Reply to How are you preparing your DD to protect herself?

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]I don’t considering one experience “harassment”

Be is from cat calling in a street, a random comment at a party, a homeless man exposing himself on the street. Perhaps it meets the definition, but this shouldn’t be traumatizing.  Just move on.

Harassment is if the same person repeatedly gives you unwanted attention after you have explicitly told them to stop. [/quote]

I think this is interesting.  I used to really think this and believe this and didn't really even register all the small things men did.  The guy at work who blatantly looks you up and down in a lewd manner and makes a comment.  The guy at work who puts both his hands on your shoulders while talking to you "make a point".  The guy at the regular coffee shop you go to who comes out from the back to stare every time you are in line so eventually you just go to another coffee shop.  Unwelcome looks, touches, comments.  All of these are actual examples and I have so many more.  I'm sure we all do.  I had a guy witness one of these things and he acknowledged it later and asked me if I was okay.  I was stunned.  We all just harden ourselves to it and don't even speak up or think twice about it.  It's sad really.[/quote]
We have been conditioned to accept a certain amount of sexual harassment as just part of life. That’s why some of these women say they’ve never been harassed. They’ve overlooked things because “boys willl be boys,” and it’s just something everyone lives with. Just this very morning, my teenaged dd told me that when she was in 6th grade, she complained to the male gym teacher that a couple male classmates were saying they wanted to touch her tits. He told her that boys are just going to say stupid things and it’s only a problem if they actually touch you. This was 5 years ago, post Me Too.

[/quote]

Yep agree. I call BS on the “never experienced “ posters. I have no doubt they believe it and maybe a rare minority really have not. [b]But that is in large part bc we are conditioned to accept the smaller slights, harassment, and disrespect.[/b] [/quote]

I don't think it's that we accept these things. We just don't actually call every offender out every time. Many of the incidents people are talking about in this post are one-time occurrences from strangers in bars, walking down the street, on a bus or train, etc. I'm not going to get into a confrontation with these guys and I would not encourage my daughter to, either. These days, yes, it would be great if more of the incidents are called out when it's feasible and safe to do so -- like the example a previous commenter gave about the bus masturbator and the woman taking the young girl to a seat by the driver and telling the driver what was going on.

It's not that we're "accepting" the minor slights and disrespect - we endure them and move on. Continual offenses in the same environment or by the same individual are different and are absolutely more likely to be called out and not tolerated.[/quote]
You say you’re not “accepting” being disrespected on the basis of your sex; you’re just enduring it and moving on without calling it out. That IS “accepting” it. You even admit that you don’t call these things out because it wouldn’t be safe to get into a confrontation with men who do it. That’s the conditioning that causes you to not to stand up for yourself. You know these men are doing it because they have a certain power over women. They’re bigger, they’re stronger, they’re more aggressive, and they’re not the least bit afraid of getting into a confrontation with you. You know that if you call them out, the situation may escalate and you might find yourself in actual physical danger.

The men who harass random women passing them on the street usually pay no price for that behavior, so it’s not discouraged. The women who are harassed know the men could potentially be real menaces, so they endure and endure and endure it some more, while rationalizing that that wasn’t really harassment because each of the guys only did it once or it was brief or perhaps their clothing or physical appearance provoked the men to it or it wasn’t that bad because it wasn’t scary (even though speaking up was deemed too dangerous for the situation).[/quote]

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