Men face sexual harassment on the regular as well as women. We often tend to neglect the perils men face, due to the fact that most of the time men have been the guilty party in these situations, but that doesn't negate the times when they too fall victim to a harasser. We all, as an entire race, need to learn how to do better in these scenarios.
Redditor u/chutiyamadarchod wanted the men out there to speak up about the trials they face by asking... Men, what kind of low grade sexual harassment do you face on a daily basis?Men harassing men and women harassing men is a real issue. It's not okay to ask men about their underwear that day or the size of... you know... and vice versa.
Hands off the Kilt
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Worked in bars and would constantly be groped by older women who thought it was funny.
Also, as a Scottish piper, kilt-lifting is a thing and honestly it needs to stop, grow up.
The Bulge
My "bulge" was a topic of open discussion between some of the women in the office at a previous job. The kicker is that one of the women was our HR and Sexual Assault/Harassment Reporter.
In my experience those middle aged women at the offices can be DOGS. The most inappropriate crap I've seen, heard, or experienced comes from those weird 50 year old "wine mommy" types. It's gross.
Beach Days
Not really low grade but when I used to work as a lifeguard on the beach there was lots of non-consensual touching. The two that really stick out are the middle aged woman who walked up to me like she had a question about my penis through my trunks because she "wanted to know how big it was" and the girl who backed me into my stand and shoved a skittle into my mouth with her tongue.
True
A female coworker I tell her if she was male, she would have been fired multiple times for her behavior. She just laughs and says "ya probably".
That's terrible. Sometimes I think people legitimately don't realise their behaviour is unacceptable, but the fact that she's been given the opportunity to apologise and just admitted her behaviour was wrong and not take it seriously is terrible.
Poor Unfortunate Soul
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My 55 year old coworker somewhat resembles Ursula from the little mermaid. That hasn't stopped her from asking me if I think she's pretty, asking me to take her home, and telling me she "sprays like a watering can" (yes, really...)
Edit: I should add that I'm 21, which I think makes it a LOT weirder.
That was all that a bit much. Show of hands... who found any of that appropriate? To be clear... nobody should be showing a hand. Men should also be able to wear what they want without issue. Let's see who else is having problems understanding boundaries.
While Shirtless
Not daily, but as a Cosplayer who does shirtless characters (Ace, Grimmjow, Bahn) I get groped a lot... chest and arms mostly, also my butt gets slapped/squeezed and crotch grabs are often enough to mention too.
Hell even when I'm armored they find a way to "get to me"
Inclusive Issues
I have been referred to HR for my voice being naturally too low. I was told I need to try and do more to be inclusive at the chat with HR about it.
"I feel like I'm being singled out in the workplace." These are magic words to HR. It's just the nice way of saying "you're about to be sued for running a hostile work environment."
Where's Linda?
My first job out of college. It was a home health company that was 97% women. I had to cover for the receptionist during her lunch break and would have to deal with nurses calling in all the time. I would get comments as soon as I answered the phone "they have a man answering the phone now" or "this is home health right?!? Where's Linda?"
Also had several complaints too. I had my manager ask me to not use such a low and intimidating voice and try and sound more happy. This was an HR position and I was given the equivalent of perk up buttercup.
Stalker
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One day I got a text message from someone I didn't know, asking me to meet for dinner.
I had gone to a new hair cut place a few days earlier. One of the hair dressers (not the one who cut my hair) had seen me and decided it made sense to look up my phone number from the client records and ask me out. I had no idea who this was, it was so weird. I got several more messages from her before she stopped messaging me. Never went back to that hair place.
Jiggle
I recently became a father and was working on a hit tv series. A female producer who is best friends with the executive in charge thought it would be funny to grab my stomach and say "working on your dad bod already?" My daughter at that point was 1 week old. If I grabbed a woman's stomach and said she was fat or pregnant I would have been fired. Well, I complained to make a point. She recently was promoted and I wasn't invited back after 5 seasons.
The Rubs
I was walking down town with a friend when two drunk girls came out of a bar, and one of them just walked up to me and shoved her hands up my shirt and started rubbing my chest.
She was yelling to her friend 'This is what a real man feels like!'.
My friend was laughing his butt off, and her friend was explaining this was 'breakup therapy', because she'd been dumped and she was in the process of accepting there are better men out there.
I laughed it off and took it as a compliment, but imagining the gender roles reversed always stuck with me.
Gross
My family owns a restaurant and I would help out doing the dishes and operating front of house. My mum mainly hired female waitresses for some reason and I overheard things like "he's cute I wonder what it's like to ride Asian guys" and one time, one of the girls finished their shift and I was brushing the floor near entrance, she came up to me and grabbed my "area" with a lip bite. I was really uncomfortable as I had a girlfriend at the time.
I stalked them on social media for a bit and I found out they were really into kpop and one of them had a history of dating Asian guys.
They eventually quit as they had A levels to prepare for (equivalent to AP) and because I live in a small town, I bump into them a lot meaning they stare whenever I walk past them.
Ok?
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Got my junk grabbed and pinched once when I was in a public transport by an older, homeless looking women. Everyone saw what happened and didn't do nothing. I was in shocked and didn't know what to do so I just pretended nothing happened.
SUPER upset...
A woman who was celebrating her 21st birthday did the same to me at the bar. I left the bar to go home and she was outside crying, obviously sloppy drunk. She had been dancing with a bunch of dudes which made her insecure boyfriend SUPER upset. I had no idea what the situation was, so I walked up and asked if if they needed anything. She looked straight up at me and grabbed my area. Hard. I backed away, obviously shocked, and she tried it again.
Then the boyfriend started screaming "DO YOU WANT ME TO KICK HISS A**?! IS THAT WHAT YOU WANT???" and she sobbed even harder. I was so confused by everything, I threw my hands up, said "Good luck with that," and bounced. There were people all around but no one seemed pissed when she grabbed me. Most were laughing.
Call a Bouncer
Getting physically and verbally assaulted by women in nightclubs and then being asked to leave because of it. Even with multiple people trying to tell bouncers what was actually happening they'll always just pick you to throw out.
That's unfortunately an economics thing more than anything else. Women in a club attract men, men who buy drinks and throw cash around thinking they'll get laid. A club full of men does not attract women tossing around cash.
Animals
My MIL assumes that men have this complete inability to control themselves and it is 100% up to women to not pursue attached men. I was not aware of this until there was a debate going on about such things at a family function when she ask me, the only non old male at the event, to confirm her belief. The implication that men are practically wild animals and unable to control themselves is pretty insulting.
Scooter Lady
I was in the store and an old woman on a mobility scooter wanted to pass me so i stepped to the side against the shelf. Instead of using all the free space on the other side she starts turning closer to me as she passes so my area rubs all across her shoulder, she did a weird moaning sound at the same time.
I posted about this on Facebook at the time and almost everyone thought it was hilarious.
Tickles
I was also going to mention the man boob comment.
But used to be all the time drunk women or men would run their fingers through my beard and have some sly comment like, "I wonder if this tickles".
If any of this is unclear please continue reading. Maybe it'll shed further light. And learn the difference between a compliment and harassment. We need to put ourselves in each other's shoes. And act accordingly...
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Try not to follow the bad advice given here, because you don't want to get the results that these guys did.
U/Duckerton375 asked: What's the worst advice someone ever gave you, but you still followed?
The workplace can bring a cornucopia of terrible advice. Don’t follow these unless you want to get fired.
​Bad jobs are usually not worth it.
Stick with a job no matter how bad it is. I stayed with a terrible job working retail, dealing with horrible customers and sexual harassment. I was told I wouldn't find anything better.
"No, no, you misunderstand. I said you wouldn't find anything better at making you feel like complete garbage."
This gets really creepy really fast.
frustrated workplace GIFGiphy"After you put in a job application, you need to call them at least once a day every day until they hire you."
Note: this did not get me hired. It got me called out by the HR person I was calling and forbidden to ever contact their facility again.
I work for a law firm that employees over 1500 people in the home office alone. Once I received a call from the building security saying, "Insert Name is here to speak with the owner." Well we are run by a committee so that's odd. Found out they just applied for a job and wanted to talk directly to the person that would potentially hire them. Told him the firm will contact them to schedule an interview. They refused to leave without "talking to the owner." Had security escort them out of the building.
​This is absolutely not true.
"Sleep is for people who do not want success" great words from my uncle, it almost killed me.
Now I may be oversleeping.
​Interpersonal relationships are also a big breeding ground for terrible advice. Don’t listen to any of these.
Heartbreaking.
My father always tought me and my brother that "having friends is bad and in the end they will never be there for you" so everytime I told my father about my friends he would get kinda mad and give me the advice to stop talking to them.
Now I am afraid of people and have several trust issues, thanks dad.
​This won’t end well.
A Christmas Story GIF by filmeditorGiphyIn the fifth grade my teacher was talking about bullying, then she said "if anyone tries to bully you just agree with them." So the next time I got bullied I agreed with the bully and they bullied me more.
Dude one time I saw an anti bullying video that told the victims to just BE NICE TO THE BULLY. Like the bully was hurling insults and the victim was smiling and complimenting him. My first thought was about how much I hated the mere thought that this would work. My second thought was of how the people who came up with that method had clearly never been bullied.
​Oof.
When I met my now wife at the age of 19, one of my coworkers said that it's very important to start at the bottom with presents and work your way up, she still has the socks I gave her on our first anniversary on the wall over our bed as a reminder...
I'm still trying to teach my boyfriend about good presents and bad presents. Biscuits from the supermarket = bad present. Cheap unbranded laptop battery from China as my only present = bad present (and only lasted 2 months). Anything off my 7-page wishlist = good present. It's literally a list of things I want to receive as presents.
​Can tell you from experience that this is a bad idea.
Had a falling out with some friends. My husband recommended I reach out to an old friend who ghosted me suddenly in a manner that induced some pretty severe abandonment trauma. Went for it anyways because "it's been so long, surely they changed". Am now experiencing the same things as last time.
When you follow bad advice, it can lead to mistakes that you just can’t come back from.​
Buying a house is tricky.
for sale dancing GIF by Lisa VertudachesGiphy"Buy a home now before the prices go up!" -my FIL in 2006.
We bought in 2007 and paid $259,500 for our 1,300 sq ft house (we really couldn't afford it and had an 80/20 so we had 8% interest for one loan and 6% on the other) and in 2008 it was worth $97,000 so refinancing wasn't even an option. We watched all of our neighbors walk away or get foreclosed on but we kept paying our bills and as of this very moment our house is worth $462,000. I'm so happy we stuck it out, we both worked our @sses off and the house will be paid off in 2 years.
It worked out for us, it's a horrible idea. Especially since 1300 sq ft houses are $460+k
My heartbreaks for future generations, I honestly don't know how people are going to afford housing in the future.
It’s there for a reason.
"Never apply for any government assistance."
Cue years of suffering trying to work full-time with a painful disability. Quit a particularly terrible job, and wanted to apply for food aid until I could find another gig; a friend with lots of DHS experience recommended I apply for Social Security "just to get in the system." Turns out my disability was bad enough to get accepted the first time, which I wasn't expecting. Really could've used that support, oh, the 30+ previous years of my life.
Credit is important to have.
I was told to not get a credit card until after college. I was super fortunate to have my college paid for so I had no loans, car paid in cash, no credit card or anything to start building credit. Found myself out in the world at 22 years old with a credit score of 0.
So while a lot of this bad advice came from trusted people, oftentimes they were too misinformed to give that advice in the first place. Don't trust the word of one person--do your research, and make decisions for yourself.
It'll be way better in the long run