Why, if you think harassment is flattering, you are stupid
From CNN: Catcalling: creepy or a compliment?
Naturally, in the above linked article, the woman who argues it’s flattering to be catcalled and looked up and down when she walks on the street is from… wait for it… you can guess this… Los Angeles. (If I start a “help Beta escape from Los Angeles” fund, would any of you make donations? I’m, like, totally serious.)
I just want to take a moment to expound on something that came up in the comments on this post.
Strange men do not hoot at, yell at, or leer at you because they think you’re hot. They do those things because they think you’re vulnerable and needy. If you think they want you sexually, you need some serious education on power psychology. They want to feel like they’re on top of you, but not in the way you imagine.
When you see someone attractive, it’s natural to look. But not to stare - there are rules against staring throughout the animal kingdom. And you don’t talk unless the person you’re looking at says something to you first, because when you get caught looking, it would be aggressive to follow that up with verbalization. This is something your cat understands, for pete’s sake. Stop reading Cosmopolitan and get in touch with your animal instincts. Discrete looks are flattering because they reflect only a natural aesthetic reaction. Leering - staring overtly at someone who’s watching you stare - signals aggression. Uninvited verbalizations are also aggressive - that’s why when the salesman at the kiosk leaps out to ask you if you ever get split ends, you feel pressured and cornered (until you realize you’re entitled to tell them to back off and leave you alone because they started the hostility and you’re only responding in kind).
If you don’t know the difference between aggression and honest appreciation, you’ve bought into civilization too much for your own good. Ask yourself: why do men typically leer and catcall in packs? Rarely will one man by himself with no buddies around look you over and say something about your appearance. Because they know deep down it’s aggressive, not merely appreciative. Ask yourself: why do they continue to yell daily at women who’ve told them clearly to back off? Because they’re so concerned she understand how sexy they find her? Or is it maybe a little more likely they like pissing her off because it’s a power struggle, not a sex game.
I’ll grant that there can be some disagreement over precisely where the line between appreciation and aggression gets drawn, but my point is: if you don’t draw one anywhere, you have been completely brainwashed by your culture into thinking your meaty deliciousness is something these men give a shit about. It’s not. Especially here in L.A., where beautiful women are in extreme surplus. Men who want to be with beautiful women devote their energy to winning dates with beautiful women. Men who devote their energy to aggression toward strange women enjoy winning fights with women. That’s why they’ve set up a context where she feels cornered and pressured and where their male buddies back them up.
And when you find that flattering, they think you’re pathetic. They think you like having a big strong man be forcible with you. They think you’re a vain, selfish ass who ought to be brought down a peg. They start talking behind your back about the things they’d like to do to you, and those things revolve around humiliation, not simple sexual enjoyment.
Get the 
35 comments
Thank you, yes.
There’s nothing wrong with looking, even sexually motivated looking: when riding the T home, I often take a gander at some of the young college beefcake that occupies my car and think some variant of “I’d hit that like the fist of an angry god.” But *staring*? When it’s not sleazy, it’s creepy: guys who stare only come in Practically Licking His Lips Perv and Dead Eyed Serial Killer. Don’t do it.
And for the love of God, don’t talk. I mean, admittedly, I’m coming at this as a repressed New England girl, wherein strangers who talk to me on the street are either hitting on me, hitting me up for money, or trying to convert me to Scientology (with a small minority of honestly confused tourists trying to figure out where Harvard is) and I firmly believe that, if you want to meet people, you should do the civilized thing and join a book club, so my opinion may be in the minority. But if you do talk? One statement. Conversational tone. Not about her body. Very brief. And if she responds with a monosyllable, BACK THE FUCK OFF.
Lord. Also, the next person who tells me “it won’t hurt to be friendly” is getting a permanent iPod mark on the side of their face. Yes, it will: it’s a waste of my time, it’s a waste of the dude’s time, it gets people’s hopes up when they shouldn’t be, and also, I don’t owe theoretical guy anything. Not sex; not empathy; not conversation. I have a book, it’s far more interesting than you, let’s all move on.
Furthermore, I totally sympathize about LA. I lived in SoCal for a while, and if there was ever a city built over a Hellmouth…
“…when riding the T home…”
Hey, I’m in Boston, too.
As a gazillionth generation New Englander, I completely understand that instinctive reaction of “What do you want?!” when a stranger looks at you the wrong way. As a moderately pretty and fairly shy geek/nerd girl, I’ve never been comfortable being ogled (Well, who is, really?), and that kind of attention puts up my defenses in the blink of an eye. There have been a few times when I almost resorted to violence because of the high creepy factor.
So, yes. I agree with Beta that catcalling, etc. is not a sincere form of flattery. Nor should it be acceptable in a society struggling for so many forms of equality. It’s one thing to appreciate an attractive person. It’s something else entirely to make that attractive person question their value as a human being by turning them into an object to be leered at without their consent.
But if you do talk? One statement. Conversational tone. Not about her body.
The only appearance-based comment I’ve ever made to a strange woman was asking where she got her T-shirt because I wanted one too. (I thought it was constellations at first, but it actually seemed to be a rendering of particle-tracks; and I SO wanted one).
“But it will hurt to be friendly, because tolerating your bullshit is painful to me. So fuck off.”
You win at the internet for this post.
One angle you’re missing, though, is that of the men who have actually bought into this and perpetuate it because they think what they’re doing is flattering. I don’t know how common they are, but I’ve had a couple long conversations with friends like that trying to explain to them that, while some women may take it the way they mean it, at its core their behaviour is still aggressive and intimidating. It’s a hard sell, though… especially since we live in a culture that heralds hierarchical heteronormativity as the only kind of romance there is.
This became much, much funnier since I got to watch my year-old kitten beat up an Akita puppy nearly twice her size this morning. When she hisses, he now backs up and lies down. Shouldn’t have barked at her, dude. And people think I got this nickname because it’s “cute”.
I’m using this analogy from now on when someone asks why I wasn’t bothered by a relatively brief glance but gave a nasty glare to someone who called out something allegedly complimentary in some circles. I didn’t feel like prey for the first, and it’s socially and legally unacceptable for me to hiss and growl and smack him on the nose for the second.
Robin: Hey, fellow Bostonian! Neat!
Harlemjd: Word. So much word.
tekanji: I’ve had a couple long conversations with friends like that trying to explain to them that, while some women may take it the way they mean it, at its core their behaviour is still aggressive and intimidating.
Heh, yes. I spent a not-very-productive hour trying to explain to the boyfriend (who doesn’t do the catcalling thing himself) why responding to “Smile, honey!” with “Fuck off and die, asswipe!” is not particularly unwarranted. (To be fair, he says he’s been told to smile himself, and takes it as people wanting to cheer him up. But it probably doesn’t sound as patronizing to a 6′3 dude, and people probably don’t call him “honey.”)
Question: Did he have any sort of contact with the people who’ve told him to smile other than that single interaction? I’m genuinely curious, because I’d be willing to swear in court that I have absolutely never seen a complete stranger tell a passerby who’s male to smile, while the number of women I’ve seen or heard about it happening to (including myself) is simply staggering.
I’m genuinely curious, because I’d be willing to swear in court that I have absolutely never seen a complete stranger tell a passerby who’s male to smile, while the number of women I’ve seen or heard about it happening to (including myself) is simply staggering.
Shoot, homeless people looking for change and getting denied by me quite frequently respond with, “Well, can I at least get a smile?”
WTF? No. SBG does not smile on command.
I’ve never heard of or observed a guy being told to smile (but then they’d know better than I would), but I have a face that naturally on first glance looks either serious or snobbish, depending completely on how insecure the person observer is.
I only ever make it a few months without some strange man - always men - telling me to smile, usually with a follow-up along the lines of “It’s not so bad.” And the thing is, I’m almost always in a fine mood when this happens.
I have been, but my face tends to look unhappy, which means there may be a slightly different motive in asking.
I tend to have s serious expression on my face at most times, but no one has ever told me to smile as a solitary interaction, nor have I seen it happen to any other man.
The only response that seems to shame the smile guys is “my mom just died.” It doesn’t teach them that they’re being controlling assholes, but it at least points out that they’re intruding in the life of someone they know fuck-all about, who may have a damn good reason for not smiling.
I’d rather they learned, but I’ll settle for making them feel like shit.
The only response that seems to shame the smile guys is “my mom just died.”
That makes me wish that I was asked to smile just so I can say that.
My ear/facial piercings seem to be significant deterrent for that kind of behaviour, though. Now I just wish it was a good screening method for jerks (unfortunately it seems to attract them; makes them think I’m kinky, which is true, and therefore I will want to sleep with them, which is not)….
I think one thing it’s important to keep in mind is that in our society it’s a lot more likely that you’ll think someone’s threatening if they’re a PoC. That’s one of the things I get torn about in debates about catcalling — a lot of times conversation about it gets racialized in really problematic ways.
@Nick and Patrick: it’s always men who tell me to smile, and they’re usually middle aged or older. I think they believe they’re flirting harmlessly, but the feeling I get is that while they’re perfectly happy to see a man like Patrick thinking hard, it disturbs them to see a woman “worrying her pretty little head” about something which, if it requires thought, obviously should be left to her male caretakers. Nick, it’s interesting that you get told to smile because you look “unhappy.” I’m pretty sure my look is serious or thoughtful rather than unhappy, so I wonder what that’s about. Possibly it’s just minions from the Ministry of Eternal Happiness doing their job. You know, those people who are determined every day is good and life is always lovely and we should be grateful for every second and no one is ever allowed to have a fucking bad day once in a while.
@Harlemjd, that is AWESOME. ROFL!
@Melpomene, very true. That’s another false distinction we’re all programmed to make. I forget to point it out because I grew up in a very all white (redneck) area, so there was never any question in my mind that all the many attacks and sexual assaults on women that went on locally were committed by white men.* And yet even there, I witnessed a lot of people convincing themselves against all fact that it was mystery men of color doing these things (and then when that failed, it was the woman’s fault). So I should remember to mention that when I talk about stuff like this.
*As a result, I have almost the opposite bias, wherein I expect a man of color to have some sympathy for me and be less likely to harm me… or at least have more fear of the law than a white man.
Tekanji, that’s true about men who think they’re being flattering. I kind of had them in mind as I was writing this post, and hoped the remarks about animal aggression might mean something to guys who think that behavior is flattering. But it might be worth a post on its own.
That may well be so. I have wanted to say the same thing as Harlemjd (though I’d make it my sister, since I don’t have a real one), but never thought of it at the right moment.
There was one time I was walking along in obvious and severe pain - I wasn’t told to cheer up, but someone did ask if they could pray for me.
re. smiling– there’s always, “why don’t you drop dead and give me something to smile about, motherfucker?”
re. race– statistically we are prone to be victimized by known assailants of the same ethnic and socio-economic group. i’m from memphis, where i grew up as part of a white minority, and on the rare occasions i was harassed, either from a distance or up close, it was done by a rainbow coalition of strangers. so much for statistics– or– look on the bright side: integration works! actually, the latter may be true. if you compare the south to southern california, wage disparity in regards to ethnicity is greater in socal.
What if it’s actually meant as a challenge?
I subscribe to a couple of mailing lists that tell men how to attract women, and they all teach that the way to flirt with a woman is to challenge her. By teasing her slightly, touching her arm, being “cocky and funny”, etc. The point is to show her that you’re (a) interested and (b) dominant.
I always wonder how well those courses work in real life, because when a man approaches me with what seems like a show of dominance I tend to raise my hackles and growl, and many other women probably do the same. But maybe there’s a lot of men who believe that all women want to be swept off their feet, and maybe some of them think that catcalls are a good way to flirt for the same reason.
See, when I used to complain about getting cat-calls/ogled while walking to/from work about four years back, my female co-workers would respond, “Was he young or cute?” as if that would have made it OK.
Only one of the older women I worked with and my ROOMMATE — incidentally, part of why she and I shared a home was because neither one of us felt safe living alone– agreed that That. Made. No. Difference.
This was a point in my life, as well, that I wasn’t dating much. Apparently, if he was a young/cute harasser, it was supposed to be flattering, and I should have been more friendly.
Actually, come to think of it — and to link that to the random people who tell you to smile — it’s amazing how many of my stories end with me being told I should have been more friendly.
I may have been twenty at the time, but I’ve always been told I look three-to-five years younger than I am, and ANY man harassing someone whom looks like she’s in high school, regardless of whether or not he’s genuinely closer to my age is not ANY less creepy than getting the same from a guy who’s middle-aged.
Lavode - you forgot the time-honored trick of feeding her back-handed compliments to lower her self-esteem until she’ll sleep with you. It’s super-classy.
The hell of it is, I like men who *actually* challenge me–men who have opinions and aren’t afraid to back them up, who can hold their own in the witty banter department, who aren’t scared by my fairly direct and sometimes vicious personality. When I push, I like someone to push back.
But this is totally different from the invasion-of-personal-space, backhanded-compliment, yeah-you-totally-want-me pseudo-challenge.
Did he have any sort of contact with the people who’ve told him to smile other than that single interaction?
I don’t think so, though I’m not sure. It could just be the Ministry types, as BetaCandy says. And they almost piss me off more than guys who are just trying to get into my pants or show off their cocks or whatever, because….well, basically because the Sunny Sally mindset is alien in a nigh-Lovecraftian way.
Not that the guys don’t piss me off. But it’s like, okay, you’re trying your thing, you’re a dipshit, whatever. Whereas some random stranger giving a damn whether or not I smile= “WHAT THE FUCK IS WRONG WITH YOU?”
Lavode, I think most men use (what they believe to be) their best seduction tricks when they’re the only one engaging with a given woman. Catcalling always seems to happen with groups of men, so I can’t buy that they really think they’re on the path to getting her number or whatever.
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Mana G, don’t you know the solution to everything in a woman’s life is to get her fucked by a man, and to that end she needs to be more and more tolerant of men until she finds one that will fuck her? As soon as people find out I don’t have a “husband” or “boyfriend” and am not gay, which they take to mean I’m not getting fucked, they start advising me to be nicer and nicer and nicer to whatever dregs of humanity they see flirting with me - or looking at me twice, or yelling harassment at me from the street. Unoccupied vaginas really really bother people in a way that, strangely, imminent threats of nuclear bombs dropping during the Cold War never seemed to.
And if the owner of the vagina in question is really ecstatically thrilled to have it unoccupied (by other humans, anyway) at the moment? She’s obviously deranged, and we must save her from herself!
If you had a young cute guy paying you ANY sort of attention, even the really scary kind, and your vagina wasn’t occupied, WTF WERE YOU THINKING, GIRLFRIEND?! Go get that penis! /sarcasm
This is one of the many reasons why I hate people.
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Izzy, I’m right there with you on the genuine challenge thing. I rarely find men who can challenge me that way - to be fair, I don’t think I always realized that decent human males need a LOT of encouragement before they’re going to say anything that could possibly be interpreted as antagonistic or intimidating because they recognize that men have an unfair advantage there so they need to get to know me before going there. OTOH, I’ve found a lot of men interpret MY challenges to them not as the playful banter I intend, but as a man-hating insult to their hetero-mega-virility… so it’s still mostly a good litmus test of whether I can be bothered to get to know a guy better or not.
[...] recently wrote a post to explain the difference between street harassment and sincere flirtation. Unthinkingly, I wrote it to an audience of women. I guess I unconsciously assumed any man who [...]
I hope this doesn’t seem too weird, and it’s kind of off-topic, but: okay, this is my first time at this blog, and this post really struck a chord with me, as did your bio. I’m a writer and a recent film grad that’s new to LA, and the whole “nerdy-girl-feminist-fish-out-of-water in a land full of beautiful people” thing is kind of freaking me out. Do you have any survival tips? My email is here. (I literally, until reading this, didn’t even think that there was a “surplus of beautiful women” in LA… I was just spending all this time wondering why I felt so lousy about my appearance all of a sudden. I am clueless.)
Wemblee, welcome - to the blog and L.A. I’ll shoot you an email so we don’t go too far off topic. It’s always great to hear from someone else who can relate to these experiences. I don’t know that I have any great survival tips, but I’ll tell you the thoughts I have during all my “If I could go back again, knowing what I know now” ruminations.
I get the “Smile!” thing less now that I live in the UK than I did when I lived in the US. But every now and again it rears its ugly head.
The most recent one was a few days ago. I’m currently dealing with back problems and at the time I was in agony and on my way to a doctor’s appointment to get painkillers that would make the pain bearable. I stopped at a fast food place to quickly get something to eat. When my burger arrived, someone had written on the paper in large letters “SMILE, MATE”.
I didn’t. I just ate as quickly as I could and left. I was literally in too much pain to have the energy to make a fuss.
The ‘mate’ thing especially bothered me. Guys in the UK use terms such as ‘mate’ and ‘pal’ towards women they don’t know as a way of saying ‘I’m not interested in you’. But to say that still means they’ve thought about it, so the sexual thing is still at the forefront, unlike it would be if they’d just said whatever they wanted to say without using epithets.
Thanks! Yeah, I don’t want to derail you either — it’s a great post — so email is great. Thank you!
So, um, moving to L.A. is my creepy little secret dream and I’d really appreciate some advice too.
I want to go to school out there, but I realize it’s the land of Fake Bitches (male and female).
Samia,
Most of what I emailed Wemblee had to do with being in film as well as just surviving out here - you didn’t mention film school, so I’ll assume you’re just talking about how to function in a city where traditionally gorgeous women abound and men who couldn’t score a date in any other city are able to find female companionship.
The first thing to realize is that if you were a 7/10 on that nasty “traditional beauty scale” where you live now, you’ll feel like a 5 in L.A. (If you’re a 5, you’ll be a 3, etc.) You will notice that the “quality” (again, going by the nasty beauty standard our society forces on us) of men hitting on you here will drop sharply - as a cute blond friend of mine once said, “Back home in Denver, I’d have been hit on by 5 young, cute guys by this point in the evening - here, I’ve been hit on by one really old guy, and he wasn’t cute.”
No matter how much you realize that it’s all bullshit, your ego still feels it. Mine did. But this is where it’s important to remind yourself: I am fabulous. I may or may not be gorgeous, but I am wonderful in other ways. Anyone who doesn’t realize that doesn’t deserve to know me.
You may feel fake telling yourself those things, but it’s less fake than padding your bits with silicone and collagen and telling yourself, “Ah, now I’m beautiful, and that makes me worthy.”
The more you believe in yourself, and disbelieve in anyone who ignores you or doesn’t want you because they think they can score a “hotter chick”, the more confidence you’ll have. Confidence is attractive - not just to potential dates, but to friends, professors, employers. It must also be said confidence is unattractive to some people - but those are almost always people you don’t want around anyway. Think of it as a litmus test.
Hope that’s some help!
Melpomene, thank you for pointing that out - I was going to post, in response that I (white, fat girl) have always been really squicked by white guys catcalling/talking me up on the street, but never by men of color…and then I realized that, living in the upper Midwest and being white, I have *never* been catcalled by a group of men of color I didn’t know.
One-on-0ne, sure, “smile, baby” “Let me carry that, do you have a man at home?” Even, when I used to dye my hair blue “Can I touch that hair?” All the time. That’s how it is in my neighborhood, and it’s generally pretty friendly, no negative pushback if I say no gracefully. (Not that it’s not intrusive and sometimes rude…but not threatening or extra time-consuming)
But the white boys feel the need to rev the engine on their SUV and try to talk me up out the window when I’m stopped at a red light on my bike, or follow me out of the bar to have a talk with me at 11 pm when I’m headed home. It’s always threatening. Even one-on-one it feels creepy to me. I wonder if it’s just my personal experience talking, or the specific circumstances (car -> bike is a whole power imbalance of its own) or if the underlying race/power dynamic trumps the sea of racist bullshit we all swim in.
Can I make a late addition to the advice for people thinking of living in L.A.? When you get sick of the scene and the constant pressure of Los Angeles itself, but still want the advantages of the City and the wonderful weather, move to Long Beach. It’s nice, I swear. Don’t listen to what the television tells you. It has an arts community that does not require supermodel looks or rock star backing for participation.
The most socially miserable I’ve ever been is when I’ve gone to clubs in L.A. I just don’t want to try that hard, and that impulse (not wanting to spend every ounce of energy to be aesthetically pleasing to extremely particular men) is quickly noted and punished. Night life? No, not for me. Not on those terms.
Any chance I could get a copy of the suggestions you sent to Wemblee, BetaCandy? I’m in the same boat as Wemblee - writer, heading towards film, nerd, etc - and all suggestions or tips would be exponentially appreciated! Thanks a ton!
[...] recently wrote a post to explain the difference between street harassment and sincere flirtation. Unthinkingly, I wrote it to an audience of women. I guess I unconsciously assumed any man who [...]
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