How to deal with ‘hello beautiful’

[Sunflowersandspiders]

A man in my office has started saying ‘hello beautiful’ to me when I see him. It seems to be a common schtick for him that he deploys on lots of women I work with. It makes me uncomfortable, I want it to stop, but I don’t know what to say. ‘Hi John, do you mind not commenting on my appearance please?’

At the moment I’m avoiding him, trying not to walk past his desk, no eye contact if he walks past mine. Probably can’t be sustained eternally.

Sidebar: why do men do this? Control? I am so tired of having to navigate this shit in the workplace.

I agree, non of these things will have entered John's head. Thats why he needs telling. It gives me Benny Hill vibes.

This would be a really good come back ‘can’t you remember my name John? I won’t mind if you’ve forgotten but I’d rather you asked than call me beautiful - it feels really uncomfortable’

So now John is chasing women around the office with his tongue lolling out.

I'd probably make a bit of a joke out of it.
Like I'd respond with 'morning John. Are you due an opticians appointment?' he'd presumably say 'why?', and I'd say, 'well you need one if you're calling me beautiful!' and laugh.
Hopefully he'd see it's a bit of an awkward thing to say, laugh as well and not do it again?
If that doesn't work, I'd would just say 'please don't call me that.' and move the subject on.

I think I would look him up and down and say hello Mr podgy, or something similar which picked on some aspect of his appearance 🤷🏻‍♀️

'Can't you remember women's names? You don't seem to find any of the men here beautiful?'

but it clearly bothers OP and that is why she's asked for help.

FFS

OP in your shoes i would have already said "good morning is enough, don't comment on my appearance again"

if it didn't stop, one reminder that he needs to pack it in then HR.

This wouldnit bother me at all....really who cares!

I'd probably just respond with "how are you today handsome?" and laugh it off. I worked in male dominated cultures in the 80s and 90s and found a little self deprecating humour the best way to go rather than appearing offended. It stopped it and gave nothing to wind me up with. Those who were offended got it worse. It was wrong but silly cultures are like bullies, if they think something hurts or offends they get worse.

I do find the culture today quite precious and often wonder at the complaints "he winked at me" "he chatted me up in the workplace". Honestly I think people today need to grow a back bone and learn to deflect. People are people and some offend. This is low level and should be quietly dealt with by the individual concerned. It isn't something to get offended about.

No. He will not see the humour - he’ll just see a women he can ‘rescue’ from her own low self esteem. You don’t need to make jokes at your own expense to placate sexist men.

There was a guy who worked in our staff canteen who did this and I assumed it was a control/power thing. I used to deadpan back to him “good morning sweet cheeks” and it did stop. The other responses on this thread are much more professional and appropriate 😂

Lighten up. Take it as a compliment

I replied with Hello Handsome, what times your wife home tonight?

Everyone cracked up, ripped the piss out of him and he never said it again.

I think next time he just greets a man with 'hello X' I would say 'ah John, you don't think X is beautiful then as that's not your usual greeting?' and then hope that he gets the point

I'm glad the bar has been raised for what is and isn't acceptable like this now - coz none of this shit has ever been aimed at men in the same way - and young women don't have to accept the Carry on/Benny Hill nonsense that we (I'm late 40s did) did.

Exactly my thoughts!

I had this fairly recently. It was a new graduate too...

I have MASSIVE hints to save having to be blunt but it just didn't work.

In the end I had to tell him straight to stop calling me 'beautiful' and 'gorgeous'. I stopped short of explaining why.

He seem quite offended and asked what I wanted to be called. Strangely, the answer was simply my name. He then tried to say he called everyone it, I let him have that even though it definitely wasn't true. He never called male colleagues anything other than their name - same with younger colleagues.

I felt ok saying it because I'm a middle-aged woman and I was friendly to him as I felt a bit sorry for him (he was fairly clueless but thought he was fabulous and managed to piss off just about everyone in one way or another). He came very close to getting the sack over various other lapses in judgement...thankfully he has left now.

i care. I work in a massively male dominated environment. I have dragged myself into a management position by working bloody hard, and being much better than my peers. I am mostly respected by my team/colleagues because I'm good.

Hearing someone say this would really annoy me. I am not there because i'm gorgeous (I am, btw) but because I' good. and well qualified. But I'd go with "hello Bref will do, thanks" the first time. And then "I've asked you not to say that" the second to "let's go and visit the HR manager, right now" if it happened again.

It’s funny isn’t it, I’m sure all these posters saying I and others who think this is inappropriate are ‘delicate’ and ‘precious’ and ‘shouldn’t get offended’ would go ballistic if a colleague said ‘good morning fattie!’ or ‘hi old hag’. It’s really no different. Thankfully the world has moved on from environments where men could say whatever the fuck they wanted at work and women had to take it or try and deflect in a way that saved the poor wee man’s blushes. I’ll be straightforward and formal, as a number of posters have suggested, and if he doesn’t stop I’ll escalate as it will be bullying/harassment and like most workplaces we have policies about that 😁

when i was in the army we were greeted with "hello sugar tits" and the like. 5 women in a 40 strong troop. Fucking hilarious.

Ciao brutto (Italian for hello ugly) is tempting but in reality one of the more sensible responses posted above is better.

It's unprofessional - would probably have been accepted by women 25 years ago but certainly not now we've moved on

With all due respect sating "hello beautiful" is totally different.t to saying "hello fatty". The world has changed and not always for the better.

Of course it’s different to saying something rude like “hello fatty” and if he’s saying it to lots of women it’s not a personal comment on your appearance, it’s just an expression he uses. It might not be professional, or politically correct as he’s not doing it to men, but it’s not awful or creepy or personal.

Gok Wan.. Rylan and other celebrities say " hello beautiful" to people.
I say it to my friends .
It's not just a comment for appearance...it's for the person's personality etc.
I love it.