Should I stop saying, "Hello." to women I encounter?

[junebug17]

I'm probably going to ramble a bit, and probably not be very clear, which I have a tendency towards these days, so I apologize in advance. That video really disturbed me and made me think. It made me examine my own comfort level, and the tricky part of the issue is that the level varies from woman to woman but I guess I can only speak for myself. The one situation where I would feel comfortable with a man saying hello is if I was out for a walk in my suburban neighborhood and a guy walking his yellow lab glanced over and said hello in a casual way. It's normal to say a quick hello to others in my neighborhood and everyone greets each other. And maybe in an airplane if I guy said hello as he was sitting down in the seat next to me, just a quick acknowledgement in a normal tone of voice. It seems pretty standard to give a short greeting in that situation, at least to me. But I'm thinking of other situations - I would feel uncomfortable if a man said hello to me as I was walking down a crowded street, in a store, in a restaurant, on a bus, or some fairly public place where I felt there was no reason for any kind of greeting and I was being singled out.

Well, I was right, I rambled, but I guess the bottom line is that, for me, it depends on the environment, tone of voice, and overall demeanor of the person. I'm vaguely bothered by my "it's ok in certain situations but not others" response but I think all of the things I just mentioned do come into play, and I can honestly say that in most situations I would prefer to be ignored lol. I do think a good rule of thumb for a man is if he wouldn't say hello to a man in a certain situation, he shouldn't say it to a woman either.

 

[Dancing Fire]

Perhaps I look like the back end of a bus, or I give out some sort of "don't mess with me" kind of aura, however, I have not experienced any notable harassment that made me feel uncomfortable.

I was flashed by a drunken youth once. He was walking with a group of youths, almost certain to be new uni students on their way back from a fresher week party.

I took one look, and shouted back "I have seen better!" and walked on. They were rather surprised by the response.

DK

better or bigger?..

 

[Circe]

Kenny, I'm perfectly happy to have people say "hello" to me. But there are caveats (and here comes the thread jack):

"Hello" (literally the word HELLO) is *typically* a friendly greeting and I tend to receive it as such, unless there are other factors to take into account. If we vary from the word "hello" though and just go to a general greeting using other words of acknowledgement, then maybe not so much. I had a guy say to me not long ago, "How you doin' today?" That is NOT "hello." It is initiating an engagement, which I made very clear I DID NOT whish to have. The incident happened during the afternoon (still daylight) and on a street that has car traffic, but not a lot of foot traffic. The background info is just to show that the environment plays a large part in the scenario, and that is just one example, but FOR ME anything other than "hello" from may put me on guard and I am prepared to react in a much more aggressive manner than the other person expects. Not in a physical manner, but I will speak VERY loudly and clearly and make serious eye contact in a Do Not Fvck With Me sort of way. For instance: "I. Am. Good." (Level voice, no raising of the voice at the end of the words.) Eye contact. Move on.

I think part of it is I am a small person and that makes me hyper aware of my surroundings because I can see that someone might mistake me as a person who would be easy to approach or subdue so I do my best to make sure they do not have that impression, even going so far as to make eye contact and give a greeting first when there is someone that makes me uncomfortable. It catches them off guard.

Another things is about confidence. I've read a number of times that the greatest deterrent to a would be harasser is to move with confidence. I see women (and forgive me for generalizing here, I'm sure this applies to men to, but I happen to notice it in women) who clutch their purses tight to their bodies, walk head down, and with a stiff gait. My guess is if someone is out looking for a victim (and I use "victim" in a general sense; someone to verbally harass, someone to mug, someone to attempt physical contact with) they are going for the person who is not moving with confidence before they are going to approach someone who is striding right along. The exceptions of course are the aggressors who can read the cues or body language, or who don't care about the fight that a confident person vs. a non-confident person might put up. In those cases all bets are off on what might happen.

So Kenny, back to your question (as I have seriously digressed because this is something that I've thought about and feel strongly about), I think it's absolutely fine to assess the situation and say "hello" to someone in a way that it is obvious to them that no harm is about to come. But just be careful, knowing how very sensitive some people can be, and don't do it in an scenario that might cause the other person apprehension. (And when I say "sensitive" I don't mean in any OVERLY sensitive way, I just mean sensitive to the things that women are aware *can* happen.)

Whew -- I bet you're sorry when I post a reply to one of your threads! That's what you get for asking good questions!

Totally agree that this is a case-by-case thing that every woman needs to gauge for herself, every time. I'm generally pretty physically confident: some guys take this in stride, some guys take it as a ... provocation, almost.

Comparative examples: the time I was walking with a lady friend in the Village in NYC vs. the time I was walking with a lady friend in San Jose in Cali. The first time, we were going to meet friends and happened to be dressed kind of stereotypically femme/butch. She was definitely tense, having grown up in a small town: I grew up here, I'm used to it, and as these things go, the guys were on the lower-to-middle end of the scale of the guys in the video; they were saying perfectly normal things, just in a fairly insinuating tone while following us I was fine responding in just the way you're describing - definitively. After a few minutes, the penny dropped (into the wrong slot, but, hey), and one guy hit the other on the arm and said to his friend, "Hey, man, have some respect - that's her girlfriend!" Oy. On the one hand, I'll take what I can get to get out of the awkward situation. On the other hand, that one balances nicely on the edge of "women are only off-limits if they 'belong' to somebody else" and its corollary, "if they're not into us, they must be lesbians." But it was early evening, the guys were sober and good natured, we both walked away feeling exasperated but not endangered.

The other time, a my friend and I (different friend) were at a conference and stepped out for dinner. We walked past a trio of guys standing on the corner outside of a bar. They led with a couple of fairly graphic descriptions of what they'd like to do to us. She and I are both city-dwellers who know the drill all too well, and neither of us felt like it was the time for a snappy comeback: for those guys, any response would have been escalation. Hell, NO response was escalation: they shouted a variety of charming things like "****ing dykes!" at us as we just walked away. It cast a bit of a pall over the whole evening, and, for that matter, the conference - my friend didn't feel comfortable walking the city the rest of the time we were there.

The reason all too many women are reacting strongly to this video while some guys just aren't getting it - not you, Kenny, obviously, what with starting this thread - is that you're lucky if the difference between the two kinds of likely response is that clear-cut. There have been three cases this month that I know of of women being assaulted (and in at least one case, killed) when a guy flipped over from "just annoying" to "assault with a deadly weapon" in the time it took for a lady to say, "Sorry, I'm married." Messed up doesn't even begin to cover it.

 

[Calliecake]

Well Kenny, You certainly gave us something to think about with this post.

The one thing I've noticed is we all seem have the creep-o-meter going for us. Momhappy's comments about that working from a mile away really is a true statement.

 

[kenny]

Thank you, all.
It makes a lot of sense what you are describing and I appreciate y'all taking the time to answer what might seem like another inane question.

What I'm hearing is, while the video had an important message there's no sea-change in the air.
I do of course get the situational side of the answer.

Good point about the density of people ... while I practice that I had never heard it articulated or thought about it ...
Walking in a residential neighborhood where you might encounter one person every 10 minutes = saying Hello is fine.
Walking in a busy commercial district where you will pass by 5 people per second = saying Hello is whacko.

 

[kenny]

Well Kenny, You certainly gave us something to think about with this post.
The one thing I've noticed is we all seem have the creep-o-meter going for us.

I've noticed lots written about how differently men and women react to the video.
I think there is an explanation for why most men see this differently from most women ... IOW, "men don't get it".

Think of zillions of years of evolution.
Men who fathered children with many women produced more kids ... who also passed on dad's horndog trait their many kids.
A monogamous man could produce only a tiny fraction of the kids that the wandering horndog could.
Do the math; over time the promiscuous men displaced the monogamous ones.
Sure, modern culture offers rewards for monogamy but that does not just vanish zillions of years of hardwired evolution that rewarded male promiscuity.

Not only are men wired for 15 sex partners a day, they are usually stronger than women.
Women are WAY more likely to get attacked or raped than men are.
It is reasonable that they must remain more guarded than men.

Of course a guy on the street, saying DAAAAMN GIRL! is not the same as rape, but there is some chance it could lead to something very bad for her.
Even many guys who would never rape WILL try to get as much nookie as possible, and are always looking for another opportunity for sex.
Like the lottery, you can't win if you don't play.

At some level men will never get it.
Men are wired differently.
Nature/evolution/biology did not make men the walking targets that women are.

I'm only trying to get it because I've heard this same perplexing narrative from women for over and over for 50 years ... so I'm going to concede that their concerns are legit.

 

[Circe]

Well Kenny, You certainly gave us something to think about with this post.
The one thing I've noticed is we all seem have the creep-o-meter going for us.

I've noticed lots written about how differently men and women react to the video.
I think there is an explanation for why most men see this differently from most women ... IOW, "men don't get it".

Think of zillions of years of evolution.
Men who fathered children with many women produced more kids ... who also passed on dad's horndog trait their many kids.
A monogamous man could produce only a tiny fraction of the kids that the wandering horndog could.
Do the math; over time the promiscuous men displaced the monogamous ones.
Sure, modern culture offers rewards for monogamy but that does not just vanish zillions of years of hardwired evolution that rewarded male promiscuity.

Not only are men wired for 15 sex partners a day, they are usually stronger than women.
Women are WAY more likely to get attacked or raped than men are.
It is reasonable that they must remain more guarded than men.

Of course a guy on the street, saying DAAAAMN GIRL! is not the same as rape, but there is some chance it could lead to something very bad for her.
Even many guys who would never rape WILL try to get as much nookie as possible, and are always looking for another opportunity for sex.
Like the lottery, you can't win if you don't play.

At some level men will never get it.
Men are wired differently.
Nature/evolution/biology did not make men the walking targets that women are.

I'm only trying to get it because I've heard this same perplexing narrative from women for over and over for 50 years ... so I'm going to concede that their concerns are legit.

I dunno ... evolutionary sociology always makes me a little nervous, because all too often it seems like it's being used as a backwards formation to justify the way things are (examples like, women like shopping more because they were the gatherers! or women go for flashy males because of peacocks spring to mind).

I think the way things are is frequently its own reward for people who uphold the status quo.

I've had the "catcalling is bad" conversation with a lot of the men in my life. Almost all of them have been known to say some variation of, "Oh, he didn't mean it like that," or "I never see that sort of thing when I'm out! Maybe you did ____X_____?" (for X fill in anything from "went to the wrong part of town" to "dressed provocatively). Even my own father - the guy who taught me to make a fist, told me to aim for the eyes, throat, or balls, and gave me my first taser at 14 - even he couldn't resist bemoaning the good 'ole days, when men could tell women their hair looked pretty without facing a potential harassment complaint. Hard to usher in an era when one might get oneself into trouble, I suppose.

My theory is that people (in general, not just men) tend to automatically identify with whoever has the greatest superficial resemblance to them. And for whatever reason, "similar genitalia" trumps "not being a sleazeball" if a woman is telling a man an anecdote involving her and another man. I also think a lot of men defensively assume if we're telling these stories, because of that resemblance, we're indicting them. Generally speaking, we're not - we're asking for sympathy. And maybe hoping that though the guys in question might not have noticed yet, after seeing the situation through our eyes, they might start keeping their own out ... might maybe interfere the next time they see a crew of strong young guys harassing some high school girl.

Girl can dream.

 

[Dee*Jay]

I'm on my phone so this will be brief, but I wanted to touch on one of Circe's points. A man alone is a whole nother animal than men (plural) in a pack, and especially men in a pack who have been drinking (or doing whatever). In the pack scenario I am much more inclined to just keep walking because I think that situation can spiral out of control very quickly.

 

[partgypsy]

I think it would be weird to stop acknowledging other people, though I don't live in a big city. Sometimes I'm just getting to where i'm going and I'm not really making eye contact, etc. But then if I am walking slower and more in a neighborhood, I do a a nod and a wave if make eye contact.
If someone is with their dog may ask if it's friendly and pet it.

If the person seems preoccupied/nonsocial/not making eye contact, again wouldn't initiate anything.

 

[ericad]

Nothing wrong with a casual and polite, "How ya doin?", which all women know is very different from a leering "How YOU doin???"

I say hello to people on the bus, on the elevator, etc. It's the polite thing to do and very different from the other kind of hello. One's intentions come through in tone and facial expression - I wouldn't worry about it!

 

[GliderPoss]

Nothing wrong with a casual and polite, "How ya doin?", which all women know is very different from a leering "How YOU doin???"

I say hello to people on the bus, on the elevator, etc. It's the polite thing to do and very different from the other kind of hello. One's intentions come through in tone and facial expression - I wouldn't worry about it!

THIS EXACTLY Erica has hit the nail on the head - I love when people are friendly and I will often smile, nod or say hello, good morning etc. Any comments about appearance/body are strictly off limits and generally people know who has good intentions and who has otherwise! I've lived in a 2 country towns and at last count 4 capital cities and I have NEVER experienced overt harassment like that in the video. At least half of the comments in the video I would not have considered "harrassment" per say but the rest were bl**dy awful...