My conversation Me: i dont want marriage or children, i never have Them: youll change your mind/youre too young to think that/you havent met the right man yet/tell me in 10years when youre married with kids etc My boyfriends conversation Him: i dont want marriage or children. I never have Them: what about your partner? Him: she doesnt want that either Them: sweet/lucky/highfives all round Why cant i get that reaction for knowing what i want with my life? Why is he lucky but im deluded?
I was followed around by a male coworker, and when my friends and I were preparing for bed in our at-work dorm, he continuously knocked on the door to interrupt us and ask us to play a game with him in his dorm (which was against the rules). Later at a staff pool night, he followed my friends around for an hour until another man got between them and stopped him. This has happened multiple times; one girl stopped working here because she was creeped out by it.
I’m 17 and work at a coffee shop in a small town and my Everyday Sexism occurrence is old men coming and mentioning how they “love it when pretty girls make them coffee” and my only male coworker is constantly joking about how “at least here women are in their right place”
A male coworker, let’s call him L, was discussing this other male coworker, let’s call him G. So G is married to a woman, and has a couple of kids, and they are apparently having trouble finding reliable childcare. So occasionally the wife will take time off, and occasionally the husband will, in order to pick up their kids. So L’s comment was that “G’s wife decided she wanted to work, so now he has to take time off work to deal with this childcare situation.” How do I even start on how sexist this is? First of all, BOTH parents are working to support the family, and BOTH parents are compromising to make it work. So how is it the wife’s fault? And I don’t know who “decided they want to work”, you HAVE to work in order to make money to survive. They probably needed two incomes.
“Hey tuck down your shirt” I hear a male coworker point out to be honest a little skin was showing, nothing embarrassing, so I just tucked it down I kept on working. “Hey, I’m just trying to protect you” he said a little more loudly, I just forced a weak smile his way and kept on working. ‘Protect you’ those words echoed in the back of my head, protect me? Protect me from what? You? This? Me? Society? Did I need protection? It was just a small strip of skin about half an inch, not even my underwear was showing, was it that distracting? Was I in such danger? In our office most of the employees are female, about 60% , even our COO is female, so why did I need so much protection and why did I feel such shame and discomfort from that comment. Maybe he didn’t mean to make me uncomfortable but why would I need protection for such a small strip of skin showing, this happened a while back and it still lingers on the back of my mind.