At the pool - other adult behavior

[CousCousDefinitely]

I was at our local leisure centre today. It's a private hotel one, if it makes a difference, so it's users would be a combination of members, hotel guests and you can also pay for a day pass. I'm a member.
It was busy as it is normally on a Saturday afternoon. There were two guys I hadn't seen before in the lanes section (where you can do serious swimming, up one side and down the other). I wanted to do 50 or so lengths but it was tricky as it was me and them in the section and they were doing handstands, diving in (under the no diving sign) and generally getting in the way. I get this with children sometimes but not usually adults in their 30s or 40s.
Im laid back so I just sort of went around them as best I could. They were swimming under me and making me nervous. So after about 20 lengths I gave up.
I went into the steamroom and they arrived in about 10 minutes after and stared at me up and down in a pervy uncomfortable way.
So they it clicked that the pool annoyance was probably on purpose.
I left and was pissed off that it made me felt so uncomfortable.
I was pissed off that I couldn't do anything to stop them staring, that they'd intrrupted my swim and that I couldnt complain to the lifeguard while I was there as it would have been awkward, or as I was leaving as I didn't want to appear racist. The two guys were speaking Arabic to each other which is pretty uncommon in my town.
My dh went to the pool after I got home, for his turn at a bit of child free peace and I described them to him. He came back and said they were in the hot tub (this was 2 hours after me) so they'd probably got a day pass and stayed to piss off more people.
Was I unreasonable to just leave and say nothing and if so, what should I have done or said? Either to them or to the lifeguard. I feel like such a chicken.

They pick and choose because they refuse to accept or follow blindly. Guess you are just one of the blind, unquestioning Catholics then Solomon. The paedophile priests depend on folk like you.

Oh my we actually have a Magdelene laundries denier on the thread.

solomon i was brought up Catholic in an Italian family and i left it for the same reasons Bambam did.

And another point.....there have been discussions in the press and on tv in the past about how archaic and out of date it is for it to be expected that priests remain celibate.

I have yet to hear the same argument put forward on behalf of the nuns. So there is some more misogyny right there!

And many muslim dominated countries have very good education system for girls.

And i dont speak Italian because my dad is British and i was brought up in the UK but i know it when i hear it.

Bambambini
I don't doubt you had a bad experience. What I am getting at is that blatent sexism is easy to spot but what we have in this country is much harder to tackle. Women may have to deal with less overt sexism but still suffer serious discrimination. The focus only on other communities or obvious sexism allows the deeply damaging institutionalised sexism to continue. The sort of sexism that has a very senior Judge saying that women should wait 50 years for equality in the Judiciary;that allowed for a Cabinet that contained more old Etonians than women;that saw Jeremy Corbyn appoint very few women to the shadow cabinet.

I wonder why we are constantly being encouraged to look at the problem with someone else rather than the issues we have closer to home.

zzzzz What is a cafeteria catholic? I'm reading back the thread and can't seem to work out how it's popped into discussion.
I'm also laughing at "Where is your superior education from Solomon" Apologies - I don't want to change the tone of an important discussion.

Ah! I've figured it out - Catholicism à la carte...

zzzzz Thanks for clarifying. Anyway as you were....
I think i'll check to see if I can adopt Cafeteria Catholic as a NN if it's not already taken - I think it has nice ring to it

I wonder why we are constantly being encouraged to look at the problem with someone else rather than the issues we have closer to home

To equate the two problems is facile in the extreme.

There is no comparison between a culture in which women are not just thought of as lesser by the majority in the society, but where it is enshrined and endorsed through religious scripture and incorporated into law, to that where discrimination occurs despite the law prohibiting it.

The first results frequently results in honour killings, rape and acid attacks. In the second, you may not secure a conviction against your rapist but you wouldn't ever be forced to marry him to 'recover your honour' as you might have had to do until relatively recently in Morocco and still have to do in large parts of the ME/NA and other Islamic countries.

nytlive.nytimes.com/womenintheworld/2015/07/29/when-youre-forced-to-marry-your-rapist/

zzzzz..
Given you didn't know what a cafeteria catholic is, this tells me you have been out of contact with Catholic circles for quite some time, despite being educated in a convent school.

"
And another point.....there have been discussions in the press and on tv in the past about how archaic and out of date it is for it to be expected that priests remain celibate. "
It's no more out of date or archaic than asking men and women to be faithful to each other in marriage for life (which people are now claiming is "impossible"). Do you really think that intrinsic human nature and sexuality has changed one iota in 1000 years?

"I have yet to hear the same argument put forward on behalf of the nuns. So there is some more misogyny right there!"
Don't worry, that argument has been put out there. Another false attempt at crying misogyny... Convents are having a record recruitment at present so they must be doing something right.

MistressMia
Thanks for proving my point so nicely.

Yes there are serious problems in other countries which may make this country look good by comparison. However, this country is not a great place to be a women just because it is a better place than extreme regimes like Saudi Arabia. Most of the people discriminating against women in this country are not muslim or immigrants but white, indigenous british males. That doesn't mean we should ignore the problems elsewhere but neither should they blind us to the problems at home.

solomon sexuality is something the Catholic church frowns upon. I havent heard the argument for stopping celibacy for nuns on any POPULAR or well watched news programme.

Link please.

YY zzzzz Our local convent is winding down. Only 3 nuns there now.

Highest number entering convents in UK for 25 years.
www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/dissatisfaction-with-modern-life-prompts-surge-in-number-of-women-entering-convents-10196369.html

"sexuality is something the Catholic church frowns upon"
Usual lies and bullshit thrown at the church.

Solomon if they didnt frown on it they wouldnt be asking for celibacy from their priests and their nuns.

And they wouldnt be opposing contraception.

The girls who were forced into the laundries were shamed for having sex. Some hadnt had sex but were deemed to be dressing inappropriately and being flirtatious.

Some girls had fallen pregnant after being raped and were sent to these places because of it. The most vicious cases of victim blaming.

So you are the one talking bullshit.

The CC certainly hates womens sexuality.

A friend of mine works quite high up in the prison service. She is not white and told me herself that one of the biggest problems is men coming to Europe and not being able to transition from how women are treated in their culture to how women are treated in ours ie women in tiny clothing = asking for sex etc. I do think it is a problem and one that will not get addressed as most people, like the op, immediately get accused of being racist. Evidently being sexist is fine but being racist is not.

Yes there are serious problems in other countries which may make this country look good by comparison

May MAY ????????????

Are you out of your mind ?

There is no MAY about it.

Women's and girls lives in this country is country compared to Islamic ones is WAAAAAAAAAY WAAAAAAAAY better in just about every aspect measurable and not measurable.

I despair at the whataboutery and false moral equivalence.

I really don't have the time or inclination to post yet again the myriad of injustices against women enshrined in Sharia that is incorporated into so many of Islamic countries national laws. Nor to post the stats on the massive levels of honour based violence or the daily degradation that muslim women face from their families and society.

The apologists can continue to pontificate. The evidence to the contrary will continue to fill the news pages and wreck more lives.

Stripping the thread right back to the OP's original question: Yes, of course they should have been reported.

I do wonder though, why the Op didn't feel she could deal with the situation herself. Someone swimming under me, would freak me out, and I would have shouted "Oy", shook my head etc. Universally understood, I would imagine.

But I guess, hindsight is a wonderful thing.

Fwiw, I think we are going to have enormous problems in areas where refugees are re settled in the UK.

We are taking men from Countries where women are completely covered up, and then plonking them in the middle of an episode of Geordie Shore.

You'd be hard pressed, to go out in any town centre in the UK, and not see young women, totally plastered, falling over, showing their underwear, being sick, peeing in the street, getting their Tits out.......how are men who have never seen such behaviour or women dressed this way, meant to process this?

Obviously, it's not acceptable to attack such women, but will they ogle them? Yes, I am sure they will. In the same way, that if I had never seen a naked man, and then you dropped me on to a beach where all the guys wore Speedos, then I'm sure my eyes would be popping out of their sockets.

We are expecting people from totally different cultures to integrate - it's a huge ask. And it's no-one's fault. It's just how it is.

Regards what PP referred to, about Asian men seeing white women as slags.....I dated an Asian man when I was in my late teens. He told me himself that our relationship would NEVER progress, as white women were seen as girls to shag and to never take home, and that he would be marring a "good Asian girl". So I left him. And that's just what he did. Married a good Asian Girl.

MistressMia
Your one track approach to all discussions doesn't help the debate. Nobody is apologising for what happens in those countries but that shouldn't mean that women in this country have to settle for less than equality because other women have it worse.

I should accept that after 40 years of equal pay legislation women in this country are still paid less than men because my life would worse if I lived in the ME.

"They pick and choose because they refuse to accept or follow blindly."
Nope, they pick and choose because they don't realise that the faith is something as a complete package. They would be far better leaving entirely, that would be much less hypocritical. Jesus Christ didn't say, oh you can just follow a few of my commands, the hard ones you can not bother.

"The CC certainly hates womens sexuality."
It hates it that much that it protects women and their unborn children from destruction.... yes more of the usual mindless MN rubbish again!