Hacker News Reader

Comment by facepalm | Hacker News Reader

Um how is the "societal pressure" not to be rude different for women and men? In general people try not to be rude. Not only because of societal pressure, but also to avoid escalation of conflicts. What is different is that women get asked out a lot more than men, so maybe they are more often confronted with the task of rejecting somebody.

There is no indication here that being rude would have prevented the stalking.

View on HN

> Um how is the "societal pressure" not to be rude different for women and men?

Where to begin? A rude man might be described as "tough", "assertive", or "confident". What would a rude woman be described as? Moreover, what constituted rudeness for a man? How about for a woman? See the double standard?

Hopefully this is changing, and people will come to view rudeness as equally negative (or positive) regardless of gender. I for one would not describe a rude man in any way that wouldn't also apply equally to a rude woman.

>See the double standard

No, not in real life. Wherever you live/work is fucked up if you do (academia, perchance ?). Rude men are just described as rude, often in less polite ways. I've worked bars, factories, manual labour, all the way up to board rooms and I have never once seen this particular double standard applied. I say this as someone with both a keen eye for and a near zero tolerance of prejudice and discrimination of any kind.

Imagine a business meeting. A person is talking, and a man interrupts and talks over that person.

The person asserts themselves, and tells the interrupting man not to interrupt.

That person is more likely to be seen as confident or assertive if they're a man, and more likely to be seen as shrill or bitchy if they're a woman.

> I have never once seen this particular double standard applied. I say this as someone with both a keen eye for and a near zero tolerance of prejudice and discrimination of any kind.

I'm surprised by this, because it's very very common, and has been written about in national newspapers in different countries.

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/01/11/opinion/sunday/speaking-wh...

http://time.com/3666135/sheryl-sandberg-talking-while-female...

http://nytlive.nytimes.com/womenintheworld/2015/03/19/google...

http://www.forbes.com/sites/womensmedia/2012/12/03/womens-id...

http://womeninastronomy.blogspot.co.uk/2014/07/stop-interrup...

etc etc.

I think you have changed the subject, though. Interrupting somebody in a group discussion may or may not be rude at times, but it is hardly the same kind of rude as brushing off somebody who invites you to a date. Taking a woman's ideas and pretending they are your own is completely unrelated.

Edit: more specifically, your links are about non-rude actions by women being considered rude, whereas the discussion is about rude actions by men not being considered rude. For example, from one of your links, I don't think anybody thought Kanye West was not rude for grabbing the microphone from Taylor Swift.

Huh. I would have thought that the woman in question is assertive and putting an asshole in his place, but now that you've told me society at large thinks of her as a bitch, I'll make sure to fall in line.

Do not try that mock outrage here. You know exactly what was said. It is not a new thing that most people will think that an assertive woman is acting like a bitch, even if they're doing the same thing a man is doing.

No, a rude man is typically described as rude or as being an asshole. And women can be tough, assertive and confident, too.

While true, it ignores the very pertinent fact that the behaviors that are called rude in women are often called something entirely different when they're done by men. Women behaving assertively tends to get them called bitches, and ball-busters, and other, far less printable things.

That's just a claim you make. And I doubt people like assertive men so much. In what context, anyway? So if you have an assertive male boss, you go "thank god I don't have to make decisions myself, he is so great", if you have an assertive female boss you go "what a bitch"? Seems very unlikely to me - more likely, your opinion is based on lots of one-sided anecdotes by women who only noticed themselves. (Meaning they noticed a backlash against their assertiveness and assumed it must be a woman problem, never noticing any backlash against men because of confirmation bias).

They are more often confronted with the task of rejecting somebody...

...who might attack them.

When your experience of "rejecting" someone includes having been subject to verbal, or even physical abuse, you learn very quickly to dissemble, dodge the question, and otherwise avoid confrontation.

Don't think it happens? Ask your girlfriend, or your sister, or any other woman in your life. After you've heard their stories, ask yourself if you'd start to behave differently around rejecting people, if you had to risk that kind of treatment.

I have been screamed at by women, too (for example once I asked one who was struggling with a vending machine if I could help her). As I said - in general we try to be polite to prevent escalation of things.

And it doesn't sound from the story as if the girl agreed to meet for dinner because she feared an abusive response otherwise.

Yeah? And were you physically intimidated by that woman? Could she obviously have overpowered you and visited violence upon you, if she'd wanted to? That is a very real threat that almost every woman (okay, maybe not Rhonda Rousey) faces in almost every interaction with almost every man.

Is it likely? No. Absolutely not. In many — if not most — cases, it's vanishingly unlikely. But is it possible? What do you think? Frankly, it's delusional not to believe that it does — and should — legitimately play into a woman's thought process pretty much every time she has to turn a man down for a drink, or a date, or when she says no, or tells him to stop.

It seriously blows my mind how many people apparently can't even attempt to look at the world from someone else's perspective, and instead just assume — and not even consciously assume, but the more insidious, unconscious kind of assumption — "Welp, this is how things are for me, so they must be the same for everyone else, too." That is some of the most myopic, unexamined "thinking" I can imagine, and it literally causes me pain every time I have to confront it, or try to engage with it, in whatever form.

And you just offered a perfect example of it: "I didn't feel threatened when that woman at the vending machine yelled at me, so women must not feel that way in a confrontation with men!" I know you don't actually believe that — at least not completely — but that's precisely the perspective that offering your anecdote as a counter to my comment conveys.

And then, on top of all of that, there's your victim-blaming. "She agreed to meet this taint smear for dinner, so clearly she invited his attentions!"

I mean, really?

You really exaggerate. Most such interactions happen in public spaces. A man can not just beat up a woman in a public space on a whim. Most woman don't walk around in constant fear of men, either. Perhaps the opposite is true: we are all so used to people being polite that we don't know how to react when somebody isn't, like a stalker who doesn't get the hint. (And can I just say Trump...). If that girl had had more encounters with messed up men she would perhaps have reacted differently.

I actually tend to be afraid of women going mental. These days, they might be armed. When I walk home from the tube at night I always worry the woman in front of me might get it into her head that I could be following her and suddenly draw a weapon on me. So, in your own words, it is unlikely, but also possible that a woman could go violent on me. There are also the false rape accusations - women have many options to ruin a man's life.

Also, I never said she invited the attention, just that her agreeing to go for dinner was not because she was afraid he would become violent otherwise. There is nothing in that statement that validates his actions. Don't just shout "victim blaming" as a knee jerk reaction in any discussion about women, it's ridiculous.

I boggles my mind that you assume so many things, and seem to be so cocksure in your opinions.

Women may be more afraid of escalating conflicts than a man would. Surely it's not controversial that an average woman is physically weaker than an average man.

Maybe, but in general it is a bad idea to provoke a conflict without good reason. Even if you are very strong, there is always a probability > 0 that you receive some damage in a fight.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com