Is the fact that men view women primarily as something to have sex with innate or learnt?

[LackingInspiration]

I visited my DH at his work this other day for the first time. The industry he works in is inherently misogynist. He hates it (the misogyny) and always challenges it.

There are women who work there, who play up to it - 'one of the lads' type of thing - but who behave very differently with DH if they're on their own with him. I guess they know he takes them seriously as people, rather than as a pair of tits on legs.

Anyway, when I went in, everyone was very polite and friendly. Yesterday DH texted me to tell me that one of the gay men there said he'd sleep with me even though he's gay, and his manager said he'd 'have a go' too!

While a small part of me found it very funny and a little flattering; I also felt really frustrated and irritated!

FFS! The first thing they think when they see a woman is 'is she fuckable'.

But...why isn't my DH like that? I've been talking to him about it this morning. He said he thinks it's innate that men do that...but that it can become subconsciously controlled if they're taught that it's inappropriate from a young age.

So what do you all think? Is it innate? Can they help it? Are they taught it? Or not taught to control it? Can we ever win as women if men all naturally look at men as sex objects before they see them as people? Is it the patriarchy that means they don't learn to control that behaviour?

I dont think this is a big deal personally but everyone feels differently on the issue. Loads of my mates have said they would shag my husband, would fuck him etc. I dont see the big deal and I have said it about some of their boyfriends etc. It just means to me that you think they are attracttive and its a compliment.

Thats the first thing we usually discuss when we see a new man come in or meet one. Doesnt mean we dont respect them its just girls chatting. I have lovelyrelationships with all the men in my life its just nothing wrong with appreciating beauty that brightens up the working day ;)

Yes, I disagree with Sunny too. Appreciating beauty is very different from thinking 'I'd fuck her'. I have no issue with someone saying to DH 'was that your wife? She seems nice, and she's really pretty'. But saying 'I'd sleep with her'!

It's putting sex before humanity. And I would also be filing a sexual harrassment suit if I worked there and was treated the way the women are treated there. But they join in, sadly, and just encourage it . One of them offered my DH a blow job in exchange for him getting some paperwork done for him!

Feminism won't change things until women stop letting men get away with such despicable behaviour or, worse, actually joining in with it.

So, sorry, sunny - I think you're fairly misogynist yourself.

This probably relates to that class thread. I think if you are in working class jobs then this is a given how it is and you probably see it as a laugh and a joke. Its often more of a middle class thing to be bothered about it.

If it bothers you tell them and they would stop but as they didnt say it in front of you now you have told your partner I doubt he will mention it again if they did talk about it so you will never know if they are saying it or not so that solves that problem lol.

It's not about class at all, sunny. It's about respecting people for being people, not thinking of them automatically as someone you could potentially have sex with. I haven't been on the class thread, but I really am bemused as to how you have managed to bring it round to class.

And I'm feeling irritated by your second paragraph! How on earth does it solve the problem for DH not to tell me things? Why would you think he wouldn't? Does your DP hide things from you? Of course he'd tell me - he already knows how I feel about casual misogyny; and feels the same way himself. Hence why he told them off. He told me in a kind of 'you won't believe what they've said now' kind of way.

Still totally as to how me not knowing about it going on actually stops it being a problem!

I'm with sunny on this one. To me it is a laugh and a joke. I would take it as a compliment unless this is all that was ever referred to. I hear men AND women talking about the opposite sex in a 'would you or wouldn't you?' conversation. This does not mean that once that conversation has ended that they don't think/talk to or about them as human beings.

But inalso agree it is a class thing too

I imagine peer pressure is part of it. If one of your colleagues says "Phwoar, boys, I'd do that till her teeth rattled" (or whatever), it takes a fair bit of balls to say "Would you like someone saying that about your wfie/daughter?"

I disagree it's a class thing. I have heard my grandfather and his peers (who was a 9th Earl) speaking about women in exactly the same way. It has fuck all to do with class.

And, IMO, allowing it to continue being a laugh and a joke is just encouraging the view that women (and men) are firstly sex objects, and human beings second.

I agree I was flattered - I'm 30, had four children, and recently lost a lot of weight...didn't think I'd be attractive to anyone except DH ever again!

However, I also felt discomfited; and feel very uncomfortable about the idea of going to visit him at work again, knowing that men will be looking at me and wondering how big my nipples are; or if I'd be any good at blow jobs. I want men (and women) to look at me and consider whether I'd be interesting to talk to; or be interested in the work I do.

Heathen - I agree. My DH is amazing!

I have known more men who are not like that than I have known men who are like that.

So I don't think there is something about being male that compels you to behave that way. It's down to the individual and whether or not they're a twat.

Exactly moominmama. It isnt something to get worried about and if anyone says it about me I think its a compliment. We do the would you or wouldnt you? convos, who who you rather and why? etc. It doesnt mean that you dont think they are human.

My best friend tells people all the time that she would love to do my husband as she has seen a picture of his willy and thinks I am a lucky girl etc. I take it as a joke and we all think its funny, so does my husband. I know my best friend thinks my husband is human etc!

My bloke and her bloke are good mates. He doesnt care either. Within all my group of friends we have spoke about stuff like this. It seriously is a class thing its what you say when you are hammered on a bottle of cider down the club on a Friday not exactly dinner party conversation lol. Thats what I mean its just different circles and in my circles it isnt anything to be offended by.

But how do they become (or not) a twat, Hecate? I agree with you about knowing more men who don't behave like that, but is that because I don't tend to want to spend any time with those men, so steer clear of them?

I think that now, although DH would say all his friends are not like that, working where he works now, most of the men he actually knows are like that.

Sunny and moominmama - sorry, but I think you're part of the problem . And how can it be a class thing, if all classes do the same thing? Middle class business men are just as bad IME, as working class mechanics, and upper class toffs!

I like looking at men and dont see the problem. I have used people from my husbands work in sexual fantasies. I have called my husband by the name of one of them whilst I have been having sex with my husband as a sex game. I dont think I am part of the problem as to me there is no problem. I have never offended anyone and no one has offended me. If I moved in circles it did offend people then I wont do it but I cant help being surrounded by such sexy men

How you know you have never offended anyone, or made them feel uncomfortable because they know you think about them sexually?

How does anyone become a twat? They are just twats In this sort of case - Lack of confidence? peer pressure? wanting to impress ? feeling bad about themselves so choosing to humiliate someone else to make themselves feel better? too much porn? immaturity? gang mentality (funny how different people behave when in groups. The larger the group, the worse the behaviour. Individually - quite ok. Small group - loud. Medium sized group - disruptive. Large group - riot.)

I have a picture in my mind of a peacock, strutting and displaying its feathers. Because a lot of human behaviour is that, isn't it? Strutting and showing your feathers.

I know because I know the guy that I did that about thinks I am fit as he has told me and his girlfriend who is a good friend of mine.

As I said on this thread www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/1030189-Teaching-children-young-people-about-boundaries-and-sex

Some people just do things differently and there is no right or wrong. As long as you dont do it to anyone that is offended by it then what is the problem? You were offended by this tell your partner and he will tell the boys and I doubt they will say it about you again. I really dont see this as humiliating and is no different to you average ann summers party conversations etc. It is just random conversation and nothing more.

Do they?

To be fair, I think most women, if they see an attractive man, do think "yum", just like men do if they see an attractive woman.

Perhaps men do vocalise it more, but if I see a fit guy and I'm walking with a girlfriend, we would probably pass comment.

However, I think the main difference is that women dont feel the same need to also pass comment on the ones they dont find attractive. So women only comment on the hits whereas men feel obliged to comment on the entire spectrum.

My personal experience of men is nothing like this, so either I've just been very lucky, or it's simply not something that is par for the course.

My personal opinion is that some men, when they get together with some other men, talk the big talk and say what they think the other blokes want to hear and will find funny. It's not innate and it's certainly not inevitable - it's just group mentality and peer pressure among certain types of men. It simply wouldn't occur to plenty of other types of men to behave in this way. I honestly believe this.

And if I was working class, I'd be pretty offended by insinuations further up the thread that WC men are just inherently more Neanderthal. Crikey...

I am just saying it is going to prevelant in working class jobs where the boys have half naked girl calenders and working class womens jobs where they have half naked boy calenders etc. It is going to be less prevelant if you are a lawyer and going out to executive lunches than if you are a cleaner doing the floors at a hotel and are left to your own devices etc.

I used to work in an industry like this. Out of 35 of us, only 5 were women, and the men valued a woman first and foremost by how fuckable she was. And I agree with the poster who disagree with sunny, appreciating beauty is very different from rating somebody's fuckability.

I think men have this in them, but they can easily override it, unless they're working in an environment where it's rife and the norm.

The men I used to work with were no poster boys. I don't think there was a conventionally handsome one amongst them, but that never stopped them from mocking women who were fat or plain. They didn't seem to see any irony there at all.

A plain or overweight woman would never mock a man's appearance in a big public office and expect a laugh.

Re the class issue, I think that all men are the same regardless of their class, but each man's environment will have different norms and expectations. A middle-class man working in a tradionally male environment has no problem getting down with the lads and marking women out of ten. And a working class man who might do that with his friends in the pub has the intelligence to know that that is not the done thing in an office staffed 60% by women (well, the smart ones know that).

op I would ask your husband not to refrain from telling you in the future who in the office finds you fuckable or non-fuckable.

It's totally irrelevant, and passing on such information only feeds the erroneous notion some men have that a woman's value is how fuckable she is.

why do they feel the need to tell you? Because they think you'll be relieved/flattered that a bunch of randomers would like to fuck you?

I work in an all female workforce though Valium Singleton. The last few jobs I have had have been all female. I havent actually worked with a man for about 4 years so I think that the men didnt get offended by what we were saying as they werent around to here it. I have worked in jobs where the female toilets/store cupboards are covered in pictures of men with their tops off/calenders etc.

I dont mock people for being plain or fat. We just say things like oh I would fuck blah blah and the other would say no I wouldnt (insert name] is way more fuckable etc. We dont insult anyone we just say we like whoever and who are the ones we like best. We arent picking them apart or saying anything horrible about them. Everything we say is always complimentary but it just happens that we all have individual preferences but thats normal.