Pubs and clubs

[sunshineandbooks]

Since having DC, I rarely visit clubs or pubs any more as my social activities tend to steer away from drinking. However, I do like a good dance, so average a night out at a club about once a year. That night out was this weekend just gone.

I had a great time, but I was struck by how awful some men can be. Some were lovely, some tried it on but took no as an answer first time, a couple were absolutely dreadful.

One guy was so persistent that not only did I have to spell it out that I wasn't interested, but I actually had to resort to "will you just fuck off".

I was with a group of girlfriends, but had I been on my own (as I used to be quite often in the past) I would have been very unhappy leaving this club with this guy still around. Likewise, if I hadn't had plenty of friends around inside the club I would have had no choice but to get the bouncers to intervene and chuck him out. TBH I wish I'd done that anyway now.

Looking around me, it was a pattern repeated all over the place, with young girls being particularly targetted. Now I handled this. I'm a 36-year-old mother of two with an abusive ex and self-defence training, but the thought of naive 18 year old girls going out there and facing this horrifies me. I know many 18 year olds are more than capable of handling this, as was I at that age, but many aren't, it's really horrible and IMO it's wrong. Why should women have to go around in groups for their own safety? They're going to a nightclub not a bloody war zone. Why are we (as in society) tolerating so much crap behaviour from sexually predatory men? Why did I think only of my self-preservation at the time instead of making a stand for all women and having him chucked out? Am I so conditioned by society that I consider this a normal part of a night out? It's really got me thinking.

As it happens, I had a great night, but I really feel like I'd like a personality test done on people before they're allowed in. Am I alone in wishing you could have same-sex (non-gay) clubs where you can go and dance without any unwanted attention?

I suffered a lot when I got unwanted attention as a younger adult and it really bothers me that the same (poss. worse these days...?) might affect my DD and DSD. I am a lot stronger mentally now than I was back then - vexing, but true - and I really struggled in the past to know how to handle it and got into some really difficult situations. I don't think I would ever have thought to ask a bouncer to do something because I would always have expected the management to say they couldn't do anything about it... and maybe that's the problem? People do think that it's not something that can be dealt with, so they just learn to live with it?

I wish clubs and bars would operate some kind of no-tolerance policy towards this kind of behaviour. I suppose the trouble is that society in general has trouble believing a woman when she says a man is doing something unpleasant to her.

I used to love going out to pubs and clubs when I was younger, but that was when a lot of my esteem was wrapped up in male attention (I wish I could go back in time and talk to the woman I used to be - I am so embarrassed that I used to let some awful men think that I actually thought they were alright...if you know what I mean!!)

Now i have children and a husband I can think of nothing worse than to go back to what is really the human version of a cattle market. YUK!

If unwanted attention in nightclubs and bars is the worst it has got for you then be thankful that you have led such shletered lives

I deal with this a lot (I play in pub bands.)

I don't take any shit, whatsoever. This has worked well for me, but the type of man who indulges in the behaviour (whether it's arse grabbing or just verbals) seems unable to generalise. They still do it to other, less scary women.

On the one hand, I don't love being seen as such a ball-buster, but I'm regularly the only female in the bar and I have to keep myself safe. Oh, and they pretty much all think I'm gay, and I don't do anything to challenge the stereotype, which is probably wrong. (I think that failure to fall to the floor and suck cock in gratitude for male attention = GAY in their weird little world.)

I love playing, I love my band mates very much (they are good blokes, if a little dinosaur-like) and I do enjoy banter, but I have had to grow a very thick skin. You'd be amazed how many men have never heard of the word or concept of misogyny, but I'm happy to explain it to them until their eyes glaze over (usually about 5 seconds in)

There are women who welcome the attention, which I find very difficult to understand.

Absentfather You are right, of course. Why should I expect to go about my work without having slavering men using me as wank fodder, or taking ownership of my body with a quick grope as I walk past? I should be grateful that someone wants to shag me, I expect?

Wanker.

How often do you get groped in this day and age? Even the wrong remark in most workplaces will get you fired.

So men admire your breasts? It does not mean they go home and bang one out.
And the reverse never happens? You never know any women colleagues who call the IT guy out and then collectively check out his rear as he bends over?

Sheltered lives some of you lead.

AbsentFather - we had a thread here about a year or so ago about small sexual assaults. It turned out to be not so small. Would you mind not being so rude as to come on to a thread and dismiss the OPs feelings. I am beginning to realise what your ex-wife had to put up with.

"how often do you get groped in this day and age"

Weekly. I am out (working) in the pub at least 4 nights a week, and it happens on at least one of them.

Propositioned every time.

I don't get it as badly as some other women (my sister's a bar maid and it's far worse.) Also, not that it matters, but in case you were wondering, I wear jeans, t shirt, no make up and flat shoes. Just in case, you know, you think I'm "asking for it."

It does not happen to men.

AbsentFather so being harrassed or sexually assaulted in pubs and clubs may not be the worse thing that can happen in life (didn't realise there was a competition btw) but why is this something that most women should have to put up with? If you can expect to go out for a drink or a night out unmolested why should women not expect the same?

And what on earth are you banging on about women checking out the IT workers arse? I have never experienced this and even if it does happen that does not make it right does it? How is that even relevant to the OP?

I hope you don't have any daughters with an attitude like yours.

We aren't sickened by male sexualty. We are sickened by male obnoxiousness. HTH.

Male barmen get propositioned all the time and groped by women.

You work around drunks ....... Whatever gender there will always be some who are going to overstep the normal limits.

Find another job seriously. Pub cricket is a fine British institution

Awww, thanks for your concern - I cope, thanks. There's a serious lack of openings for musicians outside the pub circuit, think I'll stick where I am and just keep challenging the status quo. Bless your wee heart.

AbsentFather you'll excuse me if I don't take your opinion seriously, since I have trouble doing so with men who justify violence, infidelity and prostitution. No wonder you think a bit of groping is harmless.

How about joining an orchestra? :)

Yeah, Sunshine, it's so simple

and just one more because I couldn't resist

Cor blimey sunshine where's yer sense of humour?

Every knows that the ladies love minor sexual assaults!

And it doesn't matter if ladies don't love minor sexual assault anyway - everyone knows that it is part and parcel of being lady to be sexually harassed and assaulted on a regular basis. Cos that's what ladies is for.

So STFU with the complaining already. Didn't you hear the man telling you what you may and may not discuss with other women?

I love a good ole fashioned circle-jerk

spent far too long on shitredditsays

Just don't you go taxing your ladybrain with too much thinking First. Especially not thinking about that type of masculine sexuality which is expressed through unwanted and unsolicited sexual attention (AKA sexual harassment) - you might end up being accused of being a prude (which everyone knows is a terrible thing for a lady to be).

YY, sunshine, in my 30s & 40s I was still going clubbing by myself sometimes - to dance. By that time I was well able to get rid of pests and unafraid to ask the bouncers to help if need be. Thinking back to when I was younger (even longer ago), I used to get some other geezer to help out by doing a desperate look or even just asking someone to help me get rid of a creep.

I would have hoped that, by now, young women weren't as worried about upsetting a male ego. But I fear most are :(

I have seen groups of women sexually harassing men, btw, and it's just as horrid.

Oh, dear :(

I know this topic abhors the word "empowerment", but there seems to be a worrying shortage of it! Isn't anybody advising young women they're free to tell annoying blokes to get lost?