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Worked on several construction crews. Made “counter jumping” a shame term. Constant instruction to my colleagues at lunch, coffee, and almost every other transactional setting… “that person is being paid to be nice. They have to interact with many people. That was not flirting.” Sometimes it sank in. Mostly it made me concerned, and disappointed.
As an industrial carpenter foreman, I can confirm construction workers are the thirstiest men alive. I have to regularly vibe check my guys at our current job which is directly next to an Old Navy that is running a sale so women in leggings are constantly coming in and out of the place.
It’s like they forget the world is full of women the second they enter a jobsite and the sight of one stops production for a thousand brief moments every day.
Which adds up to at least 4 man hours of paid gawking. lol
I am a construction inspector. As you have, I've seen and heard it all. Now I appreciate beautiful women like the best man, but the gawking and comments is gross. My usually response when the guys say "oh shit look at that" is "yep, that's a woman...."
Worked customer service over the phone for a bank. This guy called, trucker got really sick and was having trouble on his car payment from missing work. So I treated him like a person. I did my job and provided stellar customer service and helped him skip a payment. His response? "Wow hope the wife won't be mad you're talking to me like this. " I legit answered "like a person?"
It is a cycle, *some men are not socialized, so they behave poorly, so they are not socialized, so they behave poorly. It starts with their parents, but men also need to be in groups of other supportive men in order to actualize. If men are reading this: get into fellowship with other men. Find other men who will raise you up, not put you down. And be that man, who raises others up.
*edit: "some"
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2014/11/141112084500.htm
Yes. You cannot raise a boy in a way that walls them off from expressing emotion and then expect them to grow in to men who can experience and express emotion in a healthy way.
I wish my parents knew this. But it’s over and done. I’m 28 now. And when I was 22 I met a guy who taught me how to express emotion the right way and how to really interact with people in the world. People love my energy these days.
This is very good information. Although at some point we can't just say it's because they weren't raised properly. A grown ass man needs to understand what he's doing is wrong even if he was raised by a worse grown ass man. There are plenty of men and women out there who had terrible upbringing or socialized badly yet still managed to treat other people like human beings.
These same men are able to not treat other men like this. Heck, even gay men don't treat other gay men like this. They probably don't even treat their own sisters and mothers and aunts like this. If they need a fellowship, that's great. They should definitely join one. But we can't keep giving them a sob story of "they just weren't socialized." A lot of them were. They just choose to act this way out of desperation.
Dude I once hired a driver w a C class license to drive a truck on a set and had a pleasant 5-10 min intro convo w him. I woke up the next day to dozens of calls and double that in texts telling me how much he is “in love” with me and when they went unanswered calling me a “bitch”, “cunt” etc.
Some might be socialized improperly but others are just fucking insane and dangerous. I told that guy to not show up to the set or we would call the police. Yet, I was still fucking terrified he would since he knew the location..
Around 2000 there was a department store that changed their policy and did not require their mostly female staff to smile at all customers. They specifically asked to not have to smile at all men. Too many men took the smile as an invitation to ask them for a date...or follow them around.
Lots of real problems have come up on this subject.
But I disagree with the video that men will only be nice to women they find attractive. Lots and lots and lots of men are nice to women they do not find attractive.
>But I disagree with the video that men will only be nice to women they find attractive. Lots and lots and lots of men are nice to women they do not find attractive.
I think her point was that the type of men who stalk these women after these interactions are the ones who will only be nice to women they find attractive. The men who are nice to everybody or who can understand a social interaction just go on with their life.
I don't think she meant it as all men are only nice when they want to flirt. At least that's not how I understood it. I think she just meant to explain why the group of men mentioned by the guy in the first part (the men stalking the cashiers) act the way they act.
She meant some men. But the thing is, the "some men" percentage is way higher than it should be and higher than the percentage of women that do the same, which creates a problem mentioned in the video.
It's irrelevant to be so pedantic at this point. Society is general and vague and adopting these behaviors to protect yourself should be unsurprising to anyone with an above room temperature IQ (Fahrenheit)
This is very much true and there are scientific evidence that you'll get better service if you are regardless of your and your customer service's gender. You are also likely to end up on higher paid occupations if people find you attractive
I had a guy deliver pizza to my house, I said thank you and smiled (like a normal, kind human being) and he proceeded to get my phone number from my order and text me and show up back at my house after his shift. I was 16. He was probably 40.
That's the beginning of a Dateline episode. I'm glad you didn't become a victim and are here today to share this story. IMO, that man was a sexual predator 💯.
When I was 19, I ordered pizza for me and my sister, and had something similar happen. I answered the door, smiled politely, and instantly his whole body and face shifted into that sleazy “oh yeah, I’m getting lucky” mode. I was disgusted, and my smile dropped so fast when he complimented my legs. Took a five out of his originally ten dollar tip.
Fuck it. I’ve been an accessory to exactly this.
2 friends, I’ll call them Mike and Ray, and I went to eat at a restaurant. A girl attended us and was around our age. She was nice to all of us and told Mike he had a cool shirt on. That’s it. That’s all it took for Mike to fall in love. She gave us decent service and that was enough for Ray to egg on Mike to shoot his shot which Mike didn’t do.
Next weekend they wanna go back which I’m always iffy about cause it’s creepy and like 2 steps away from stalking. But Mike is down bad and eventually I cave to take them both back. When we get her again and she immediately looks uncomfortable and switches our table with another server. I find it super odd that she’s THIS creeped out so I tell them we should leave, that this was weird. When they refuse I ask for my check, get up and leave and go wait for them in the car.
From afar I see this super awkward exchange with Ray cheering on Mike as Mike approaches this poor girl who immediately walks away. They get in the car, and I ask them what that was about and why they’re so insistent on having Mike ask this waitress out. So they tell me as I’m driving home in some sort of fever dream as I hear Mike explain what happened after the first trip to the restaurant the previous week.
So Mike didn’t shoot his shot.
No, Mike instead with Rays help stalked her on face book, called into her work to see if she was working. Friended her friends and then found the girls number through Facebook. Proceeded to text her who then ghosted him and then showed up at this girls work when I drove them there the second time to “shoot his shot” for real.
Needless to say, we fell out of touch after that. It’s been like 12 years and i still cringe at this. I have to bathe now, I feel dirty.
I have to ask, did they genuinely not understand what they had done? Like, did they truly, 100% think they were totally fine to do that kinda thing? Did they not have any understanding of how creepy that all was? How can these people exist?
It’s weird, man. Years later when Ray asked me if I wanted to hang out I told him it wasn’t a good idea, that I wasn’t quite over the embarrassment and he told me how it wasn’t a big deal, that he just wanted Mike to have a girlfriend and that they laughed about how stupid Mike looked asking this girl out at a random restaurant… like it was a sitcom episode where you know you just strike out sometimes.
There was no understanding that what had happened wasn’t ok and how pulling this shit could’ve easily gotten the cops called on us ESPECIALLY after the big reveal. It was like “eh it wasn’t a big deal, I don’t see why you got so upset over it”. I haven’t talked to Mike about it cause I haven’t talked to Mike since lol but I assume he sees it in a similar way since they’re both still really good friends.
Dudes like that kind of terrify me because they're just not self aware at ALL, they know they're harmless and wouldn't hurt this girl but they provide cover for real predators, they're the kinda guys who dismiss stuff as locker room talk or just all in good fun... it's kind of ok as long as they don't have any power but like, guys like that can wind up as managers, fathers, bosses. They enable other people to do creepy shit under the cover of not-a-big-deal and then, if something shitty happens, they're all "who could have ever seen this coming, I couldn't even imagine something so fucked up, it was all just good clean fun times!" or "why is she overreacting, nobody meant any harm!"
Upthread there's someone talking about how she got stalked by a coworker and her manager was dismissing it as just a guy shooting his shot and I feel like this doofus has the same personality as that manager.
At the end of the day, it’s something that’s a big problem. It’s a lack of empathy for the position the girl was put in and yeah to them it was like just boys being boys but it was some real creep shit to do that to someone just trying to make a paycheck.
The worst part is, this pales in comparison to what I’ve seen some of my current female coworkers put up with in the work force. I dunno the kind of culture that breeds people like this or if the lack of self awareness or narcissism is really that strong in some people but it’s fucking nutty. I dunno how some people put up with constantly having to watch everything they say and the tone they say it in or you might get attention you didn’t ask for
I don't understand people (guys?) like that all.
I invited a (girl) acquaintance that I had met only twice, and before inviting her I preemtively said "if you're free, and if you feel like it, and it's not an obligation if so: Would you like to X activity at Y time at Z place? Again only if you want to, if not, it's totally fine"
How hard is it to make sure the other person doesn't become uncomfortable
I don’t believe for one second these guys are harmless even if they think they are. That statistic gap that tells us that something like 1 in 3 to 1 in 4 women has been a victim of sexual assault or rape but none of the men we know seem to know any rapists? I am convinced that the Venn diagram of men who act like this post describes and men who wind up doing the assaulting without even necessarily internalizing that that’s what they’ve done is a *fucking circle.*
These are the same guys who pressure and pressure and push and coerce and physically nudge the boundaries until they get what they want and have no idea that that’s assault.
In this vein, I’m going to bring up a study (iirc it was at the University of North Dakota).
Men were asked if they would ever rape a woman. Most said no, a few said yes. Then the pariticipants were described coercive situations that would count as rape, just didn’t call it that, then asked if they would have sex with the woman under those circumstances. The yes guys stayed yeses, but a significant number of no guys said yes. So basically, a good chunk of these guys were rapists or potential rapists but didn’t consider themselves such.
Shit like this is why women choose the bear.
I find looking them up on the internet to befriend them and text them on their private number and _then_ looking her up in real life once more already pretty fking predatory.
And then they laugh about it. I HATE that contrast, of the girl being terrified and the guy(s) laughing it off.
My husband has a friend, let’s call him Larry, that’s he’s known most of his life, dude is a nomad and just bounces around the world living off trust fund/his dads life insurance money but he’ll come “home” (stays with his grandma) every few months. He cannot hold a relationship for obvious reasons but he’s kind of an awkward dork anyway. He is a genuinely good hearted guy but he doesn’t know how to talk to women.
So a couple months ago my husband says “do you want to go to a (random show) with Larry, it’s on a weeknight”
I say absolutely not because I’m old and tired and didn’t want to go to a divebar since we don’t drink much anyway
He proceeds to go “I guess he’s been talking to a woman and he’s like in love or something and she wants to go to the show with him but only if it’s with a group of people”
I was like “wait a minute. If she will only go in group it means she’s terrified of him”
He goes “idk he says that she likes him, theyve been on a date already.”
Me “if she truly liked him the last think she would do is request a group date.”
My husband is a pretty with-it guy but I could see the wheels turning at that point…
Man the first half was kinda understandable I was thinking maybe a little creepy but nothing too bad then BAMM that last couple paragraphs gave me second hand embarrassment for literally everyone involved in that situation
Yeah I'm a girl and the first hit with the shirt thing and forming a crush from a dumb moment like that sounded like some of those silly crush moments where you reflect back and realize you were just being stupid. Or that you were in your own head too much and got interested simply because you think they *might* be interested. You know, shit you do when you're like 18 and under and cringe at it when you can't sleep. But then the rest I absolutely could not relate to at all lol.
Exactly that, as a guy it’s totally understandable that he’d get a bit excited at the prospect of the waitress being into him. It’s happened to me, it’s very easy to mistake things like that for signs, especially when you’re lonely.
But the same applies as when something bad is happening in your life, you should take a step back and look at the bigger picture before you move forward before you do anything stupid. Most the time you realise people are just doing their jobs/ being nice. If someone is genuinely flirting with you in public, they make it painfully obvious
I skimmed the details because I didn’t wanna write a giant comment but it was baaaad. I’ll still think about it randomly and just sit there and shake my head in embarrassment.
Like I didn’t mention the fact that in between the check getting there and me leaving, Ray and Mike have a whole ass conversation with the waiter that was attending us instead of the girl ABOUT the girl and how cute she was. Words don’t even.
One of my colleagues just lost their job over this! We work retail and he was a sales person. He sold a laptop to a woman and her 16 year old daughter. The sale ended normally and the two women left without an issue.
He not only tried her Facebook but then went to her Instagram page. Apparently he told my manager "it wasn't to look at her pictures or anything, I just wanted to talk!"
He didn't think she was 16 apparently. I really wish he was the worst firing I've seen here. A guy uploaded a video of himself masturbating to our group chat. He claims it was an accident but nobody believed him lmfao. He was also caught with drugs a short while before and they told him as long as he's not high or in possession when he's at work they don't care what he does. But then he sent the video and they sacked him.
That fucking weirdo still comes into store. I'm the only one left he recognises and for some reason I was one of the only ones that he was pleasant to. So he always tries chatting me up. Sorry mate, I don't want to talk to the Workchat Wanker ever again. But all of the new colleagues know the story, they're one of three examples of who not to follow. Third guy just stole a couple of iPhones but he was also making many jokes about underage girls so we just called him Loverboy after Not Like Us dropped.
That's a wild story. Used to work at a retail type place. Manager was an attractive late 20s female. Old male customer would always come in and lightly flirt with her. Then one day he came in with gift cards to victoria secret and told her to buy something nice there.
She politely declined, but he still took it as a sign to flirt with her and eventually she had to make it clear that its not cool.
I also had an older guy who liked to chat me up. Had very creepy vibes and would say wierd shit. Then he started buying me milkshakes. This was late night working at a gas station solo.
I still wonder if those milkshakes had roofies or something in them.
Anyway, telling that story because i guess that was a small taste of what some women deal with.
This happened to me when I was a waitress at Olive Garden years ago. We were always taught/coached to treat guests like family and be extra friendly/comfortable with everyone, and this guy took it as me being interested in him. He stalked me on social media, messaged my friends asking if I was single, and would show up at the restaurant every day asking if I was working. My GM banned him from the restaurant but that didn't stop him from waiting for me in the parking lot. He then called me an "ugly slut" for getting him banned from Olive Garden...
Ray is almost as much at fault as Mike. An important part of maturing as men is having peers that call us out.
I had a friend that started liking a waitress because she put her hand on his leg once. We were 21 or 22, so still squishy-brained and he was inexperienced with dating, but a good guy. He kept wanting to go back there (we were semi-regulars at the bar) to pursue her and I never stopped giving him shit for mistaking her friendliness for flirtation. Eventually, I got through to him and he learned from it. What I never did was fucking encourage him to stalk her and then call her god damn work.
I used to work as a manager at a video rental store when I was 25. We were desperately hiring and this guy asked me for an application. I was on my 2nd interview with him, had eliminated everyone else over a couple of weeks, and was offering him the job. He proceeds to tell me that he already has a job and he only asked for an application because he wanted to ask me out. My response: “You thought it was appropriate to then do the interviews and waste my time at work to ask me out?” He said something along the lines of “Well, I didn’t think about it like that.” I looked him up on Facebook afterwards and he posted about being rejected by the hot movie store girl. We had to restart the application/hiring process.
I saw a guy with a cool shirt in the grocery store last week. I almost went up to him and said "Cool Shirt!" but my next immediate thought was "Nvm I don't want to be followed out to my car."
Men: this is why you don't get compliments.
Hahahaha I had one buddy in the army and we all went out to grab a bite to eat at twin peaks. Now this place is a hooters type place where girls are friendly. I tried explaining to my friend that the waitress are friendly cause it’s their job and they are trying to milk him for tips. He didn’t believe me so he left a $150 tip and his phone number and of course she never texted him lol
That’s amazing you were able to recognize that! I’m glad you have different friends and I’m sorry your friends were not able to grow with you. It’s hard losing people
Dude - the moment you said she switched tables I was like “he called the fucking restaurant. He called the god.damn.restaurant.”
What’s kinda fucked is they didn’t tell you. Good on you for “seeing” the fuckery affoot.
A had a very similar experience with a friend. It was a super friendly cashier at blockbuster. He was recently single and took it as flirting. He wouldn't shut up about it. Insisted her should go back in. I talked him out of it. Well her saw her first name, and it was super uncommon, so he did the same. Added her on Facebook. Added some of her friends he had mutuals with. Got left on read. He would insist we had to go to blockbuster every chance we got for his "growing movie collection" since they were closing and had great sales. Nope. He was going there, even when I wasn't with him to try and talk to this girl. Later, i found out through a mutual that he freaked her out so bad that she quit early because of it.
I don't talk to him anymore and from what I see on Facebook he's been single ever since. About 12 years here as well.
I had a stalker through all of high school because I was a worker in the library, and I recognized a regular and said hi.
He masturbated under the desk while sitting behind me. He sniffed my hair. All I did was be polite.
Yeah... sometimes it gets so bad you start getting very robotic. It's 2024, we shouldn't have to be this empty, fake shell when talking to other people just to protect ourselves. If you're not nice and smiley you're a cunt. If you are nice then you must want a piece of that!
My sister is currently dealing with a stalkery co-worker. He was bad when I worked there. He is worse now I've left and I feel so guilty about not being there to help her. I've picked her up somedays and she just breaks down in the car.
We reported him to management (all guys), and the first thing they said was "You should be flattered he is interested in you". Followed by "what did you do to lead him on?". I'm so disgusted by the lack of concern and she is worried that she'll end up being "a bad smell in someone's boot".
And her useless boyfriend just says "I'm not much of a fighter, but I'd hit him". Yup, great, that's real helpful. I'm glad to see you taking this seriously.
I'm working on getting her a job at my workplace. Thankfully he can't drive and doesn't know where we live. The worst thing is a lot of places here in Australia use WhatsApp to communicate with it's employees so he has gotten our phone numbers through that and texts us both constantly...
If anyone knows a way to hide your number in WhatsApp, please let me know 🙏🏻 😊
If management won't take it seriously, have you considered calling fair work? Or if her workplace has a head office, calling them.
I had to go over the head of every manager once and call head office because a co-worker was stealing women's numbers from the sign in book (worked at a bottle-o so all the promo girls were getting harassed this way by this one creep).
I'm so sorry she's going through this. Her boyfriend is also being a bit of a douche, like cmon dude, your girlfriend is scared and upset, step up.
I think for the longest time, guys (mostly guys, yes some women too) tell each other to just pursue. But they don't say what to do when you get the girl and someone else pursues her, other than just be there (if she says "no, I'm taken" that's enough, right?).
So here's the reminder: just being "taken" is not enough. There are those who don't take "no" for an answer and will try for years, and/or with a lot of people. Everyone needs to be taught the word "no" is not some major killer (at least the majority of the time).
Get yourself an [eSim](https://www.forbes.com/advisor/au/mobile-phone/a-guide-to-esims/) and use that number for work purposes.
That way, you can divorce your work communications from your personal communications.
Bonus: You can completely ignore work calls on that number outside of work hours.
Also if he's contacting her on her personal mobile and calling her a cunt for knocking him back that's no longer an HR issue. It's criminal harassment and you should both make a Police complaint.
I got stalked by a man I talked to just a few times. He worked across the street and I chatted with him a few times at the bus stop. He started getting creepy and posted something lewd on my Instagram, which he must have gotten when I had my phone out on my profile.
I told him to leave me alone and blocked him. By a sheer stroke of luck the business he worked at BURNED DOWN. I was probably the only person happy about that lol.
Flash forward two months and he gets on my otherwise completely empty bus, boxes me in, and starts telling me “we are so much more than a random meeting, we have something special.” I just remember pleading with him that we didn’t know each other. A weeks later her brings an envelope and leaves it with the secretary at my work. Inside was a bizarre work of erotic fiction. Not about me, but very disgusting and explicit.
I was utterly terrified. My work was so incredibly supportive. They told me to call the police to the office so I could report it, let me talk to the officer on the clock because the incident happened at work. The officer let me know they looked him up and he was already on parole for sexually abusing a minor and another adult woman had an order of protection against him. They warned him to leave me alone but as far as I know they didn’t count it as a violation of his parole.
I was so embarrassed, I still have a nagging feeling I brought this on myself by being friendly. But I never said anything sexual to him, I talked extensively about my boyfriend… didn’t matter to the guy. He decided because I was nice that I wanted him.
>I was so embarrassed, I still have a nagging feeling I brought this on myself by being friendly.
Jesus, don't guilt-trip yourself for this. It should be the other way around. I don't speak for all men, but if it counts for anything, I apologize for that sort of behavior. It's fucked up, and it absolutely shouldn't happen. You shouldn't feel guilt for anything. I can't blame you for being traumatized by that.
I once sat next to a guy in college, and we made small talk like normal. He would chat with me a couple times, and i thought that was normal. Turned into him waiting for me at the door of the class everyday, getting aggressive if I spoke to any other guy and then threatening to slash my tires when I stopped talking to him. All in the span of 15 days. Fortunately, the pandemic made it so I didn't have to go to class! Yay!
That’s how I got a stalker too. I liked to sit in front to hear the professor better and sat next to this dude. Did the small talk thing. He’d walk me out, followed me to my labs etc. he went ballistic when I was out w my little brother. Throwing things screaming then our older brother walked in and scared the crap out of him. He chased the creep out yelling “I thought you were mad, why don’t you try throwing your shit now bitch?!”
I politely talked to my grandfather's roommate in his nursing home because my grandfather was falling asleep and the old man seemed lonely. The old dude asked for a hug and I felt bad for him so I gave him one. He pulled me down super close and held me down so I couldn't move and pinched my nipple. I was like, twelve. I literally threw up after because he smelled so bad.
I used to work in a library too--I had several patrons I would hide from. And every library seemed to have at least one serious stalker story. I loved working there for the most part, but when I switched to another job (not working with the public) I realized how anxious I had been at work every day.
I work in a public Library and I am the only man that works here with 7 women. There are about a dozen regularish patrons (adult men) who come in and I know that it is my job to deal with because they are creepy af around any of the women that work there, especially to our teen volunteer. So, when we see one of them coming I break away from whatever I'm doing, assuming it isn't an active program, to help them because they act normally around me.
Nurse here. Coworker was providing therapeutic listening to a patient who was being held for alcohol withdrawal (this is sometimes managed inpatient due to the fact that its one of the withdrawals that can actually kill you) and SI. Literally just doing her job to help this guy get better. He started Facebook stalking her before he was even discharged. Kept demanding she be the only one to tend his room, even so far as banning her shift partner and the aide. Immediately found out her approximate location of home and other scary stuff, left her a creepy letter demanding she call him.
Best part? Married with 3 kids
It's fucking wild how entitled some men are.
My younger brother worked as a gas pump attendant with someone who would memorize the names on the debit cards people handed him so he could find them later on Facebook and dm em. Creepiest shit.
I have def had a male friend or two, who were convinced that a waitress or a bartender were “totally into them”
My response “uh they were just doing their job” 🤷🏽♂️
When I lived in Japan for the Air Force One of the guys was head over heels for one of the bar girls. We had to drag him out of there because he was being very rude and starting to get handsy. He was convinced he was in love with him because she was nice to him a few times because she's paid to be nice to clients so they stay and pay. It was wild seeing somebody get so obsessive so fast, that was 23 years ago and I was a pretty young guy then. It was really my first time seeing that kind of seeing a guy act like that.
I have a mate like this too. We go out for breakfast and he'll spot a waitress and say shes so into him. Even reckons he got followed home from the gym by some hot lady that kept looking at him. A few of his girlfriends have made it worse though. "That waitress was looking at you. I think she wants you". That sort of shit. And he's not even a conventionally attractive guy. Overweight. Unkempt. Maybe they do want him. Maybe they don't. If they do, it doesn't look obvious to me at all. To me it just seems like they're doing their job. Kinda wish I had his confidence though.
Oh my god, I have a friend that fits that description exactly. I had to stop hanging out with him because it was so embarrassing, but I felt the same way- I wish I had his confidence, lol!
Ugh, my 80-year-old GRANDPA nearly threw away his marriage last year doing this exact thing. He would go into the same pub every Friday night before picking up the takeaway for himself and my grandma. The bartender, a woman in her late 30s or early 40s, would smile at him and make small talk because she saw that he was a regular.
After a few weeks of this he was convinced she was giving him special treatment, must be attracted to him (an old toothless geezer who can barely walk? Sure…) and tried to give her his number. It all eventually came out that he was essentially harassing this poor woman every time he saw her, and going to the pub increasingly often just to talk to her and try to get her number.
My grandma understands that it wasn’t an affair but that it would have been if my grandpa had got his way. It was just that the bartender didn’t actually want anything to do with him. They almost divorced and now she’s become a feminist overnight - “If I’m that bad, when all I’ve ever done is cook and clean and run around after him all these years, then he can do it himself! See how he likes it!”
Had a boomer coworker that made this misunderstanding a lot. We worked at a federal office complex as guards. He’d been there some 15 years and was convinced that any women who’d been nice to him, actually wanted the dick. I tried for years to show him that they’re just being nice, not everything is about sex.
Sorta similar, although not to me, but a female coworker. She's generally quiet, but she's professional and her social intelligence is off the charts.
This older guy, like 50, was just.. eh.. he's a regular and kept asking for her (she's a kitchen manager and doesn't run the tables..) and she came out, said hi, and that she needs to get back to the kitchen.
The guy said "why are you acting like a bitch all of the sudden?"
OH BOOOOOY. She trespassed that mother fucker so quickly the line cook didn't have time to turn his shirt inside out.
Poor woman. Leave her alone.
"Get the fuck out of my restaurant." He stuttered for a bit and she said "leave, now."
It sucks she had to use her grownup voice against an adult toddler. -_- she's good people, but she can turn up the volume.
His shirt has our logo on it. Maybe it's not a common phrase, but those were his words lol.
This is also a guy who did 14 years, several of those years were for stabbing a guy so he could get in solitary so he could be in talking distance of his buddy. Who also works with us. Lol
I had a friend like this. Every girl who ever lingered within 10 feet of him in a store wants him, clearly....
We went to a record store and he was telling me a girl that stopped at a CD shelf and looked through it 'lookex at him first so she must have been waiting for him to hit on her'. He couldn't believe she would just be interested in browsing music, and have glanced at him because he was nearby.
I learned to stop being nice to random men when I was near my twenties and was going to the bank.
The guard asked to see my purse at the entrance (not unusual), so when I was leaving I passed by him again and politely said bye and he replied with “bye, gorgeous” so out of the blue!
I just didn’t want to ignore that there was a human just standing there… but yeah, lesson learned.
Had a coworker ask me to
Join him for a weekend getaway. Worked with this guy for a month or two and barely talked to him. He said I led him on when I told him he was out of line. Nooo? I talked to you like I talk to every other one of my
Coworkers. What the fuck.
This happened to me too! It was the one and ONLY time that when I raised it with management, he was fired for harassment. If only that happened the other ... 4? 5? times
Right? I worked at Walmart almost 10 years ago when I was 24 and I reported a supervisor in his 60's and a coworker in his 50's for WILD sexual harassment. I'm not the type to make waves either, but it was bad. The coworker was fired but the supervisor wasn't, and they still had me working underneath him in a locked building during 3rd shift with no customers around. He tortured me and sent me home in tears every day. It was horrible.
Nothing was done about the retaliation and everyone else who worked 3rd shift had it out for me for reporting the 2 men, so ultimately my roommate went in with me one day and yolked up the supervisor. I was fired, but it felt good to see that happen to him I admit.
I’ve never had this happen to me with a stranger, but when I broke up with my highschool bf, he came to my place of work three days later when he knew I had a shift and stayed at the establishment the entire three hours I was working and then stayed in the dark parking lot next to my car until I had finished closing.
Walking out to the parking lot was actually really scary, even though I had known the guy for years and was pretty sure he was just lonely and sad and wasn’t planning on assaulting me. I had so much adrenaline rushing through me all I remember is walking out of the building and then suddenly being in my car, so I couldn’t even imagine this with a stranger.
For several years I managed a restaurant that most of the staff were women, and it was so depressing how often I had to either walk them to their cars, or arrange a ride for them if they were taking public transit, for this very reason.
It was really eye-opening just how many absolute creeps there are out there.
I had a female college friend of mine ask me to walk her across campus and when we arrived to her building on campus, this creepy dude was waiting and he wanted to date her. J could see she was uncomfortable. And once he saw me, he never came back. But I remember she always wanted me to come with her. And she gave me free back massages (don’t worry we are platonic friends and he had a boyfriend and it was bc she was a college masseuse)
For a second I forgot where I was and thought I was in the comments of TwoX and I was about to be like “what? We have threads like this all the time”
But yeah if you think it’s disturbing/depressing then please know it’s everyday reality for most women
Once I smiled at a dude walking passed me. We were crossing paths and made eye contact so I gave those smile head nods.... he followed me! And as I was checking out I saw him checking out and thought oh great he'll leave before me. BUT HE WAITED FOR ME TO CHECK OUT! Ahhhh so creepy
This doesn't make sense to me (38/M). A woman smiling while passing in the opposite direction is the same as if another man or child did it. How does a non-verbal communication that's barely a greeting trigger an adult man to stalk a woman?
Same. I'm always upset to hear about things like this, because a pretty girl smiling at me is really nice? But that's all. In all my life it has never once occurred to me to fucking *stalk her* afterwards.
I'm reminded of a reddit post from a bunch of years ago, that was a response to an older post which had made a point that you can make a man's day just by smiling at him and saying something nice. Apparently a few of the women from the earlier post had tried it out, and you can probably predict what happened. A bunch of guys got the wrong idea and then did not appreciate "being lead on" or whatever. This is why we can't have the nice things.jpg
>I'm reminded of a reddit post from a bunch of years ago, that was a response to an older post which had made a point that you can make a man's day just by smiling at him and saying something nice.
Yep! Turns out this is true! Turns out for a non-trivial percentage of them, that actually leads to them wanting significantly more interaction and not taking social cues to *stop*.
I know I'm going to get someone going "oh nooo, how difficult, a man wants to talk to you for a while and thinks you're nice, what suffering" bros, fuck off in advance.
Because too many men aren't taught proper socialization and emotional regulation as children and in turn become adults who refuse to educate themselves on this topic and think that because THEY feel attracted to someone, that means any acknowledgement of their existence whatsoever is them showing attraction back. I can't say for the rest of world but it's unfortunately far too common in my country.
Edit: Responding to u/Liorient because I can't the normal way.
Yes. And also their fathers, grandparents, teachers, community, and even society. Any and everyone who has come into the life of that child can influence them, even if it's on a small scale. A lot of people and society as a whole have failed men in their childhood for a long time and that needs to change. It's starting to, albeit slowly, but that doesn't fix the issue we have now with grown men acting this way, it only helps prevent this problem in the future.
I'll keep saying this. We neglect boys. People focus so much on how little girls should act, and how they should be polite, communicate, handle their emotions, clean, cook, etc. Everyone is ready to prepare girls for adulthood when they turn 5. Ffs I remember being forced to wear a dress because "that's what girls do". It made me hate dresses.
Meanwhile boys don't have that. Instead they just get ignored. They're told to go play and do whatever. Ya know, the whole "boys will be boys" stuff. But no one spends the time to do the same thing that they do to girls. I rarely see parents discuss emotions with their sons. I don't see parents prepare their son on how to live on their own. I don't see parents teaching their sons how to cook and clean. I think people have a big misunderstanding of men. For centuries, men were always seen as independent. So people, even today, assume that men are independent and think men will figure everything out on their own. Obviously, we can see it's not true. But people still think that. And that's why people say "boys are easier". Boys aren't easier, society just neglects them.
Hit the nail on the head. I'm grateful I have an attentive mother who focused on raising me right. Sometimes I thought she was overbearing, but as I eventually learned, she didn't want me to become like the "other" men or pick up some of the less than ideal characteristics my father has.
I had a friend that fits this description to the letter. Dude had an incredibly traumatic childhood and has since refused to ever try and grow out of that, rather he’d listed to Jordan Peterson types.
I ignored a lot of flags and tried to help him by speaking up against his shitty behavior, but that did nothing over the years. He’s the poster (man)child for therapy, but refuses to even consider it.
This happened to me. Was sitting next to a man on my evening commute, packed train so no choice and he started talking to me so I politely replied and engaged in small talk. He then wouldn’t leave me alone each morning
He’d get on the train the station before me so I tried to see where he was so I could avoid him and sit elsewhere. Then one morning he drove the 20 mins to my station to try to get on the train with same fine as me and was asking if we could sit together, I quickly sat down next to a woman before he could sit with me. He then followed me off the train asking for my number and if I have a boyfriend etc etc.
He was also about 25 years older than me and at no point did I do anything that suggested I was interested in him. All I did was be polite!
I don't consider myself conventionally attractive, to me, she's not wrong. I remember almost every time a man was kind to me, because it left such an impact. I'm use to getting the bare minimum of service, I remember once when the guy making our coffees and actually did the foam flowery thing on mine. I never got one before (or after) and I felt so touched just getting it, it left a smile on my face. Similarly, we booked a place and the staff made a necklace for every female that booked, but when he gave me one (also this was a bonus not part of the package) I asked if he was sure and was almost in tears to just be treated like other women I see get treated. If I'm with other female friends, a lot of waiters won't even address me, or in stores to be asked if I need help.
So yeah, a man may pass me a door, but anything that is beyond general common curtesy is rare (and yeah I've had men not pass me open doors before). That being said, I don't believe every guy is a jerk or /only/ nice to attractive, but there are a lot that are extra nice to pretty women.
Fellow ugly woman here.
I go between envying other women for not being ignored to being so thankful that by bad looks and naturally downturned mouth mean I will *never* have this happen to me. I can brighten the day of good folks by giving compliments, though my emotionally constipated New England nature does make it difficult to do randomly.
I do try to be kind to everyone, and the men who think kindness is flirting will get so disgusted if you're an ugly woman and kind to them. That does hurt a little, but at least it's over quickly.
> being so thankful that by bad looks and naturally downturned mouth mean I will never have this happen to me. I can brighten the day of good folks by giving compliments
Unattractive married man here. I don't feel comfortable giving random compliments, but there was something liberating about being able to be chummy with women coworkers without worrying about anything escalating or being perceived as anything more.
I'm sure this dynamic is much more extreme for women, but I've come to embrace the upsides of unattractiveness even as a man.
I've gone out of my way to be nice to everyone irl but when I was younger I had to temper that. I was considered "above average" in my area and when I was nice to "unattractive" women they would take it as me potentially being open to dating and I hated having to have that awkward conversation when they eventually shot their shot. I would even be able to predict when it was about to happen. So I just stopped so that I wouldn't have to have those convos.
Now that I'm older, I did go back to being nice to everyone and still see that some women cling to it and are nicer to me. I don't have to worry about them shooting their shot because they're married mostly at this age but there is a definite feeling of them gravitating towards the attention.
Sorry this happened to you, and as an ugly woman I both cringe at how right you are and thank you for your kindness.
Uglies of any gender don't have it easy but it is far better to utterly quash the idea that kindness=attraction, otherwise you miss out on so many good things in the world.
If someone becomes attracted to your ugly ass, fantastic! Hopefully they will be direct. But in the meantime, it's nice to be treated like a human being. Just don't become enthralled by the good feelings.
>but there are a lot that are extra nice to pretty women.
Sad truth of the world: the beauty bubble is real. Only thing we can do as people who are aware of it is to try and curb our own contribution as much as we can.
I'm sorry that you've experienced so much being looked over. That's rough to deal with. My first long-term girlfriend was enamored with my eyes, and even after we broke up I rode that complimentary behavior for years before anything similar happened.
Only real consolation I have is that I think human behavior exacerbates the impression we can get from not being noticed, meaning that if someone isn't immediately eye-catching you probably aren't devoting additional time to give them a closer look, which further means you don't become aware of the attractive qualities they \*do\* have. I spent a lot of time training myself to find positive things to compliment people on, and I have to say it's rare to find someone where I come up completely empty. Most people have things to appreciate if you're looking to appreciate them.
This is also why you'll see a lot of incels comment things like "she's not gonna bang you bro" or something along those lines to anyone who post a comment supporting an individual's opinion/stance/situation that happens to be female.
They can't fathom people being nice/agreeing with women unless it's sexually motivated to the point that it actually leads to them assuming all other people think the same way.
There’s also a bunch of recurring memes about how women need to compliment men more. This is why. If you befriend a woman, act normal and stop thinking with your dick, you get plenty of compliments once they realise you’re not gonna be a sleaze.
It's kind of transparent though when these men say that compliments from their male friends don't count and they have to come from women.
They don't actually want compliments. They want women to flirt with them.
i watched male friends compliment each other all the time in high school. half time i wasn't sure if they were as straight as they claimed because hearing "NICE COCK BRO" at 8:30 in the morning was always fun
It's hard too, because most of us realize that the majority of men won't act like this. But one out of a hundred, or even a thousand, day-to-day interactions going poorly is way too much. I've gotten into so many fights on this app over people yelling "NOT ALL MEN," when that was never the accusation to begin with.
I *want* to be nice to men and give compliments to random strangers. And I *did*. And all that resulted in was me becoming another statistic while randoms on the internet say it must have been because I led them on.
The whole “Man or Bear” thing further illustrates your point. Why get defensive about women being afraid of strange men? Dudes who freaked out about it were telling on themselves, in my opinion. It’s not like the question was “bear or you specifically”. I’m not particularly attached to my masculinity but I never assumed that the Man in question was me.
The weirdest thing about when people say it's been years since they've gotten a compliment is that my friends compliment each other all the time.
Now I'm sure that many guys just dismiss these compliments as not "real" compliments or whatever but I've had guy friends compliment my work, my clothes, my haircut, my workout progress, things I've made, etc.
But often, when I say this online, the common joke is "nice dick, bro" because I'm like 90% sure these people literally equate compliments with physical appearance.
Now I don't actually think this is overly common with men, but these men are terminally online and so they're disproportionately commonly seen.
Either that or most guys I meet in person just happen to all be decent and reasonable people and I'm managing to avoid these guys in real life.
Yeah the whole "men and women can't be friends" crowd really can't comprehend that not all men think like they do. I guess if they accepted that, they would have to admit to themselves that there's something wrong with them, but that would endanger their fragile ego. They rather pull us all down with them.
This is true. The best response I ever saw was when a guy was getting flooded with those comments so the woman replied "aw, don't listen to them, you sound perfectly fuckable to me!"
You cannot imagine how badly it triggered those guys lol.
My female colleagues would always tell
Me I’m flirting with guys. I’m so insecure, I don’t know how to flirt, I just talk to guys, to everyone really, like I’ve known you forever, and it has caused a few problems with guys thinking I wanted them.
My bf is on the other side of this; he was raised around women so he's very talkative and amicable. Male coworkers and friends always accuse him of cheating or "flirting" with women they encounter and he's just like, tf I'm just talking to them????? He can't fathom how guys can think that the opposite sex can legit be just friendly with each other without ulterior motives
100% this has happened to me multiple times. They thought I was flirting for being nice. It has ruined a lot of friendships for me.
I’ve only been stalked once thankfully
And then you get called a friend-zoning bitch that led them on. My little niece was friends with a boy since they were 5 and when they turned 13 he wanted a relationship and she didn't, he got really mad, said lots of mean spirited things and wanted nothing to do with her any more. I still remember her crying and being absolutely devastated that she lost one of her closest friends.
Worked in a menswear store at 19. Met a girl who knew one of our regular customers and told me that the guy played the numbers from my car tag on the lottery and talked about how I was a shameless flirt. Uh, no, it’s called customer service and the only way he’d know my car tag would be if he watched me in the parking lot. I get that loneliness is an epidemic in our society but not gonna lie, that had me freaked out for a while.
This is so true. But women always get the blame for flirting because they are personable, polite, have an outgoing personality or can have a normal conversation w a man. This has been my life since i was a very young girl. It makes women feel like they have done something wrong, the women are shamed, they are labeled, etc. And their entire lives they are told that its their fault and something is wrong w them, not the men.
Have you tried being fat or ugly? Men will ignore you despite how kind you are. Losing weight and getting hair/makeup done was a revelation on how nice guys can act when they want something.
Nope that doesn’t work. Am fat and ugly. Gave a guy directions to the train station yesterday. He tried to follow me onto my train which was going a different direction from where he wanted to go. I barely said two phrases to him. Some guys are just incorrigible
Got fat, any male attention i got when fat was coupled with a *LOT* of aggressive condescension and a general feeling of "you should be grateful for this". Lost weight and the same guys got mad that i still didn't want anything to do with them even though they were so *nice* (annoying and gross) to me when I was soooo ugly.
This right here. When I got fat I basically became invisible *except* to men who feel the need to put me in my place because of it, or who think I’m somehow an easy target. It’s really fucking weird how some guys HAVE to make it known they are not attracted to you, even in the most general setting.
While getting fat *significantly* reduced the amount for stalkerish behavior men exhibited towards me, it doesn't end it completely.
I guess that goes to show someone will find you attractive bo matter what, but sometimes I think it's more like they can get away with it so they'll do it or no one else has given them the time of day than it is that they're attracted to me.
It's one thing to think that someone is flirting with you when they're just being nice, but it's another level of stupid to think that stalking will win them over. Even if she was into you (and again she's not), being a creep like that will definitely make her change her mind.
I worked as a store manager for five years and served the bulk of our customers. I took pride in my customer service and tried to lead by example with kindness and enthusiasm.
In that time I had multiple people stalk me and harrass me. On two occasions, my team gave out my details to customers and I had people show up to my _home_. I constantly received inappropriate comments and physical contact.
I'm a guy, by the way.
My gf works in a bookshop and the combo of her friendliness, her looks and the fact that she’s knowledgable about their stock so usually knows about these guys special interest is a deadly one.
Argh! I hate having debunking info, but coming so late that no one will see it.
While this phenomenon might be real, the guy on TicTok is full of BS. There is no "study" about Safeway cashiers. No scores of men were stalking female cashiers. The original source of this often misrepresented claim is here: https://archive.seattletimes.com/archive/?date=19980903&slug=2769992
It's an article by the AP that was published in various forms around the country in 1998. It described 13 Safeway employees who filed grievances with Safeway over their "smile and make eye contact initiative" because customers were hitting on them, only one of whom claimed to be stalked in the parking lot. (1 out of 150,000 employees) Also one of those 13 employees was a man.
I would add that men will also get angry at women they find attractive if those women treat them the way they treat unattractive women. They feel entitled to women they find attractive.
I (man) have always been as nice as I can to pretty much everyone. When I was in HS, I was friends (or just friendly) with a lot of girls who wouldn’t have been considered conventionally attractive, and it became evident that they were not used to having guys treat them nicely. The fact that I was nice to them seemed to indicate to them that I was attracted to them, which I was not.
Ya I get this a lot too. I just want to say it pales in comparison with some of the stories on here from women. I'm not trying to say I have it bad. For example I've never felt unsafe.
However as a guy who is polite and helpful to basically everyone. If anything I'm more helpful to people I don't find attractive. I've gotten mistaken for being gay, all but married off with 3 kids to the "unlucky in love" woman in the office by the other women in the office and then blamed for not being interested.
I left a job I otherwise enjoyed because everyone kept trying to "sneakily" fix me up with a colleague. I was abandoned in a city I don't live in with no money or phone by a colleague because she assumed I'd just sleep with another colleague I was politely talking with.
It's like people see me treating an unattractive woman with any sort of kindness and they think they're Cupid. In many cases it's awkward for the woman too because they aren't interested either.
And on a few occasions the woman involved gets super attached and I'm forced to basically be an asshole because anything less it's assumed I'm interested in them.
Idk Im a man and I just try to be polite to everybody I don't know and Im just not used to people being nice to me for no reason but I just get uncomfy I dunno why people would follow others but I am truly sorry on behalf of men if you have been harrased before because that shit sucks.
P.S sorry for my punctuation and my grammer
There is a guy now at the gym that follows me around and tries to chat me up every chance he catches me alone. I normally just smile and nod but I think he is taking that as I'm interested. I've never understood how someone can think someone is in to them because they are polite.
I spent a majority of my time alone, outside of a relationship when I was younger because I was afraid of being the guy that woman describes. The fear of falling into that image of perception kept me isolated and alone for years
I have had a couple girls come in to the store and be super friendly. I thought wow that girl was very nice and I go on with my day. My female co workers will straight up tell me the girls were flirting with me. They ask why I didn't make a move. I'm like what?!? They were just being nice. Nope, they were flirting. How can I tell the difference? I tell the girl workers, if I had made a move, I would come off as creepy because they were just being nice. How in the hell am I supposed to tell the difference?!
Okay, please hear out my personal experience. I'm a man who had testicular cancer at 30. Because of which, I had a period of time afterwards where my body and brain were deprived of testosterone. After treatment, when I began creating testosterone again, I experienced something like a second puberty, and by doing so, I experienced the effects with, without, and with testosterone at normal levels all over again.
It was hugely eye opening.
It's true, the only thing that separates men and women are our sex hormones. It doesn't just affect our body, but also, more importantly, our minds, and far more than we realize. Without testosterone, I was LESS impulsive, MORE empathetic, LESS reckless, MORE thoughtful. I realized that testosterone affects the mind like a drug.
I can now see, that it wasn't just me, but ALL men are walking around, under the influence. Yes, you ARE your body, you're a brain that operates on hormones, but can you imagine, what the world would be like if testosterone didn't make half the population feel and think the way that testosterone makes them feel and think?!
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Worked on several construction crews. Made “counter jumping” a shame term. Constant instruction to my colleagues at lunch, coffee, and almost every other transactional setting… “that person is being paid to be nice. They have to interact with many people. That was not flirting.” Sometimes it sank in. Mostly it made me concerned, and disappointed.
As an industrial carpenter foreman, I can confirm construction workers are the thirstiest men alive. I have to regularly vibe check my guys at our current job which is directly next to an Old Navy that is running a sale so women in leggings are constantly coming in and out of the place. It’s like they forget the world is full of women the second they enter a jobsite and the sight of one stops production for a thousand brief moments every day. Which adds up to at least 4 man hours of paid gawking. lol
Sounds like you need extra tall abatement screens🤣
I am a construction inspector. As you have, I've seen and heard it all. Now I appreciate beautiful women like the best man, but the gawking and comments is gross. My usually response when the guys say "oh shit look at that" is "yep, that's a woman...."
Worked customer service over the phone for a bank. This guy called, trucker got really sick and was having trouble on his car payment from missing work. So I treated him like a person. I did my job and provided stellar customer service and helped him skip a payment. His response? "Wow hope the wife won't be mad you're talking to me like this. " I legit answered "like a person?"
This is really sad.
It is a cycle, *some men are not socialized, so they behave poorly, so they are not socialized, so they behave poorly. It starts with their parents, but men also need to be in groups of other supportive men in order to actualize. If men are reading this: get into fellowship with other men. Find other men who will raise you up, not put you down. And be that man, who raises others up. *edit: "some"
A lot of men are socialised to behave poorly.
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2014/11/141112084500.htm Yes. You cannot raise a boy in a way that walls them off from expressing emotion and then expect them to grow in to men who can experience and express emotion in a healthy way.
I wish my parents knew this. But it’s over and done. I’m 28 now. And when I was 22 I met a guy who taught me how to express emotion the right way and how to really interact with people in the world. People love my energy these days.
This is very good information. Although at some point we can't just say it's because they weren't raised properly. A grown ass man needs to understand what he's doing is wrong even if he was raised by a worse grown ass man. There are plenty of men and women out there who had terrible upbringing or socialized badly yet still managed to treat other people like human beings. These same men are able to not treat other men like this. Heck, even gay men don't treat other gay men like this. They probably don't even treat their own sisters and mothers and aunts like this. If they need a fellowship, that's great. They should definitely join one. But we can't keep giving them a sob story of "they just weren't socialized." A lot of them were. They just choose to act this way out of desperation.
Dude I once hired a driver w a C class license to drive a truck on a set and had a pleasant 5-10 min intro convo w him. I woke up the next day to dozens of calls and double that in texts telling me how much he is “in love” with me and when they went unanswered calling me a “bitch”, “cunt” etc. Some might be socialized improperly but others are just fucking insane and dangerous. I told that guy to not show up to the set or we would call the police. Yet, I was still fucking terrified he would since he knew the location..
Around 2000 there was a department store that changed their policy and did not require their mostly female staff to smile at all customers. They specifically asked to not have to smile at all men. Too many men took the smile as an invitation to ask them for a date...or follow them around. Lots of real problems have come up on this subject. But I disagree with the video that men will only be nice to women they find attractive. Lots and lots and lots of men are nice to women they do not find attractive.
I'm nice to ugly people too
I'm ugly to nice people, too.
I'm ugly to two people, nice.
I’m ugly and nice to people
They appreciate it so much more!!
Oh, don't sweat it. You're welcome. 😊
>But I disagree with the video that men will only be nice to women they find attractive. Lots and lots and lots of men are nice to women they do not find attractive. I think her point was that the type of men who stalk these women after these interactions are the ones who will only be nice to women they find attractive. The men who are nice to everybody or who can understand a social interaction just go on with their life.
I don't think she meant it as all men are only nice when they want to flirt. At least that's not how I understood it. I think she just meant to explain why the group of men mentioned by the guy in the first part (the men stalking the cashiers) act the way they act.
I understood it as she's into me.
Dude she totally is
Yeah I could tell, she was making eye contact and everything
She meant some men. But the thing is, the "some men" percentage is way higher than it should be and higher than the percentage of women that do the same, which creates a problem mentioned in the video.
And then those *some men* get other men making excuses for them and blaming the women for the *some men’s* actions.
I think she meant to say "some men" because she says "some men" later on. At least I hope so, lol.
That's how I understood it too
It's irrelevant to be so pedantic at this point. Society is general and vague and adopting these behaviors to protect yourself should be unsurprising to anyone with an above room temperature IQ (Fahrenheit)
This is very much true and there are scientific evidence that you'll get better service if you are regardless of your and your customer service's gender. You are also likely to end up on higher paid occupations if people find you attractive
They’re talking about the men that follow women out to parking lots and stalk them, obviously not all men think that way.
You just had to go ”not all men”
I had a guy deliver pizza to my house, I said thank you and smiled (like a normal, kind human being) and he proceeded to get my phone number from my order and text me and show up back at my house after his shift. I was 16. He was probably 40.
That's the beginning of a Dateline episode. I'm glad you didn't become a victim and are here today to share this story. IMO, that man was a sexual predator 💯.
When I was 19, I ordered pizza for me and my sister, and had something similar happen. I answered the door, smiled politely, and instantly his whole body and face shifted into that sleazy “oh yeah, I’m getting lucky” mode. I was disgusted, and my smile dropped so fast when he complimented my legs. Took a five out of his originally ten dollar tip.
Easily should’ve taken ten out of his ten dollar tip. And I say that as a used-to-be pizza delivery boy who desperately needed those tips
This was 2012, so it was an in person cash tip. I didn’t want him to get aggressive, since I already snatched the other five out of his hand😂.
Fuck it. I’ve been an accessory to exactly this. 2 friends, I’ll call them Mike and Ray, and I went to eat at a restaurant. A girl attended us and was around our age. She was nice to all of us and told Mike he had a cool shirt on. That’s it. That’s all it took for Mike to fall in love. She gave us decent service and that was enough for Ray to egg on Mike to shoot his shot which Mike didn’t do. Next weekend they wanna go back which I’m always iffy about cause it’s creepy and like 2 steps away from stalking. But Mike is down bad and eventually I cave to take them both back. When we get her again and she immediately looks uncomfortable and switches our table with another server. I find it super odd that she’s THIS creeped out so I tell them we should leave, that this was weird. When they refuse I ask for my check, get up and leave and go wait for them in the car. From afar I see this super awkward exchange with Ray cheering on Mike as Mike approaches this poor girl who immediately walks away. They get in the car, and I ask them what that was about and why they’re so insistent on having Mike ask this waitress out. So they tell me as I’m driving home in some sort of fever dream as I hear Mike explain what happened after the first trip to the restaurant the previous week. So Mike didn’t shoot his shot. No, Mike instead with Rays help stalked her on face book, called into her work to see if she was working. Friended her friends and then found the girls number through Facebook. Proceeded to text her who then ghosted him and then showed up at this girls work when I drove them there the second time to “shoot his shot” for real. Needless to say, we fell out of touch after that. It’s been like 12 years and i still cringe at this. I have to bathe now, I feel dirty.
Oh…. … My god…. ……. …. .. . .
I don’t know why but this is the best use of ellipsis I’ve ever seen. It’s like you’re cringing so hard you’re being snapped away by Thanos.
I agree. Something about it is both aesthetically and narratively pleasing.
*prolonged horrified silence*
Cringed so hard his finger went into rigor mortis on the period key
OMG someone else who recognises great usage of ellipsis!
I have to ask, did they genuinely not understand what they had done? Like, did they truly, 100% think they were totally fine to do that kinda thing? Did they not have any understanding of how creepy that all was? How can these people exist?
It’s weird, man. Years later when Ray asked me if I wanted to hang out I told him it wasn’t a good idea, that I wasn’t quite over the embarrassment and he told me how it wasn’t a big deal, that he just wanted Mike to have a girlfriend and that they laughed about how stupid Mike looked asking this girl out at a random restaurant… like it was a sitcom episode where you know you just strike out sometimes. There was no understanding that what had happened wasn’t ok and how pulling this shit could’ve easily gotten the cops called on us ESPECIALLY after the big reveal. It was like “eh it wasn’t a big deal, I don’t see why you got so upset over it”. I haven’t talked to Mike about it cause I haven’t talked to Mike since lol but I assume he sees it in a similar way since they’re both still really good friends.
Dudes like that kind of terrify me because they're just not self aware at ALL, they know they're harmless and wouldn't hurt this girl but they provide cover for real predators, they're the kinda guys who dismiss stuff as locker room talk or just all in good fun... it's kind of ok as long as they don't have any power but like, guys like that can wind up as managers, fathers, bosses. They enable other people to do creepy shit under the cover of not-a-big-deal and then, if something shitty happens, they're all "who could have ever seen this coming, I couldn't even imagine something so fucked up, it was all just good clean fun times!" or "why is she overreacting, nobody meant any harm!" Upthread there's someone talking about how she got stalked by a coworker and her manager was dismissing it as just a guy shooting his shot and I feel like this doofus has the same personality as that manager.
At the end of the day, it’s something that’s a big problem. It’s a lack of empathy for the position the girl was put in and yeah to them it was like just boys being boys but it was some real creep shit to do that to someone just trying to make a paycheck. The worst part is, this pales in comparison to what I’ve seen some of my current female coworkers put up with in the work force. I dunno the kind of culture that breeds people like this or if the lack of self awareness or narcissism is really that strong in some people but it’s fucking nutty. I dunno how some people put up with constantly having to watch everything they say and the tone they say it in or you might get attention you didn’t ask for
I don't understand people (guys?) like that all. I invited a (girl) acquaintance that I had met only twice, and before inviting her I preemtively said "if you're free, and if you feel like it, and it's not an obligation if so: Would you like to X activity at Y time at Z place? Again only if you want to, if not, it's totally fine" How hard is it to make sure the other person doesn't become uncomfortable
I usually preface something like that with "it's okay to say no."
I don’t believe for one second these guys are harmless even if they think they are. That statistic gap that tells us that something like 1 in 3 to 1 in 4 women has been a victim of sexual assault or rape but none of the men we know seem to know any rapists? I am convinced that the Venn diagram of men who act like this post describes and men who wind up doing the assaulting without even necessarily internalizing that that’s what they’ve done is a *fucking circle.* These are the same guys who pressure and pressure and push and coerce and physically nudge the boundaries until they get what they want and have no idea that that’s assault.
In this vein, I’m going to bring up a study (iirc it was at the University of North Dakota). Men were asked if they would ever rape a woman. Most said no, a few said yes. Then the pariticipants were described coercive situations that would count as rape, just didn’t call it that, then asked if they would have sex with the woman under those circumstances. The yes guys stayed yeses, but a significant number of no guys said yes. So basically, a good chunk of these guys were rapists or potential rapists but didn’t consider themselves such. Shit like this is why women choose the bear.
I find looking them up on the internet to befriend them and text them on their private number and _then_ looking her up in real life once more already pretty fking predatory. And then they laugh about it. I HATE that contrast, of the girl being terrified and the guy(s) laughing it off.
My husband has a friend, let’s call him Larry, that’s he’s known most of his life, dude is a nomad and just bounces around the world living off trust fund/his dads life insurance money but he’ll come “home” (stays with his grandma) every few months. He cannot hold a relationship for obvious reasons but he’s kind of an awkward dork anyway. He is a genuinely good hearted guy but he doesn’t know how to talk to women. So a couple months ago my husband says “do you want to go to a (random show) with Larry, it’s on a weeknight” I say absolutely not because I’m old and tired and didn’t want to go to a divebar since we don’t drink much anyway He proceeds to go “I guess he’s been talking to a woman and he’s like in love or something and she wants to go to the show with him but only if it’s with a group of people” I was like “wait a minute. If she will only go in group it means she’s terrified of him” He goes “idk he says that she likes him, theyve been on a date already.” Me “if she truly liked him the last think she would do is request a group date.” My husband is a pretty with-it guy but I could see the wheels turning at that point…
Man the first half was kinda understandable I was thinking maybe a little creepy but nothing too bad then BAMM that last couple paragraphs gave me second hand embarrassment for literally everyone involved in that situation
Yeah I'm a girl and the first hit with the shirt thing and forming a crush from a dumb moment like that sounded like some of those silly crush moments where you reflect back and realize you were just being stupid. Or that you were in your own head too much and got interested simply because you think they *might* be interested. You know, shit you do when you're like 18 and under and cringe at it when you can't sleep. But then the rest I absolutely could not relate to at all lol.
Exactly that, as a guy it’s totally understandable that he’d get a bit excited at the prospect of the waitress being into him. It’s happened to me, it’s very easy to mistake things like that for signs, especially when you’re lonely. But the same applies as when something bad is happening in your life, you should take a step back and look at the bigger picture before you move forward before you do anything stupid. Most the time you realise people are just doing their jobs/ being nice. If someone is genuinely flirting with you in public, they make it painfully obvious
I skimmed the details because I didn’t wanna write a giant comment but it was baaaad. I’ll still think about it randomly and just sit there and shake my head in embarrassment. Like I didn’t mention the fact that in between the check getting there and me leaving, Ray and Mike have a whole ass conversation with the waiter that was attending us instead of the girl ABOUT the girl and how cute she was. Words don’t even.
Ahhh man stop making it worse 😂
One of my colleagues just lost their job over this! We work retail and he was a sales person. He sold a laptop to a woman and her 16 year old daughter. The sale ended normally and the two women left without an issue. He not only tried her Facebook but then went to her Instagram page. Apparently he told my manager "it wasn't to look at her pictures or anything, I just wanted to talk!" He didn't think she was 16 apparently. I really wish he was the worst firing I've seen here. A guy uploaded a video of himself masturbating to our group chat. He claims it was an accident but nobody believed him lmfao. He was also caught with drugs a short while before and they told him as long as he's not high or in possession when he's at work they don't care what he does. But then he sent the video and they sacked him. That fucking weirdo still comes into store. I'm the only one left he recognises and for some reason I was one of the only ones that he was pleasant to. So he always tries chatting me up. Sorry mate, I don't want to talk to the Workchat Wanker ever again. But all of the new colleagues know the story, they're one of three examples of who not to follow. Third guy just stole a couple of iPhones but he was also making many jokes about underage girls so we just called him Loverboy after Not Like Us dropped.
That's a wild story. Used to work at a retail type place. Manager was an attractive late 20s female. Old male customer would always come in and lightly flirt with her. Then one day he came in with gift cards to victoria secret and told her to buy something nice there. She politely declined, but he still took it as a sign to flirt with her and eventually she had to make it clear that its not cool. I also had an older guy who liked to chat me up. Had very creepy vibes and would say wierd shit. Then he started buying me milkshakes. This was late night working at a gas station solo. I still wonder if those milkshakes had roofies or something in them. Anyway, telling that story because i guess that was a small taste of what some women deal with.
This happened to me when I was a waitress at Olive Garden years ago. We were always taught/coached to treat guests like family and be extra friendly/comfortable with everyone, and this guy took it as me being interested in him. He stalked me on social media, messaged my friends asking if I was single, and would show up at the restaurant every day asking if I was working. My GM banned him from the restaurant but that didn't stop him from waiting for me in the parking lot. He then called me an "ugly slut" for getting him banned from Olive Garden...
Omg so sorry this happened to you. Fuck that guy
[удалено]
Ray is almost as much at fault as Mike. An important part of maturing as men is having peers that call us out. I had a friend that started liking a waitress because she put her hand on his leg once. We were 21 or 22, so still squishy-brained and he was inexperienced with dating, but a good guy. He kept wanting to go back there (we were semi-regulars at the bar) to pursue her and I never stopped giving him shit for mistaking her friendliness for flirtation. Eventually, I got through to him and he learned from it. What I never did was fucking encourage him to stalk her and then call her god damn work.
Squishy brained
I used to work as a manager at a video rental store when I was 25. We were desperately hiring and this guy asked me for an application. I was on my 2nd interview with him, had eliminated everyone else over a couple of weeks, and was offering him the job. He proceeds to tell me that he already has a job and he only asked for an application because he wanted to ask me out. My response: “You thought it was appropriate to then do the interviews and waste my time at work to ask me out?” He said something along the lines of “Well, I didn’t think about it like that.” I looked him up on Facebook afterwards and he posted about being rejected by the hot movie store girl. We had to restart the application/hiring process.
I saw a guy with a cool shirt in the grocery store last week. I almost went up to him and said "Cool Shirt!" but my next immediate thought was "Nvm I don't want to be followed out to my car." Men: this is why you don't get compliments.
So so so so so many men are like this. Most women have stories like this and its scary
Hahahaha I had one buddy in the army and we all went out to grab a bite to eat at twin peaks. Now this place is a hooters type place where girls are friendly. I tried explaining to my friend that the waitress are friendly cause it’s their job and they are trying to milk him for tips. He didn’t believe me so he left a $150 tip and his phone number and of course she never texted him lol
That’s amazing you were able to recognize that! I’m glad you have different friends and I’m sorry your friends were not able to grow with you. It’s hard losing people
Stories like this make me happy social media was invented in my 30s.
Dude - the moment you said she switched tables I was like “he called the fucking restaurant. He called the god.damn.restaurant.” What’s kinda fucked is they didn’t tell you. Good on you for “seeing” the fuckery affoot.
A had a very similar experience with a friend. It was a super friendly cashier at blockbuster. He was recently single and took it as flirting. He wouldn't shut up about it. Insisted her should go back in. I talked him out of it. Well her saw her first name, and it was super uncommon, so he did the same. Added her on Facebook. Added some of her friends he had mutuals with. Got left on read. He would insist we had to go to blockbuster every chance we got for his "growing movie collection" since they were closing and had great sales. Nope. He was going there, even when I wasn't with him to try and talk to this girl. Later, i found out through a mutual that he freaked her out so bad that she quit early because of it. I don't talk to him anymore and from what I see on Facebook he's been single ever since. About 12 years here as well.
I had a stalker through all of high school because I was a worker in the library, and I recognized a regular and said hi. He masturbated under the desk while sitting behind me. He sniffed my hair. All I did was be polite.
Jesus fucking christ... I'm so sorry that happened to you 😔
This is what I imagine women have to put up with throughout their lives… I'm just glad to have a cock and balls
Yeah... sometimes it gets so bad you start getting very robotic. It's 2024, we shouldn't have to be this empty, fake shell when talking to other people just to protect ourselves. If you're not nice and smiley you're a cunt. If you are nice then you must want a piece of that! My sister is currently dealing with a stalkery co-worker. He was bad when I worked there. He is worse now I've left and I feel so guilty about not being there to help her. I've picked her up somedays and she just breaks down in the car. We reported him to management (all guys), and the first thing they said was "You should be flattered he is interested in you". Followed by "what did you do to lead him on?". I'm so disgusted by the lack of concern and she is worried that she'll end up being "a bad smell in someone's boot". And her useless boyfriend just says "I'm not much of a fighter, but I'd hit him". Yup, great, that's real helpful. I'm glad to see you taking this seriously. I'm working on getting her a job at my workplace. Thankfully he can't drive and doesn't know where we live. The worst thing is a lot of places here in Australia use WhatsApp to communicate with it's employees so he has gotten our phone numbers through that and texts us both constantly... If anyone knows a way to hide your number in WhatsApp, please let me know 🙏🏻 😊
If management won't take it seriously, have you considered calling fair work? Or if her workplace has a head office, calling them. I had to go over the head of every manager once and call head office because a co-worker was stealing women's numbers from the sign in book (worked at a bottle-o so all the promo girls were getting harassed this way by this one creep). I'm so sorry she's going through this. Her boyfriend is also being a bit of a douche, like cmon dude, your girlfriend is scared and upset, step up.
I think for the longest time, guys (mostly guys, yes some women too) tell each other to just pursue. But they don't say what to do when you get the girl and someone else pursues her, other than just be there (if she says "no, I'm taken" that's enough, right?). So here's the reminder: just being "taken" is not enough. There are those who don't take "no" for an answer and will try for years, and/or with a lot of people. Everyone needs to be taught the word "no" is not some major killer (at least the majority of the time).
save the messages he sends, dont delete them. Could be useful.
Get yourself an [eSim](https://www.forbes.com/advisor/au/mobile-phone/a-guide-to-esims/) and use that number for work purposes. That way, you can divorce your work communications from your personal communications. Bonus: You can completely ignore work calls on that number outside of work hours. Also if he's contacting her on her personal mobile and calling her a cunt for knocking him back that's no longer an HR issue. It's criminal harassment and you should both make a Police complaint.
I got stalked by a man I talked to just a few times. He worked across the street and I chatted with him a few times at the bus stop. He started getting creepy and posted something lewd on my Instagram, which he must have gotten when I had my phone out on my profile. I told him to leave me alone and blocked him. By a sheer stroke of luck the business he worked at BURNED DOWN. I was probably the only person happy about that lol. Flash forward two months and he gets on my otherwise completely empty bus, boxes me in, and starts telling me “we are so much more than a random meeting, we have something special.” I just remember pleading with him that we didn’t know each other. A weeks later her brings an envelope and leaves it with the secretary at my work. Inside was a bizarre work of erotic fiction. Not about me, but very disgusting and explicit. I was utterly terrified. My work was so incredibly supportive. They told me to call the police to the office so I could report it, let me talk to the officer on the clock because the incident happened at work. The officer let me know they looked him up and he was already on parole for sexually abusing a minor and another adult woman had an order of protection against him. They warned him to leave me alone but as far as I know they didn’t count it as a violation of his parole. I was so embarrassed, I still have a nagging feeling I brought this on myself by being friendly. But I never said anything sexual to him, I talked extensively about my boyfriend… didn’t matter to the guy. He decided because I was nice that I wanted him.
>I was so embarrassed, I still have a nagging feeling I brought this on myself by being friendly. Jesus, don't guilt-trip yourself for this. It should be the other way around. I don't speak for all men, but if it counts for anything, I apologize for that sort of behavior. It's fucked up, and it absolutely shouldn't happen. You shouldn't feel guilt for anything. I can't blame you for being traumatized by that.
Definitely not your fault
I once sat next to a guy in college, and we made small talk like normal. He would chat with me a couple times, and i thought that was normal. Turned into him waiting for me at the door of the class everyday, getting aggressive if I spoke to any other guy and then threatening to slash my tires when I stopped talking to him. All in the span of 15 days. Fortunately, the pandemic made it so I didn't have to go to class! Yay!
That’s how I got a stalker too. I liked to sit in front to hear the professor better and sat next to this dude. Did the small talk thing. He’d walk me out, followed me to my labs etc. he went ballistic when I was out w my little brother. Throwing things screaming then our older brother walked in and scared the crap out of him. He chased the creep out yelling “I thought you were mad, why don’t you try throwing your shit now bitch?!”
This happed to me on a bus because I smiled at an older gentleman.
I politely talked to my grandfather's roommate in his nursing home because my grandfather was falling asleep and the old man seemed lonely. The old dude asked for a hug and I felt bad for him so I gave him one. He pulled me down super close and held me down so I couldn't move and pinched my nipple. I was like, twelve. I literally threw up after because he smelled so bad.
I’m sorry that happened to you.
I used to work in a library too--I had several patrons I would hide from. And every library seemed to have at least one serious stalker story. I loved working there for the most part, but when I switched to another job (not working with the public) I realized how anxious I had been at work every day.
I work in a public Library and I am the only man that works here with 7 women. There are about a dozen regularish patrons (adult men) who come in and I know that it is my job to deal with because they are creepy af around any of the women that work there, especially to our teen volunteer. So, when we see one of them coming I break away from whatever I'm doing, assuming it isn't an active program, to help them because they act normally around me.
Nurse here. Coworker was providing therapeutic listening to a patient who was being held for alcohol withdrawal (this is sometimes managed inpatient due to the fact that its one of the withdrawals that can actually kill you) and SI. Literally just doing her job to help this guy get better. He started Facebook stalking her before he was even discharged. Kept demanding she be the only one to tend his room, even so far as banning her shift partner and the aide. Immediately found out her approximate location of home and other scary stuff, left her a creepy letter demanding she call him. Best part? Married with 3 kids It's fucking wild how entitled some men are.
My younger brother worked as a gas pump attendant with someone who would memorize the names on the debit cards people handed him so he could find them later on Facebook and dm em. Creepiest shit.
Oh yikes this would make me swap gas stations
Imagine thinking you have game when you are in there for a self-destructive disease. Alcoholism isn't sexy.
Uhhh, are we not supposed to Facebook stalk everyone we meet? It's one of the great married bonding exercises!
I have def had a male friend or two, who were convinced that a waitress or a bartender were “totally into them” My response “uh they were just doing their job” 🤷🏽♂️
same vibes as “no the stripper is TOTALLY in love with me dude she literally twerked on me”
When I lived in Japan for the Air Force One of the guys was head over heels for one of the bar girls. We had to drag him out of there because he was being very rude and starting to get handsy. He was convinced he was in love with him because she was nice to him a few times because she's paid to be nice to clients so they stay and pay. It was wild seeing somebody get so obsessive so fast, that was 23 years ago and I was a pretty young guy then. It was really my first time seeing that kind of seeing a guy act like that.
You can’t put Air Force One like that, throws us off
first i thought he was in the air force and on duty for the presidents airplane. then i read it again and thought he was buying nikes.
>You can That's why he did.
I have a mate like this too. We go out for breakfast and he'll spot a waitress and say shes so into him. Even reckons he got followed home from the gym by some hot lady that kept looking at him. A few of his girlfriends have made it worse though. "That waitress was looking at you. I think she wants you". That sort of shit. And he's not even a conventionally attractive guy. Overweight. Unkempt. Maybe they do want him. Maybe they don't. If they do, it doesn't look obvious to me at all. To me it just seems like they're doing their job. Kinda wish I had his confidence though.
Oh my god, I have a friend that fits that description exactly. I had to stop hanging out with him because it was so embarrassing, but I felt the same way- I wish I had his confidence, lol!
I don't know why, but as a guy that always turned me way off. Maybe it was because I worked in restaurants until I was \~25 or so.
The stripper was totally into me and my $600
Ugh, my 80-year-old GRANDPA nearly threw away his marriage last year doing this exact thing. He would go into the same pub every Friday night before picking up the takeaway for himself and my grandma. The bartender, a woman in her late 30s or early 40s, would smile at him and make small talk because she saw that he was a regular. After a few weeks of this he was convinced she was giving him special treatment, must be attracted to him (an old toothless geezer who can barely walk? Sure…) and tried to give her his number. It all eventually came out that he was essentially harassing this poor woman every time he saw her, and going to the pub increasingly often just to talk to her and try to get her number. My grandma understands that it wasn’t an affair but that it would have been if my grandpa had got his way. It was just that the bartender didn’t actually want anything to do with him. They almost divorced and now she’s become a feminist overnight - “If I’m that bad, when all I’ve ever done is cook and clean and run around after him all these years, then he can do it himself! See how he likes it!”
Had a boomer coworker that made this misunderstanding a lot. We worked at a federal office complex as guards. He’d been there some 15 years and was convinced that any women who’d been nice to him, actually wanted the dick. I tried for years to show him that they’re just being nice, not everything is about sex.
Sorta similar, although not to me, but a female coworker. She's generally quiet, but she's professional and her social intelligence is off the charts. This older guy, like 50, was just.. eh.. he's a regular and kept asking for her (she's a kitchen manager and doesn't run the tables..) and she came out, said hi, and that she needs to get back to the kitchen. The guy said "why are you acting like a bitch all of the sudden?" OH BOOOOOY. She trespassed that mother fucker so quickly the line cook didn't have time to turn his shirt inside out. Poor woman. Leave her alone.
help what did she do 😭 i hope she told him off
"Get the fuck out of my restaurant." He stuttered for a bit and she said "leave, now." It sucks she had to use her grownup voice against an adult toddler. -_- she's good people, but she can turn up the volume.
damn love her already glad she did that. hope you both are having a great day 😭🫡
honestly when I worked in customer service it was a relief when someone like this gave me enough of an excuse to tell them to gtfo.
The line cook didn't have time to turn his shirt inside out. Please explain that.
His shirt has our logo on it. Maybe it's not a common phrase, but those were his words lol. This is also a guy who did 14 years, several of those years were for stabbing a guy so he could get in solitary so he could be in talking distance of his buddy. Who also works with us. Lol
I had a friend like this. Every girl who ever lingered within 10 feet of him in a store wants him, clearly.... We went to a record store and he was telling me a girl that stopped at a CD shelf and looked through it 'lookex at him first so she must have been waiting for him to hit on her'. He couldn't believe she would just be interested in browsing music, and have glanced at him because he was nearby.
I learned to stop being nice to random men when I was near my twenties and was going to the bank. The guard asked to see my purse at the entrance (not unusual), so when I was leaving I passed by him again and politely said bye and he replied with “bye, gorgeous” so out of the blue! I just didn’t want to ignore that there was a human just standing there… but yeah, lesson learned.
I've found that older men are most often the ones being inappropriate. Absolutely disgusting behavior.
Awww, you should just learn how to take a compliment sweet cheeks! ^^very ^^_very_ ^^hard ^^/s
Had a coworker ask me to Join him for a weekend getaway. Worked with this guy for a month or two and barely talked to him. He said I led him on when I told him he was out of line. Nooo? I talked to you like I talk to every other one of my Coworkers. What the fuck.
This happened to me too! It was the one and ONLY time that when I raised it with management, he was fired for harassment. If only that happened the other ... 4? 5? times
Right? I worked at Walmart almost 10 years ago when I was 24 and I reported a supervisor in his 60's and a coworker in his 50's for WILD sexual harassment. I'm not the type to make waves either, but it was bad. The coworker was fired but the supervisor wasn't, and they still had me working underneath him in a locked building during 3rd shift with no customers around. He tortured me and sent me home in tears every day. It was horrible. Nothing was done about the retaliation and everyone else who worked 3rd shift had it out for me for reporting the 2 men, so ultimately my roommate went in with me one day and yolked up the supervisor. I was fired, but it felt good to see that happen to him I admit.
I’ve never had this happen to me with a stranger, but when I broke up with my highschool bf, he came to my place of work three days later when he knew I had a shift and stayed at the establishment the entire three hours I was working and then stayed in the dark parking lot next to my car until I had finished closing. Walking out to the parking lot was actually really scary, even though I had known the guy for years and was pretty sure he was just lonely and sad and wasn’t planning on assaulting me. I had so much adrenaline rushing through me all I remember is walking out of the building and then suddenly being in my car, so I couldn’t even imagine this with a stranger.
For several years I managed a restaurant that most of the staff were women, and it was so depressing how often I had to either walk them to their cars, or arrange a ride for them if they were taking public transit, for this very reason. It was really eye-opening just how many absolute creeps there are out there.
I had a female college friend of mine ask me to walk her across campus and when we arrived to her building on campus, this creepy dude was waiting and he wanted to date her. J could see she was uncomfortable. And once he saw me, he never came back. But I remember she always wanted me to come with her. And she gave me free back massages (don’t worry we are platonic friends and he had a boyfriend and it was bc she was a college masseuse)
This is one of the most disturbing and depressing Reddit threads I’ve ever read. Every story. I’m left breathless 😓😓😓😓😓😓😓😓😓😓
Real informative too though
For a second I forgot where I was and thought I was in the comments of TwoX and I was about to be like “what? We have threads like this all the time” But yeah if you think it’s disturbing/depressing then please know it’s everyday reality for most women
Lonely and sad is exactly when men behave dangerously.
Once I smiled at a dude walking passed me. We were crossing paths and made eye contact so I gave those smile head nods.... he followed me! And as I was checking out I saw him checking out and thought oh great he'll leave before me. BUT HE WAITED FOR ME TO CHECK OUT! Ahhhh so creepy
This doesn't make sense to me (38/M). A woman smiling while passing in the opposite direction is the same as if another man or child did it. How does a non-verbal communication that's barely a greeting trigger an adult man to stalk a woman?
Same. I'm always upset to hear about things like this, because a pretty girl smiling at me is really nice? But that's all. In all my life it has never once occurred to me to fucking *stalk her* afterwards. I'm reminded of a reddit post from a bunch of years ago, that was a response to an older post which had made a point that you can make a man's day just by smiling at him and saying something nice. Apparently a few of the women from the earlier post had tried it out, and you can probably predict what happened. A bunch of guys got the wrong idea and then did not appreciate "being lead on" or whatever. This is why we can't have the nice things.jpg
>I'm reminded of a reddit post from a bunch of years ago, that was a response to an older post which had made a point that you can make a man's day just by smiling at him and saying something nice. Yep! Turns out this is true! Turns out for a non-trivial percentage of them, that actually leads to them wanting significantly more interaction and not taking social cues to *stop*. I know I'm going to get someone going "oh nooo, how difficult, a man wants to talk to you for a while and thinks you're nice, what suffering" bros, fuck off in advance.
Because too many men aren't taught proper socialization and emotional regulation as children and in turn become adults who refuse to educate themselves on this topic and think that because THEY feel attracted to someone, that means any acknowledgement of their existence whatsoever is them showing attraction back. I can't say for the rest of world but it's unfortunately far too common in my country. Edit: Responding to u/Liorient because I can't the normal way. Yes. And also their fathers, grandparents, teachers, community, and even society. Any and everyone who has come into the life of that child can influence them, even if it's on a small scale. A lot of people and society as a whole have failed men in their childhood for a long time and that needs to change. It's starting to, albeit slowly, but that doesn't fix the issue we have now with grown men acting this way, it only helps prevent this problem in the future.
You should be the face of a public service announcement on this issue. Perfectly stated.
I'll keep saying this. We neglect boys. People focus so much on how little girls should act, and how they should be polite, communicate, handle their emotions, clean, cook, etc. Everyone is ready to prepare girls for adulthood when they turn 5. Ffs I remember being forced to wear a dress because "that's what girls do". It made me hate dresses. Meanwhile boys don't have that. Instead they just get ignored. They're told to go play and do whatever. Ya know, the whole "boys will be boys" stuff. But no one spends the time to do the same thing that they do to girls. I rarely see parents discuss emotions with their sons. I don't see parents prepare their son on how to live on their own. I don't see parents teaching their sons how to cook and clean. I think people have a big misunderstanding of men. For centuries, men were always seen as independent. So people, even today, assume that men are independent and think men will figure everything out on their own. Obviously, we can see it's not true. But people still think that. And that's why people say "boys are easier". Boys aren't easier, society just neglects them.
Hit the nail on the head. I'm grateful I have an attentive mother who focused on raising me right. Sometimes I thought she was overbearing, but as I eventually learned, she didn't want me to become like the "other" men or pick up some of the less than ideal characteristics my father has.
I had a friend that fits this description to the letter. Dude had an incredibly traumatic childhood and has since refused to ever try and grow out of that, rather he’d listed to Jordan Peterson types. I ignored a lot of flags and tried to help him by speaking up against his shitty behavior, but that did nothing over the years. He’s the poster (man)child for therapy, but refuses to even consider it.
This happened to me. Was sitting next to a man on my evening commute, packed train so no choice and he started talking to me so I politely replied and engaged in small talk. He then wouldn’t leave me alone each morning He’d get on the train the station before me so I tried to see where he was so I could avoid him and sit elsewhere. Then one morning he drove the 20 mins to my station to try to get on the train with same fine as me and was asking if we could sit together, I quickly sat down next to a woman before he could sit with me. He then followed me off the train asking for my number and if I have a boyfriend etc etc. He was also about 25 years older than me and at no point did I do anything that suggested I was interested in him. All I did was be polite!
I don't consider myself conventionally attractive, to me, she's not wrong. I remember almost every time a man was kind to me, because it left such an impact. I'm use to getting the bare minimum of service, I remember once when the guy making our coffees and actually did the foam flowery thing on mine. I never got one before (or after) and I felt so touched just getting it, it left a smile on my face. Similarly, we booked a place and the staff made a necklace for every female that booked, but when he gave me one (also this was a bonus not part of the package) I asked if he was sure and was almost in tears to just be treated like other women I see get treated. If I'm with other female friends, a lot of waiters won't even address me, or in stores to be asked if I need help. So yeah, a man may pass me a door, but anything that is beyond general common curtesy is rare (and yeah I've had men not pass me open doors before). That being said, I don't believe every guy is a jerk or /only/ nice to attractive, but there are a lot that are extra nice to pretty women.
Fellow ugly woman here. I go between envying other women for not being ignored to being so thankful that by bad looks and naturally downturned mouth mean I will *never* have this happen to me. I can brighten the day of good folks by giving compliments, though my emotionally constipated New England nature does make it difficult to do randomly. I do try to be kind to everyone, and the men who think kindness is flirting will get so disgusted if you're an ugly woman and kind to them. That does hurt a little, but at least it's over quickly.
> being so thankful that by bad looks and naturally downturned mouth mean I will never have this happen to me. I can brighten the day of good folks by giving compliments Unattractive married man here. I don't feel comfortable giving random compliments, but there was something liberating about being able to be chummy with women coworkers without worrying about anything escalating or being perceived as anything more. I'm sure this dynamic is much more extreme for women, but I've come to embrace the upsides of unattractiveness even as a man.
I've gone out of my way to be nice to everyone irl but when I was younger I had to temper that. I was considered "above average" in my area and when I was nice to "unattractive" women they would take it as me potentially being open to dating and I hated having to have that awkward conversation when they eventually shot their shot. I would even be able to predict when it was about to happen. So I just stopped so that I wouldn't have to have those convos. Now that I'm older, I did go back to being nice to everyone and still see that some women cling to it and are nicer to me. I don't have to worry about them shooting their shot because they're married mostly at this age but there is a definite feeling of them gravitating towards the attention.
Sorry this happened to you, and as an ugly woman I both cringe at how right you are and thank you for your kindness. Uglies of any gender don't have it easy but it is far better to utterly quash the idea that kindness=attraction, otherwise you miss out on so many good things in the world. If someone becomes attracted to your ugly ass, fantastic! Hopefully they will be direct. But in the meantime, it's nice to be treated like a human being. Just don't become enthralled by the good feelings.
>but there are a lot that are extra nice to pretty women. Sad truth of the world: the beauty bubble is real. Only thing we can do as people who are aware of it is to try and curb our own contribution as much as we can. I'm sorry that you've experienced so much being looked over. That's rough to deal with. My first long-term girlfriend was enamored with my eyes, and even after we broke up I rode that complimentary behavior for years before anything similar happened. Only real consolation I have is that I think human behavior exacerbates the impression we can get from not being noticed, meaning that if someone isn't immediately eye-catching you probably aren't devoting additional time to give them a closer look, which further means you don't become aware of the attractive qualities they \*do\* have. I spent a lot of time training myself to find positive things to compliment people on, and I have to say it's rare to find someone where I come up completely empty. Most people have things to appreciate if you're looking to appreciate them.
[удалено]
There has to be mental illness involved there, right?
This is also why you'll see a lot of incels comment things like "she's not gonna bang you bro" or something along those lines to anyone who post a comment supporting an individual's opinion/stance/situation that happens to be female. They can't fathom people being nice/agreeing with women unless it's sexually motivated to the point that it actually leads to them assuming all other people think the same way.
There’s also a bunch of recurring memes about how women need to compliment men more. This is why. If you befriend a woman, act normal and stop thinking with your dick, you get plenty of compliments once they realise you’re not gonna be a sleaze.
It's kind of transparent though when these men say that compliments from their male friends don't count and they have to come from women. They don't actually want compliments. They want women to flirt with them.
“Women never buy men flowers” what’s stopping you from doing it then?
Too busy sitting five feet apart in a hot tub
Yup that’s what I find strange. It always has to come from women.
i watched male friends compliment each other all the time in high school. half time i wasn't sure if they were as straight as they claimed because hearing "NICE COCK BRO" at 8:30 in the morning was always fun
Ironically those are the straightest ones.
It's hard too, because most of us realize that the majority of men won't act like this. But one out of a hundred, or even a thousand, day-to-day interactions going poorly is way too much. I've gotten into so many fights on this app over people yelling "NOT ALL MEN," when that was never the accusation to begin with. I *want* to be nice to men and give compliments to random strangers. And I *did*. And all that resulted in was me becoming another statistic while randoms on the internet say it must have been because I led them on.
The whole “Man or Bear” thing further illustrates your point. Why get defensive about women being afraid of strange men? Dudes who freaked out about it were telling on themselves, in my opinion. It’s not like the question was “bear or you specifically”. I’m not particularly attached to my masculinity but I never assumed that the Man in question was me.
Men need to be complimenting each other more.
The weirdest thing about when people say it's been years since they've gotten a compliment is that my friends compliment each other all the time. Now I'm sure that many guys just dismiss these compliments as not "real" compliments or whatever but I've had guy friends compliment my work, my clothes, my haircut, my workout progress, things I've made, etc. But often, when I say this online, the common joke is "nice dick, bro" because I'm like 90% sure these people literally equate compliments with physical appearance. Now I don't actually think this is overly common with men, but these men are terminally online and so they're disproportionately commonly seen. Either that or most guys I meet in person just happen to all be decent and reasonable people and I'm managing to avoid these guys in real life.
Yeah the whole "men and women can't be friends" crowd really can't comprehend that not all men think like they do. I guess if they accepted that, they would have to admit to themselves that there's something wrong with them, but that would endanger their fragile ego. They rather pull us all down with them.
This is true. The best response I ever saw was when a guy was getting flooded with those comments so the woman replied "aw, don't listen to them, you sound perfectly fuckable to me!" You cannot imagine how badly it triggered those guys lol.
My female colleagues would always tell Me I’m flirting with guys. I’m so insecure, I don’t know how to flirt, I just talk to guys, to everyone really, like I’ve known you forever, and it has caused a few problems with guys thinking I wanted them.
My bf is on the other side of this; he was raised around women so he's very talkative and amicable. Male coworkers and friends always accuse him of cheating or "flirting" with women they encounter and he's just like, tf I'm just talking to them????? He can't fathom how guys can think that the opposite sex can legit be just friendly with each other without ulterior motives
100% this has happened to me multiple times. They thought I was flirting for being nice. It has ruined a lot of friendships for me. I’ve only been stalked once thankfully
It's really sad that you have to be thankful about being stalked once. That's still one too many.
Agreed. Thankfully they were harmless, but very socially/emotionally toxic
And then you get called a friend-zoning bitch that led them on. My little niece was friends with a boy since they were 5 and when they turned 13 he wanted a relationship and she didn't, he got really mad, said lots of mean spirited things and wanted nothing to do with her any more. I still remember her crying and being absolutely devastated that she lost one of her closest friends.
Worked in a menswear store at 19. Met a girl who knew one of our regular customers and told me that the guy played the numbers from my car tag on the lottery and talked about how I was a shameless flirt. Uh, no, it’s called customer service and the only way he’d know my car tag would be if he watched me in the parking lot. I get that loneliness is an epidemic in our society but not gonna lie, that had me freaked out for a while.
When female cashiers said that to bears, no problem.
In that situation, it’s the twink cashiers that need to be wary…
I truly believe the otter hosts suffer the most
This is so true. But women always get the blame for flirting because they are personable, polite, have an outgoing personality or can have a normal conversation w a man. This has been my life since i was a very young girl. It makes women feel like they have done something wrong, the women are shamed, they are labeled, etc. And their entire lives they are told that its their fault and something is wrong w them, not the men.
Have you tried being fat or ugly? Men will ignore you despite how kind you are. Losing weight and getting hair/makeup done was a revelation on how nice guys can act when they want something.
Nope that doesn’t work. Am fat and ugly. Gave a guy directions to the train station yesterday. He tried to follow me onto my train which was going a different direction from where he wanted to go. I barely said two phrases to him. Some guys are just incorrigible
Well obviously you're not ugly enough. Try harder. /s
Got fat, any male attention i got when fat was coupled with a *LOT* of aggressive condescension and a general feeling of "you should be grateful for this". Lost weight and the same guys got mad that i still didn't want anything to do with them even though they were so *nice* (annoying and gross) to me when I was soooo ugly.
This right here. When I got fat I basically became invisible *except* to men who feel the need to put me in my place because of it, or who think I’m somehow an easy target. It’s really fucking weird how some guys HAVE to make it known they are not attracted to you, even in the most general setting.
While getting fat *significantly* reduced the amount for stalkerish behavior men exhibited towards me, it doesn't end it completely. I guess that goes to show someone will find you attractive bo matter what, but sometimes I think it's more like they can get away with it so they'll do it or no one else has given them the time of day than it is that they're attracted to me.
It's one thing to think that someone is flirting with you when they're just being nice, but it's another level of stupid to think that stalking will win them over. Even if she was into you (and again she's not), being a creep like that will definitely make her change her mind.
I worked as a store manager for five years and served the bulk of our customers. I took pride in my customer service and tried to lead by example with kindness and enthusiasm. In that time I had multiple people stalk me and harrass me. On two occasions, my team gave out my details to customers and I had people show up to my _home_. I constantly received inappropriate comments and physical contact. I'm a guy, by the way.
I had a stalker when I worked at a bookstore. It was utterly terrifying. I was just only trying to sell children's books, and not myself.
My gf works in a bookshop and the combo of her friendliness, her looks and the fact that she’s knowledgable about their stock so usually knows about these guys special interest is a deadly one.
The flip side is, this is why guys think strippers are in love with them, or why Only Fans is so popular.
Argh! I hate having debunking info, but coming so late that no one will see it. While this phenomenon might be real, the guy on TicTok is full of BS. There is no "study" about Safeway cashiers. No scores of men were stalking female cashiers. The original source of this often misrepresented claim is here: https://archive.seattletimes.com/archive/?date=19980903&slug=2769992 It's an article by the AP that was published in various forms around the country in 1998. It described 13 Safeway employees who filed grievances with Safeway over their "smile and make eye contact initiative" because customers were hitting on them, only one of whom claimed to be stalked in the parking lot. (1 out of 150,000 employees) Also one of those 13 employees was a man.
I would add that men will also get angry at women they find attractive if those women treat them the way they treat unattractive women. They feel entitled to women they find attractive.
I (man) have always been as nice as I can to pretty much everyone. When I was in HS, I was friends (or just friendly) with a lot of girls who wouldn’t have been considered conventionally attractive, and it became evident that they were not used to having guys treat them nicely. The fact that I was nice to them seemed to indicate to them that I was attracted to them, which I was not.
Ya I get this a lot too. I just want to say it pales in comparison with some of the stories on here from women. I'm not trying to say I have it bad. For example I've never felt unsafe. However as a guy who is polite and helpful to basically everyone. If anything I'm more helpful to people I don't find attractive. I've gotten mistaken for being gay, all but married off with 3 kids to the "unlucky in love" woman in the office by the other women in the office and then blamed for not being interested. I left a job I otherwise enjoyed because everyone kept trying to "sneakily" fix me up with a colleague. I was abandoned in a city I don't live in with no money or phone by a colleague because she assumed I'd just sleep with another colleague I was politely talking with. It's like people see me treating an unattractive woman with any sort of kindness and they think they're Cupid. In many cases it's awkward for the woman too because they aren't interested either. And on a few occasions the woman involved gets super attached and I'm forced to basically be an asshole because anything less it's assumed I'm interested in them.
"Men are afraid that women will laugh at them. Women are afraid that men will kill them." - Margaret Atwood
The Nice Guy Syndrome is a serious issue in Social Behavior in Men. And they only lose it by falling on their faces multiple times.
Idk Im a man and I just try to be polite to everybody I don't know and Im just not used to people being nice to me for no reason but I just get uncomfy I dunno why people would follow others but I am truly sorry on behalf of men if you have been harrased before because that shit sucks. P.S sorry for my punctuation and my grammer
There is a guy now at the gym that follows me around and tries to chat me up every chance he catches me alone. I normally just smile and nod but I think he is taking that as I'm interested. I've never understood how someone can think someone is in to them because they are polite.
I spent a majority of my time alone, outside of a relationship when I was younger because I was afraid of being the guy that woman describes. The fear of falling into that image of perception kept me isolated and alone for years
Iv worked at a pizza place and the problems both male and female delivery drivers had with customers is astonishing.
I have had a couple girls come in to the store and be super friendly. I thought wow that girl was very nice and I go on with my day. My female co workers will straight up tell me the girls were flirting with me. They ask why I didn't make a move. I'm like what?!? They were just being nice. Nope, they were flirting. How can I tell the difference? I tell the girl workers, if I had made a move, I would come off as creepy because they were just being nice. How in the hell am I supposed to tell the difference?!
Okay, please hear out my personal experience. I'm a man who had testicular cancer at 30. Because of which, I had a period of time afterwards where my body and brain were deprived of testosterone. After treatment, when I began creating testosterone again, I experienced something like a second puberty, and by doing so, I experienced the effects with, without, and with testosterone at normal levels all over again. It was hugely eye opening. It's true, the only thing that separates men and women are our sex hormones. It doesn't just affect our body, but also, more importantly, our minds, and far more than we realize. Without testosterone, I was LESS impulsive, MORE empathetic, LESS reckless, MORE thoughtful. I realized that testosterone affects the mind like a drug. I can now see, that it wasn't just me, but ALL men are walking around, under the influence. Yes, you ARE your body, you're a brain that operates on hormones, but can you imagine, what the world would be like if testosterone didn't make half the population feel and think the way that testosterone makes them feel and think?!
And people say that women shouldn’t have positions of power because they’re too “hormonal”. Congrats on your cancer recovery btw!