Men can help me better – Part 1

I worked tech support for 2 years in college, and when I wasn’t working phones, I was working the desk. It was set up in our university library, so any student/faculty visiting the library could get face-to-face support.

One afternoon I was working alongside a male colleague; we were both the same age, etc.

A male student approached the front of the queue (which was empty). Both my male colleague and I looked up. The person looked at me, looked at my colleague, and didn’t really know who to approach. To be fair, one of us should have said “I can help you” or something, but we didn’t and just waited to see who he would approach.

After a second or two, the student stuttered out sheepishly, “uhh I think he can help me better” and went to my male colleague.

At the time I was kind of relieved that I didn’t have to help him, so I could keep working on my homework. But his comment still stuck with me. Why was my male colleague able to help him better? And I know the student wasn’t being mean about it, that was just his off-guard response.