[vinceguidry]

This is her life. She can't stop the guys from hitting on her, short of doing awful things like downplaying her looks or hiding herself away.

I wear a suit and tie to work every day. I didn't really understand her position until I started job hunting. I like wearing suits. I own five of them, three are custom made. Now I have to make a decision. Do I wear a suit and tie to my in-person job interviews?

Coders seem to have an irrational hatred of suits and ties for some reason. The conservative choice would be to wear a polo shirt and slacks to my interviews. But to do that would put me in a weird position. Once I get the job, am I going to start wearing my suits again? When, the very first day? Or hide them away in the closet until I feel ready to?

Appearance is political, and therefore dangerous. But it's also very personal, you wind up wanting to take the risks anyway just to "be who you are". To purposefully choose to be less attractive feels like you're doing violence to yourself. The only real choice, once people start noticing you and complimenting you and you start noticing what it's doing for your life, is to keep going with it.

You can't just turn it off. You can choose to, but it never feels good to do that, and you're just going to face the same decision tomorrow. I, and she, would rather deal with the consequences of being really attractive than to stop. That includes being accepting of other's gifts, others' attention.

When she tells me about her experiences, she's not complaining. She's noting something that she's already been dealing with for years. She's had the internal conversations with herself, should she downplay it, should she present less of herself to the world. Should she stop letting guys express their appreciation for her. Over and over again, for years.

They're hard questions to contemplate, and there's only one real answer.

[arjie]

> Coders seem to have an irrational hatred of suits and ties for some reason. The conservative choice would be to wear a polo shirt and slacks to my interviews.

Want to hear a funny thing regarding this? From _The Big Short_ by Michael Lewis:

> The guys who ran money dressed as if they were going to a Yankees game. Their financial performance was supposed to be all that mattered about them, and so it caused suspicion if they dressed too well. If you saw a buy-side guy in a suit, it usually meant that he was in trouble, or scheduled to meet someone who had given him money, or both.

[Michael_Murray]

This. Every guy on the planet should have to understand the deep meaning of this when relating to women.

[yummyfajitas]

How is downplaying one's looks "awful" or "doing violence to yourself"? When we wear non-practical clothes (e.g. anything besides athletic wear or comfy cargo pants), the entire purpose is to cause other humans to respond to us in a way that we find favorable.

I recently purchased a slim red pants designed to convey a) that I'm a moderately creative type and b) that I have a nice ass. The net result is that I get desirable attention from women I like, but also I get undesirable attention from fat chicks and gays.

I can switch that undesirable attention off anytime I want - I just need to dress like a slob and/or be less careful about having a desirable body (i.e. eat more butter, do fewer exercises aimed at aesthetics, not carefully calibrate my beard). I choose not to because that undesirable attention is a small price to pay for the desirable attention I receive.

Similarly, consider the daily annoyance of recruiters. Who among us would trade recruiters + super hot job market for no recruiters + humanities academic-like desperation for any job at all?

[dudifordMann]

I actually had a rather lengthy debate about clothing with my fiance. It comes down to perspectives and social norms which may need to change to have equality.

Disclaimer: I do understand that this is sociologically complex topic

A woman may choose to wear what someone might consider a revealing piece of clothing for no other reason than she wants to and finds it "cute" (omitting why she has gotten to that conclusion e.g. marketing, etc). To that woman, she chose to wear something that make her happy. She is NOT responsible for the actions of the people around her based on how they view that article of clothing. This ends up always with either victim blaming or claims of "common sense" when really she should be able to go around topless if she so chooses without having to fear others' actions.

In your case, you are already assuming reactions from others which is a whole other route in this conversation. When all is said and done, I find this to be a terribly interesting and complex topic.

[toyg]

I never understood that line of thought. It's like saying one should be free to shout "FIRE!" in a cinema just so that he can feel happy with himself ("hey, my shouting is terrific! I carry no responsibility for what you'll make of the words I say!").

Wearing clothes is a social act, not a personal one. That's why there are laws about it. We geeks should know, considering how we softly strong-armed entire swaths of dress-code rules to bow to practicality over other pre-existing social rules.

That does not mean one cannot stop himself from raping a woman if she wears X or Y (nobody loses control ever, and if one does he should be held accountable for it), but it's dishonest to pretend one should not feel attracted by people wearing clothes designed to make them look attractive.

[dudifordMann]

But that's just it, attraction is an inward feeling/biochemical reaction/etc. I am by no means saying that you cannot feel attracted no one can tell you how to feel. Rather, it is a matter of how you act on that attraction. That is where society says it is or is not okay to harass/act aggressive/etc.

in the context of the original post, a customer was attracted to the image of the fictitious support staffer. How the customer acted shows a perhaps a lack of control. In this case it was "innocent" hitting on (not flirting as one of the other comments suggested). But the fact that the customer felt compelled to is strange in the context of customer support.

Like I said, this is an interesting topic.

[vinceguidry]

> It's like saying one should be free to shout "FIRE!" in a cinema just so that he can feel happy with himself

But the difference in media and consequences matter. When the consequences involve a stampede of people, you best believe it's a different situation than if the consequences amounted to revving up insecure guys.

> Wearing clothes is a social act, not a personal one.

It's both. Until society tells you how you have to dress all the time, then there's a social component and a personal one.

[toyg]

Sure, differences matter, but the point is that there will be consequences. It is perfectly reasonable to assume that they should never be violent or threatening, but it is unreasonable to expect that there will not be any. That's just selfish entitlement: "the world should work this way because it pleases me so, regardless of facts".

[peterwwillis]

I think you and vinceguidry are really missing the point.

"I, and she, would rather deal with the consequences of being really attractive than to stop."

There should be no consequences to how you look, in general, but especially not the kind of consequences that women have to deal with.

Some people (probably most people) don't wear clothes just to get a reaction from others. They wear clothes because they just like them, and don't expect, and should not be forced to comply with, unwanted attention from anyone, simply because of how they choose to dress. vinceguidry stated as much, but then seemed to just go "oh well, that's how things are I guess."

The "real answer" of "what should I do" about being treated this way is to fight this misconception that unwanted behavior is simply expected and has to be either accepted or you have to change your looks. Nobody should have to change how they look to prevent being mistreated. This is not an acceptable choice, and you should not put up with it, nor should anyone.

And as far as comparing yourselves to women's experiences, yes, you may both get "undesireable attention" for the clothes you both choose to wear. But this treatment is not even remotely like the abuse women receive just for wearing a skirt, or having the audacity to have big breasts or a nice butt or a pretty face.

While you are welcome to have your own opinion, lumping your own experiences in with theirs and expressing an opinion about both as if they were one experience is not only factually inaccurate, it prevents discussion about the issue at hand, which is women receive unfair and undesireable treatment from men.

[yummyfajitas]

It's not possible to know attention is unwanted until after it's given. Sometimes such attention is wanted.

I know at least two women who sometimes complain about unwanted attention from men at tech conferences and similar circumstances. On the other hand, they both slept with me within a few hours of meeting me under the exact same circumstances as a result of exactly the same type of attention. They just happened to find me attractive but other folks unattractive. This doesn't make the unattractive folks hitting on them sexist villains. It just makes me a guy blessed with virtues like being tall and having a symmetric face.

The fact that women receive more attention is solely proportional to the convention that men must approach women. Feel free to try to change that - I'm sure nerds with approach anxiety everywhere will thank you if you succeed.

Attention, wanted or unwanted, is of course always proportional to how desirable a person is. That's the cost of being beautiful. Similarly, being a hot commodity in the job market has some costs like unwanted recruiter attention, in addition to benefits like six figure salaries.

Is it really a worthwhile use of our time and attention to make life marginally better for people who are already at the top of the heap? (Not that you've actually provided any mechanism for separating wanted and unwanted attention.) Why not focus your time and attention on the folks who are really suffering - e.g., low skill workers who are barred from working in the US, or unattractive men who get laid once a year at best? Why is increasing social inequality such a priority of yours?

[peterwwillis]

"It's not possible to know attention is unwanted until after it's given."

It is totally possible to know in many different circumstances. Let's take the_af's example: sexual attention in the workplace.

IT IS NEVER APPROPRIATE TO GIVE SOMEONE SEXUAL ATTENTION IN THE WORKPLACE. So, right there we've got at least one way to tell when someone wants attention or not.

Another way to tell is if you are engaged in any kind of business transaction. Paying money at the toll booth, getting your strawberry power boost at Smoothie King, getting an adjustment in yoga class, getting help from tech support. Do not hit on people during a business transaction.

Yet another big hint is any time you're interacting with people you don't know in a situation where they would neither expect nor look for attention. Ask yourself if they came there to get hit on - coffee shop? Nope, they came for coffee. Farmer's market? Nope, came for vegetables. At a tech conference? They came to listen to tech talks. They did not attend so you could hit on them.

--

On a more personal note: you, sir, are basically the stereotype of a misogynist womanizer. You go to tech conferences and hit on women, and even as they complain to your face about guys who pull the same shit you do, you completely ignore the fact that they're telling you they do not want that kind of attention there. The fact that you can convince them to sleep with you does not justify this behavior.

You say women receive more attention because of a social convention about hitting on people, completely missing the fact that most women do not want to fuck everyone they meet, like most men seem to. Women actually receive more attention because of a different social convention - that men believe they have the right to objectify and pursue sex from every woman they find attractive.

Finally, men who don't get laid are not suffering. Except maybe by suffering under the delusion that they are owed sex.

[the_af]

You more or less have to assume sexual attention is unwanted in the workplace. This is merely a default, and is sometimes the wrong assumption; the problem is that the error is more serious when you assume the attention is ok but wasn't.

"But I'm polite and I'll back off if Cute Tech Support Gal isn't uninterested" isn't enough. When multiple customers decide to hit on her, this is probably upsetting to her regardless of whether you in particular were willing to back off. Even if everyone backs off it's still upsetting. It negatively impacts her work experience. Especially if her coworker, Tech Support Guy, is not constantly flirted with and customers treat him more professionally instead.

To me it's self-evident that hitting on someone using a tech support form or chat is especially lame. We're not talking about a couple who are coworkers, go to lunch frequently, talk every day, and then something blossoms between them. I've no problem with that. Instead, this is creepy male customer behavior, which decide to abruptly hitting on a staff member just because she was a girl and they liked their tiny profile picture. This really screams "inappropriate".

[JoeAltmaier]

...and the big issue facing society is, how much of that is really programmable? Shall we chemically sterilize men on one end of the spectrum? Or sequester women in convents on the other. Which in-between ideas are really practical, and which fly in the face of a million years of evolution?

[vinceguidry]

> Some people (probably most people) don't wear clothes just to get a reaction from others.

The clothes people choose to wear becomes a part of their identity. They are choosing for a reason, that reason comes from them. Unless you're a kid and your parents are picking out your clothes for you, what you wear is a reflection of who you are.

Nobody deserves to receive negative attention from others based on how they dress, but it's a bit of wishful thinking to claim that there should be no consequences to how you look. People get what they work towards, not what they deserve. And two people can receive the same attention, one person can receive it positively, the other negatively. Without reading a person's mind, it's impossible to know how to 'safely' interact with them.

> he "real answer" of "what should I do" about being treated this way is to fight this misconception

Need to stop you right there. You can't demand that someone get political just to change their personal situation. Fighting for social justice is a privilege afforded to those who have managed to reach a point in their lives where they can afford to spend great deals of their time persuading others to change the way they think.

You and I have this privilege, most people do not. Many people, if they start trying to fight the "way things are", it will get them fired.

> While you are welcome to have your own opinion, lumping your own experiences in with theirs and expressing an opinion about both as if they were one experience is not only factually inaccurate, it prevents discussion about the issue at hand, which is women receive unfair and undesireable treatment from men.

Nobody is doing this. I expressed an experience I had that I felt had parallels to her experience. Both experiences had parallels to the ordinary one. I shared them because I felt they'd help illustrate what goes on under their noses. It's not quite as overt as in my case, but it still happens, more subtly.

I'm not trying to conflate, but to raise awareness.

[jazzyk]

Off-topic, but why is attention from "fat chicks and gays" undesirable? I personally do not discriminate when someone compliments me - it does not necessarily mean they want to have sex with me and even if they do, so what?

It is nice to be appreciated (especially since happens less and less often as you age :-))

[Grishnakh]

Well, what sucks is when you only get attention from groups that you have no interest in, and the people you are interested in seem to have no interest in you.

In a way, getting the interest from the undesirable people makes it even worse, because you're seeing the difference. If everyone ignored you, it wouldn't seem as bad I think. But if you're a straight dude, and you can't get a date to save your life, but gay men are constantly hitting on you, that's not going to do much for your self-esteem, it's going to make you question why you only seem to appeal to them.

[the_af]

Kudos to you, but it's not that easy for everyone to switch the undesirable attention off. In some work environments, women would have to basically look like men, bald spots and beards included, in order not to be hit on, ogled, treated with condescension, or all of the above.

[vinceguidry]

> I choose not to because that undesirable attention is a small price to pay for the desirable attention I receive.

That's exactly my point. But note that women don't really have this option. Men will hit on them no matter how much they downplay.