am.

No, I really dont see anything wrong in it.

If it had happened to me, I would have acted just the same way as the OPs colleague and laughed about it. Although I may have been more clear about how I did not find it remotely under the context of harrassment, just so that the bloke did not become the subject of chinese whispers and office gossip. Or alternatively, if I had fancied him too, I would have kissed him back and been pleased that he had thought up a reason to contact me.

DowagersHump · 15/09/2012 16:32

But what if he hadn't backed off squeakytoy? You really don't know what's going to happen in that kind of situation.

atacareercrossroads · 15/09/2012 16:34

I dont see the harm in it either, he didnt know for sure she would invite him to her room, he possibly mistook that as this "would you like a coffee" euphamism thing (sp?), he left when told no. No, no harm in what has happened, just a bit of an embarassing mistake