Is wolf-whistling a sex crime?

Soontobe "And can still affect a man's mental wellbeing." Perhaps that's why I have ended up with a warped sense of humour.
What did we learn (we were 15), to give as good as you got !
Our "hell" was good humoured, but a bit of groping etc did occur, especially at Christmas when a few drinks had been smuggled in.
I would never have considered reporting anything, I suspect it would have no longer been good humoured if we had, not that I felt bullied in any way.

I worked in a very male orientated environment when I was 17. There were six of us under the age of 25. Most of the men were middle aged and flirted with us constantly but one was only a few years old than us. We saw him as fair game and, in modern parlance, harassed him. We loved the fact that we could make him go red and squirm. It was all harmless fun.

There is a difference between harmless fun and rape. Unfortunately we've got so far into being correct now that everything is seen as harassment or incorrect.

It is traditional in this area to call anyone 'love'. This is no longer allowed on pain of dismissal in a lot of companies because of the potential for harassment allegations. When I was a teacher I was told off for calling children 'pet' or 'kiddies'. Apparently that was being disrespectful to the children. No child or parent complained but the SMT were afraid that someone would in the future.

Of course two wrongs don't make a right, but I'm hacked off with the automatic 'men are always in the wrong' thinking. I don't think that I can take the moral high ground simply by virtue of my sex. We wanted equality in a shed load of areas-well, along with that comes the responsibility to stand up for ourselves and learn to handle ourselves in situations we find uncomfortable. This girl wasn't in any physical danger...nobody was going to physically attack her in broad daylight in full view of others. Intimidated? Yes. Unwarranted? Yes. Coarse? Yes. So just sidestep and carry on your way. I don't think that this case had been at all helpful towards the real issues we still need to fight but has made us (women) out to be a bit of a feeble bunch, bit of a laughing stock really.

And please don't jump on the ' she shouidn't have to do that' bandwagon. She probably shouidn't, but this is real life and it isn't always the way we want it to be.

If you go on this site you will see the way people are affected:
www.everydaysexism.com

I was the recipient of some mild sexism from a woman the other day. She assumed the man who came into the shop just behind me was with me, saw me, looked past me and spoke to him. Fortunately he was polite and said I was before him. I went back to the same shop a little later that day and spoke to the manager. I asked him to speak to the staff about that kind of everyday sexism. I expect it is often uncosciously done, and probably was in that instance. All the more reason to raise awareness by speaking about it.

Digression from the main theme: I think many people "never want to feel offended again" but if you think about it, that's not really a realistic want, nor even reasonable. If one wants democracy one must also accept differences – a lot of them – and some of those differences one will not like. Some of them may well even "offend" you. You have to just put up with a certain amount of offended feelings if you really want a free and democratic society. I realise a lot of people don't agree with that but it is what I think.

I've been on the site and apart from the obviously horrible ones like the boys on the bus calling the girls whores or the strange man asking the woman if she was wet I couldn't see the problem.

The taxi driver asked the girl if she had a boyfriend and ignored what she was studying. Big deal. He said the place she was going was for clever people so perhaps he didn't feel intelligent enough to comment on her educational achievements.

As for the plaques. Welcome to my garden for women and genius at work for men....oh come on. What about the plaques that insult men? Yesterday I saw some that talked about grumpy old men and boring old farts. I'd much rather have it suggested that I was friendly with a nice garden than grumpy with a wind problem.

I think that what happened in your case pompa was going too far. Way too far.

It was the norm back in the 60's, never bothered me much. Even later in life, I also worked with a mainly female workforce, although by that time I was a production engineer and not working on the shop floor, but Christmas was only for the brave. I did once split the whole back seam of my trouser in the middle of the production line

Just to clarify... I think it is natural to want not to be offended ever, but I think it's unreasonable to really expect that state to be achieved. I am "offended" by all sorts of cruel practices and customs human beings still engage in. I find some political views offensive. And so on. I am not arguing that everyday sexism and sexist behaviour should not be tackled.

vampirequeen I don't feel it is "harmless fun" to deliberately set out to embarrass someone in the workplace so that they "squirm and go red" - whether the butt of the "joke" is a man or a woman. However, I think it is mainly women who are routinely treated to sexist or insulting remarks, who are touched inappropriately or who their personal space invaded - and women are potentially at more physical risk from men than the other way round.

katek We were talking about a particular case where a young woman complained about what she considered to be a pattern of continual sexual harassment. Who is saying 'men are always in the wrong'? Would you refer to a person who has made an official complaint about racist or homophobic behaviour and those who support their complaint as taking the "moral high ground"?

And women may well want equality but it isn't, as you imply, a "done deal" - as many of the comments reported on everyday sexism demonstrates. You say women should take the responsibility of standing up for ourselves - well, in the end, that is just what this young woman did. You say she wasn't in any danger - that nobody would attack her in broad daylight in full view of others. It is, I agree, unlikely - but I personally know of one case where a woman was seriously sexually assaulted in broad daylight and I'm sure there must be many more.

You may disagree with this person's actions but to suggest that this young woman's actions make women look "feeble" and turn them into a "bit of a laughing stock" is, I think, illogical.

She got her 15 minutes of fame.

We want equality. In that case we can't ask for any special treatment. No more doors held open so we can walk through first, no seats being given up for us, no more minding their language, no having heavy things carried for us or do we want it all ways.

I thought equality was about opportunity and life chances not about whether we should get upset about a wolf whistle.

I have warned my kids about the christmas scene pompa.
Go, but leave before the drink takes over.
about your trousers.

The drink of other people there, that is.

I don't want special treatment, but equality isn't too much to ask surely. I hold doors open for the person coming along behind me, it's simple good manners. I give up seats for people who are older, disabled or pregnant.
To be free from sexual harassment in public or private spaces would be a wonder. Sexual harassment is never acceptable as others have said, no matter if it's silly women deliberately humiliating and harassing boys/men. It's simply not acceptable and I don't understand why anyone would minimise, trivialise or otherwise suggest it's only a joke

But what constitutes sexual harassment? It all seems too subjective.

If a young man is flirting with a young woman and in the process puts his arm around her is that sexual harassment?

If a young woman is flirting with a young man and in the process puts her arm around him is that sexual harassment?

Aren't we just becoming too sensitive? Common sense has to prevail at some point. It's going to a be boring world if we're not allowed to appreciate the attractiveness of someone or never be shown that we're attractive.

Coming in a bit too late to read the entire thread, I apologise in advance if the thread has moved on but I remember being about 25 and starting work in a new company. I was terrified of one of the owners who used to corner me in the corridor or office and force me to give him a kiss before he would release me. It was horrible. I needed the job desperately and had no choice but to try and stay out of his way. I would hate to think my DD or DGD's would have to suffer anything similar.

VQ, you have it in one - subjective - one persons harassment is another's flirting, it's all a matter of personal opinion. The problem comes when "A" thinks he/she is flirting and "B" thinks he/she is being harassed. There are of course incidents where the harassment is in intended as such.

I agree some harassment is intended as such and that has to be dealt with but did the men who whistled realise the woman felt harassed? Did the young man who said, "Hello," intend to harass her or was he trying to strike up a conversation in order to get to know her better?

If we don't don't want someone to say/do things we don't like then we have to tell them. If the young woman had said to any of the men or phoned the company to say that she didn't like it and they'd continued then it would have been harassment but as she didn't give any indication that she was unhappy with the situation why shouldn't they think it she was OK with it?

I despair - grown up folk who insist they don't know the difference between a bit of 'harmless' flirting and sexual harassment. gillybob, you can imagine this thread has become polarised but your experience is very similar to many others who have posted here. It's horrible isn't it.

Gillybob, your experience is blatant harassment if not worse.

gilly that was awful behaviour and certainly sexism /harrassment.

I wonder what our responses would be if the girl in the OPs story had been physically sexually molested by a workman from the site?
Would anyone be saying, 'Well why did she not report the whistling and sexual banter?'

Sexism is about imbalance of power. A group of men shouting overtly sexual remarks or whistling at a girl, only men making the rules that impact on women. Women workers systematically teasing the junior male clerk etc. It is not a healthy way for any society to function! We need to start thinking about each other as people not as men/women with sexual 'potential'!

If I was at a party / pub and I met a person that I liked and thought they liked me too and all things were 'equal' I would feel OK if I /they made a move ( arm round the shoulder...not a grope!!) that suggested they were sexually attracted.

Katek men always in the wrong... can I suggest that you take 5 minutes to look at the statistics about who commits the following types of crimes:
Murders
Rapes
Indecent assaults
etc
In fact, look at the figures for crime in general. Are the gender discrepancies due to poor men being blamed too often?
And is the intimidation felt by women in a range of circumstances possibly anything to do with the fact that men commit the above crimes rather more often than women?
vampirequeen sounds like you only bothered to read the latest of a huge number of posts on everyday sexism.

We are not talking about a situation where a man and a woman feel a mutual attraction and are flirting with one another on an equal basis. We are talking about a situation where a young woman on her own is being subjected to the unwanted attentions of a group of men, one of whom then chooses to block her path by standing in front of her. I think if that had happened to me as a young woman, I would have found it humiliating and possibly a bit frightening.

As a matter of common courtesy, I would pass through a door and hold it open for the person behind me to prevent it from swinging back in their face. If I thought that person required more assistance - say they were pushing a buggy - I would hold the door open for them as they passed through it. I would not expect a man to make a point of going in front of me to open the door and let me pass through it before him. I don't think many women would expect or even want that these days.

I think it is reasonable for a relatively able bodied man or woman to give up their seat for an elderly person, someone with mobility problems, a person holding a baby or young child, a pregnant woman or someone who is feeling unwell. It's about having consideration for those people who appear to require a little more assistance, whether they be male or female.

But she wasn't physically assaulted. She was wolf whistled and one man said, "Hello."

If we're going to go into the land of 'what if' then we need to put all men under house arrest in windowless rooms so that they can't even look at a women in case she feels harassed.

Are we really going to paint all men as potential rapists and murderers?

I think someone (I know i should read back) said that wolf whistles are more common, I have not heard a wolf whistle for many years (or any sort of whistle for that matter, but that is another thread). We had building work going on at the bottom of our garden for about a year, the site foreman came round one evening to apologise for the bad language on the site and said it would stop. We had not heard any, some pretty bad singing, but no swearing. Maybe living in a village we are insulated from this type of behaviour.
Before you jump on me, I don't doubt this sort of behaviour exists, I have just not witnessed it.