Is verbal harassment common at the gym? And do women or men catch more of it?

tbright1965 wrote: »

Second, it's right there in the post to which I replied, "You shouldn't feel painted by the brush unless you identify with that behavior."

That's not asking anyone to listen, it's telling people how they should feel. It sets up the false equivalency of if you take offense, you must be guilty.

Why are you taking offense when no one is talking about you? If you don't behave in the ways described, it's not about you. Women talking about the reality of their lives is not about you. Again, you read an accusation into my statement that was not there. I'm saying that if you don't identify with the behavior described, there's no reason for you to feel accused. No reason for you to feel like the conversation is about you. No reason to say "not all men" because nobody said "all men."

No one is saying all men do the things described. They're saying that for many women, the repeated experiences with that behavior by some men, and the need to weigh whether any given place they might go or thing they might do is worth the risk, is really wearing/stultifying/restricting/other adjectives that may be true for other women. When you try to turn it into an argument about "not all men," you're making it about you and not about the women who have had that experience. If you don't do these things, nobody's talking about you.

But we can. You imply you don't do these things. How often do you call out the men who do? How often do you call out other guys in a guys-only space when they objectify women or tell stories about sexual conquests that involve women too drunk to give consent, or passed out completely, or in which they promise to give her a lift home and then pull over somewhere isolated and figure that if she doesn't actually scream and try to scratch their eyes out (because raising the stakes to a physical fight with someone stronger, heavier, with a longer reach who by this time may already be on top of you is clearly a good idea in all cases, right?), she's good with whatever happens? How often do you call out other guys? Because you wanted this conversation to be about you.


To get back to the original point of the thread (and I have said this elsewhere, or even in this thread -- there have been a couple similar ones), in my experience, gyms are among the safest places in my experience to be a woman and not have to worry about being there alone and the ways some guys might behave.

But there are a lot of other health-positive things I don't do because of the risk of harassment or worse -- and it's a scale of bad behavior, pretending that we're only going to talk about orders to "smile" is ridiculous, because a woman can never know whether it's going to end there. There's a great trail that starts in a park near me that I could get on and bike for miles and eventually connect to other trails that go on for scores of miles. But I won't do that alone. The risk is just way too high.

I don't think anyone said unwanted touching is okay.

In response to my saying

She didn't say all guys. It doesn't take 100% of guys being jerks who think they're entitled to have women pay attention to them, smile at them, talk to them, and let them touch them for those kinds of experiences to pervade women's lives. You shouldn't feel painted by the brush unless you identify with that behavior.

tbright1965 said

Let's unpack this, you suggest that someone shouldn't feel something.

Okay, so if someone said you shouldn't feel threatened when the bad man looks at you, are you okay with that?

I just want to know the standard. Who gets to decide what someone should or shouldn't feel?
Is it not okay for men to tell women what they should or shouldn't feel "Come on, smile for me..."

But it's okay for women to tell men what they should or shouldn't feel, "You shouldn't feel painted..."

You see, from my perspective, those are exactly the same thing. The words are different, but the pattern is the same. Someone projecting upon another what they should really be feeling. Invalidating what they are feeling or experiencing and replacing it with what the speaker has decided they should feel.

So what's the standard here?

May I request that it be consistent and evenly applied?

And then I said

That's either saying that unwanted touching is OK or pretending it doesn't exist. Sweeping it under the rug. Ignoring the fact that it happens. It's just about being told to "feel something," not about being told what to do ("smile") and being told that you're uptight if you object to someone putting their hand on your shoulder or your waist or wherever it goes next.

And then lemurcat2 said

Quotes are messed up, but I really don't get how you get that from what tbright said.

The charitable thing would be to ask him if that's what he meant.

Yeah, when I saw they were messed up it wouldn't let me edit it. I think I've fixed them here.*

I said something. Then someone said nobody is talking about that. His response to my saying it was to ignore it. He even quoted just that portion I've quoted here in the second quote block (but without the bolding I added because apparently it was in invisible pixels nobody could read) and still insisted nobody was talking about that.

I make an effort in almost every interaction I have with people to assume the best when it comes to their intentions.
But I have been around the block too many times with the rhetorical device represented by "not all men" and "all lives matter" to be willing to always be the one in the conversation making the effort to be "charitable" when someone is trying to derail that conversation to undercut the people explaining the reality they live in and instead make the conversation about themselves.


*well, I didn't fix them the first try here. Trying again, but I'm killing the auto attribution as I'm afraid that has gotten messed up, and I don't want to misattribute something by mistake.

I was very specific where I commented on the part about men shouldn’t feel ....

I made no comment about the touching part of the post.

I thought it was obvious the touching was wrong and didn’t say anything.

I should have been more clear.

One can be critical of ONE part of a post without invalidating the entire post.

Perhaps this is the disconnect here.

Thoughts?

Last week a man who was old enough to be my grandfather watched me doing hip thrusts and said in a really creepy way.

"Well done girl. Are you feeling the burn?"

I almost threw up a bit!

I have been hassled by another woman at the gym, at least until I called management. She would get in my face in the locker room, every time we were there at the same time and were alone ( I go really early in the AM), and flip out over crazy stuff like me "needing to learn to share space" when we were the only 2 there, as well as making nasty comments about me being middle aged. Or she would accuse me of bizarre stuff like smearing makeup around. The manager apparently spoke to her about it, because it abruptly stopped; however, she still does things like come up and stand/put her stuff really close to me with music blaring from her phone, etc. I did tell her and the manager that if she got aggressive I had no problem calling the police, but aside from her childish antics, she's backed way down, and I'm good with that. This middle aged woman doesn't have time for middle school locker room bullying...

FitFamilyGuy wrote: »

Personally I have a workout partner and talk with them between sets or I have earphones in and keep to myself. After 26 years I've never had a problem aside from the odd guy (a few times ever) who may seem a little impatient when I asked how many sets he has left on a piece of equipment.

I would say that younger fit girls in the free weight section appear to be the celebrities of the gym. If you watch the eyes of most males they are usually staring directly or indirectly through a mirror but I've yet to see anything dramatic come of it.

Overall, I get that there can be an intimidation factor but as a lot of other posts said it isn't much different than any other new place. Most people are just doing their own thing and worried about their own progress. To each their own. We all start somewhere. It would be unfortunate to not go for it and change one's life for the better.

^All of this...

I have experienced several debates/(proverbial)backstabbing/arguments, but in the end, it turned out, that the participants all knew each other outside the gym, some for many years. They just ran into each other (literally) inside the gym.
Not sure how they do in the cardio section at the gym, as I never use any of the machines. We have some competitive bodybuilders in the weight room, though, and we tend to cut them some slack, when they get close to a competition. No brain can reasonably function on this much testosterone, and SO FEW carbs... But we like them, and they usually do better after competition and the first pizza...
As for bullies trying to get into someone's face...pointing out that there is a 20 lbs dumbbell hovering above their toes, should make them back up fairly quickly... The beauty of lifting and strengthening the back: It also helps strengthening the back bone, IMO.

Happy lifting!