Dear god....is he coming on to me?

[CharlotteBog]

I have some photos someone wants.
I said:

I can be bribed with a few thousand quid.

His reply:
What I'd want for a few thousand quid I sincerely hope and trust you wouldn't sell me.

He has flattered me in the past in general ways, but I have just taken it as him being open and friendly.

Do I ask him what the hell he means? Not reply. Ever.

I see him often at a sports club. He is nearly 20 years older than me and married. I am in my 50s. FFS.

This

Tbh, your 'i can be bribed..." nonsense was as creepy as his response
Poor bloke must be very confused
As my grandmother would say, "don't flatter yourself"

Look, I don't think you were deliberately trying to be flirty or anything but context matters here and I certainly dont think you "asked for it" at all.

That said, joking about being bribed by thousands of quid to a much older married man you met at a sports club is very, very different to joking with friends you have known for years who you know will take it in the spirit it was meant. Yes, it "could" have come across as a bit flirty to him no doubt, even if you didnt mean it that way.

Generally speaking it's better with people like that to err on the side of caution and just be straight forward in your communication. Maybe he did not mean it in a sexual way, maybe he did, but the fact this has upset you so much indicates that its probably best to reign the banter in and reserve it for people you know well to prevent situations like this occurring again.

He’s a dirty old man who has clearly been watching the Benny Hill repeats on the TV.

Unfortunately your email gave him an inroad. I don’t think you did anything wrong. I am in my 50’s and a 70-year old coming on to me would really piss me off.

Now that you know what he is about, don’t give him the opportunity to talk to you like this. If he does, tell him that he reminds you of your dad.

Wow. There must be a back story to why you’d be so upset over something so innocuous?

You started the bad joke and he just carried it on. Think nothing of it apart from don’t send “I can be bribed” to anyone again, it’s creepy.

It’s not the end of the world even if he was. Men do this shit all the time. I’m not sure what the big deal is.

Fucking hell. This thread.
The OP made an absolutely normal joke. There was no teasing, no nothing. Just ignore and send the pics OP. Hopefully he was clumsily trying to joke back.

Woman makes joke about monetary bribe for photos of award ceremony for newsletter.
Man makes sexual innuendo about bribery.

Woman's fault for joking with man. Seriously?

Why all the wide eyed faux surprise and question is he coming on to me then? If it’s just a joke between mates.

What I'd want for a few thousand quid I sincerely hope and trust you wouldn't sell me

I've been amusing myself this morning thinking of good ripostes.

"Oh don't worry John, it's not legal in the UK yet to be paid to assist someone to Dignitas!"

The

I'm assuming it's because he sent a suggestive message back. Men do that sometimes. Push their luck. It's the 70+ year old version of a dick pic. Let's not pretend they don't.

You flirted, he responded to your signal.

Think you're missing the point. His comment is perhaps a bit creepy/weird, but OP is not completely innocent as she seems to suggest. As others have said, if she wanted the convo to remain purely functional, she would have answered his question. Instead, she made a flirty joke and he's responded in a flirty/sexual way which she's uncomfortable with (completely understandable). Perhaps he misread her joke, perhaps he unknowingly crossed boundaries or perhaps he is a full blown creep. Only OP will know given their friendship.

OP should either shut him down, call him out for it, ignore it/him, or lead the conversation back to being platonic.

However it seems OP has left the thread as she didn't take well to the responses she received...

I still don’t get it - but I am quite naive, I guess. I would not necessarily think his reply meant he wanted to buy you. If anything, OP’s offer is more flirtatious than his reply which sounds more like a rebuff. So to my mind there is nothing to respond to.

Why all the wide eyed faux surprise and question is he coming on to me then? If it’s just a joke between mates.

Because she made a non sexual joke treating him like a friend, but in reply he made it sexual. I'd have thought wtf, where did that come from, just like OP has. He's a perv.

Agree. The whole exchange is as funny as toothache.
Just send the photos and stop being dramatic over nothing

That's a bit of a leap. The OP wasn't sexually assaulted. A man made a mildly suggestive comment to her.

I'm also of the opinion that the whole conversation seems a bit playful and flirty, and overall a bit weird. I don't understand why OP wouldn't just send the pictures. Refusing to send the pictures was inviting this back and forth "banter".

I do think the man's comment was weird, clumsy, and inappropriate, but if I was in his shoes I really wouldn't know what to respond to the bribe comment, which was also a weird thing to say IMO.

Am I the only one confused by his reply? Is he saying that if he were to pay a few thousand then he would expect sex for that sort of money but that he hopes OP wouldn't sell that? Logically, though, he doesn't need to pay that sort of money for sex - he could get it much cheaper. So his reply to OP doesn't make sense.

Often happens when the responses don’t go the way the OP wants them to - anything other than total validation results in a flounce.

Interesting- this also shows how some men (like the man in the OP’’s opening post) think any sort of humour/banter is sexual, and tries to say the woman caused it! This type probably send dick pics too.

I think the man in the post was subtle enough that if you reply with a curt “erm I don’t think that will ever be happening!” Or something he will get the message and it will be dropped.

And I think the op is upset and wanting to move away from the thread because she didn’t expect so many people to think she’d asked for it when she simply made a joke. There’s nothing to say that the photos were all of her.

Why do we automatically assume that his reply has sexual connotations?

I'm very confused by this too.
I've tried to think what else he might be meaning. Or whether there had been an auto-correction somewhere in his reply!

Send the photos?

I think the idea is he wants the photos for his newsletter. OP doesn't want the photos in the newsletter. He asked if she had any. She said yes, but you can't have them. He said (jokingly) that he'll bribe sara (who took the photos) for them. She said well if we're bribing, that will be a thousand pounds.

HE then turned it sexual.

He crossed the line. Up until that point it's a normal exchange between people who are friends. We are talking friends, not a stranger. He deliberately chose to interpret the bribe about the photos as the OP selling herself.

If you're a woman who considers herself friends with men, it's always a shock when you remember that many of them will never snap out of seeing any woman as a sex object, including you. That's what's happened here OP. Many men will genuinely be your friends, but there's always that edge to the relationship where they would buy you for sex if they could.