Is it complicated to say "No" to men?

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Is it complicated to say "No" to men?

Postby SandTea » Mon Jan 15, 2018 10:40 pm

Aziz Ansari got called out for sexual inappropriateness towards a date. This Mashable link says that saying "no" is more complex than it seems. Men might become enraged and it could be dangerous is the reason and I don't totally disbelieve that but I'm just not in the position to know. So I'm asking if that is a worry any respondents have and if it is with every man or just the ones with bad vibes?

You can ignore the Ansari links, that was just what spurred this thought but I'm not against talking about those in relation to the question.
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Re: Is it complicated to say "No" to men?

Postby iMURDAu » Mon Jan 15, 2018 10:56 pm

I didn't agree with the mashable article. It did make me lol quite heartily while I shoveled food in my mouth at work.

If a woman is so terrified of how a man might react then why would she put herself in a situation where she'd be alone with him?

This is how confusion happens. A woman says something happened that wasn't okay and never tells the man that it wasn't okay. Hinting around doesn't always work with men, especially when they're feeling all sex nuts and retard strong. You can't leave things open for interpretation. You have to be emphatic.

When my wife and I were first dating there was a guy who kept hanging around her job hitting on her and she wasn't interested but didn't "want to be mean" so she just blew off his advances. Finally she got fed up and told him to leave her alone because she has a boyfriend and isn't interested in anyone else. That worked.

See there's the whole thing of "playing hard to get". Being polite and nice means you're not saying no. Not saying no means there's a chance of yes. Again, left open for interpretation. Hard language and tough actions send a concrete message. Sure a sicko would just ignore those but they'd ignore everything else in their pursuit also.
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Re: Is it complicated to say "No" to men?

Postby IamNotCreepy » Mon Jan 15, 2018 11:17 pm

I think this particular case has to do with differing expectations: he was looking for some easy sex, a one-night stand, and she was looking for a relationship. He acted based on how he perceived the situation, of course now that has backfired.

As to the general situation, I think this might not be the audience for it: most of the girls here either don't have much sexual experience or are likely to seek it in a long-term relationship, not a one-night stand. That being said, here are my (not very qualified) thoughts on the matter:

My first reaction is, "Duh. Don't do things you don't want to do." Setting aside the societal and situational pressures (which are a whole other conversation), the main concern seems to be that women in that situation tend to fear that if they don't go along with it, the man will get violent.

This causes all sorts of thoughts and reactions to explode in my brain. Most guys wouldn't react violently, would they? What's the harm in declining and then moving on? What are the odds that the guy she is with is actually the violent type? I don't know, and that's where my background falls short to understand the situation -- I am the monogamous type who has only been with the one woman.

But I guess for these women the threat is enough to compel them to comply, even if they are not into it. And this brings on a whole other set of questions. Is it really that risky to decline? If she is going to feel violated either if she complies reluctantly or if he is forceful, is it worth the chance to try to decline first? Can she try to decline, and then comply if he seems forceful?

I don't know. I can only speak from my own experience, my own monogamous thought process. I hate that women have to be put in this position. And I don't know what the right answer is.

But I see both sides of these types of stories. I see where the woman can feel pressured, even violated, acting out of fear of a greater trauma. But I can also see the side of the men who go into a situation with a particular expectation and might, in the moment, miss the cues of what the woman is thinking because they think she would object like a man would in that particular situation.

/shrug
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Re: Is it complicated to say "No" to men?

Postby sunglasses » Tue Jan 16, 2018 12:12 am

Didn't read the mashable thing. But I've been down for casual hook ups and long term relationships and yeah sometimes you after quite pressured to say yes. And why it may not be common for men tip be violent when they hear no, that there is a chance is often I our minds. Women have been shot for not giving out their phone numbers. Honestly I've been more pressured to say yes when I was younger and on long term situations. Women have been raised to brew pleasers often. This falls into it. And many times men are physically stronger. This notion can be in the back of our minds.

But Anzari? He's short af. I'm not sure I'd have felt threatened by him, but I wasn't in the situation.
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Re: Is it complicated to say "No" to men?

Postby Learned Nand » Tue Jan 16, 2018 12:21 am

iMURDAu wrote:If a woman is so terrified of how a man might react then why would she put herself in a situation where she'd be alone with him?

Maybe she only became terrified upon seeing his behavior when they were already alone?

This is how confusion happens. A woman says something happened that wasn't okay and never tells the man that it wasn't okay. Hinting around doesn't always work with men, especially when they're feeling all sex nuts and retard strong. You can't leave things open for interpretation. You have to be emphatic.

The obligation is on the party seeking consent, not the party trying to deny it. It doesn't matter that she said it wasn't okay. What matters is that she didn't say it was okay. In the absence of that kind of affirmative consent, Ansari wouldn't be justified in presuming it.
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Re: Is it complicated to say "No" to men?

Postby NathanLoiselle » Tue Jan 16, 2018 12:52 am

No, it is not hard to say no.
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Re: Is it complicated to say "No" to men?

Postby Marcuse » Tue Jan 16, 2018 1:08 am

I must admit to finding myself utterly baffled by the argument that one doesn't say no to a man because they might become violent. If you think someone will hit you if you don't have sex with them, you don't want to be having sex with them, right? If you think someone will rape you if you don't agree to have sex with them, you don't want to be having sex with them, and materially how is agreeing to something you don't consent to different from them forcing the issue in this hypothetical? Both situations end with a violent sexual assault.

So personally I can't fathom the logic of the "I agreed to it because I was scared" argument. I can get the idea that some people make stupid decisions to agree to something because it seemed like a good idea then they regretted it, but I feel like that's a different (but still traumatic) class of experience.

But really this does lead us to examine the circumstances whereby people are alone with people they don't know very well and don't know their motives enough to know whether or not they're going to become violent when refused sex. Maybe I'm being old fashioned with this, but if you're not feeling safe enough to know that someone won't physically attack you if you don't do what they want then it's probably a safe bet to say you don't have any business being alone in a sexual situation with them. There's plenty of ways to date and have fun without making yourself vulnerable, and that goes for both men and women, and our culture of unrestricted consequence-free sex does tend to lead younger, more vulnerable and more impressionable people into situations where they're not feeling safe, and belittles and ridicules approaches to dating and sex that would encourage people to be safer.
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Re: Is it complicated to say "No" to men?

Postby Learned Nand » Tue Jan 16, 2018 1:13 am

Marcuse wrote:Both situations end with a violent sexual assault.

One ends with sexual assault, the other ends with violent sexual assault. In other words, people may think they're faced with the choice between being raped, and being raped and beaten.
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Re: Is it complicated to say "No" to men?

Postby Marcuse » Tue Jan 16, 2018 1:14 am

aviel wrote:
Marcuse wrote:Both situations end with a violent sexual assault.

One ends with sexual assault, the other ends with violent sexual assault. In other words, people may think they're faced with the choice between being raped, and being raped and beaten.


Rape and sexual assault is always considered a violent act.
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Re: Is it complicated to say "No" to men?

Postby Learned Nand » Tue Jan 16, 2018 1:18 am

Marcuse wrote:Rape and sexual assault is always considered a violent act.

I figured you were distinguishing the two because otherwise the phrase "violent sexual assault" seemed redundant. In any case then, see the second sentence of the post.
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Re: Is it complicated to say "No" to men?

Postby DamianaRaven » Tue Jan 16, 2018 1:48 am

Marcuse wrote:Rape and sexual assault is always considered a violent act.


As with any violent act, it can certainly be made more violent, which is usually what the victim fears. Too many people mistake compliance for consent, which leads to stupid questions like "well, why didn't you fight back." Because he had six inches and 75 pounds on me - that's why I decided to avoid engaging in hand-to-hand combat that might have ended in me being raped with a fist instead of... y'know.
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Re: Is it complicated to say "No" to men?

Postby Marcuse » Tue Jan 16, 2018 1:55 am

DamianaRaven wrote:
Marcuse wrote:Rape and sexual assault is always considered a violent act.


As with any violent act, it can certainly be made more violent, which is usually what the victim fears. Too many people mistake compliance for consent, which leads to stupid questions like "well, why didn't you fight back." Because he had six inches and 75 pounds on me - that's why I decided to avoid engaging in hand-to-hand combat.


Believe me I understand the difference between compliance and consent. But I also am unsure about the likelihood of people being as aggressively violent as people fear. Of course there's nutcases who'll do what they want and don't care who they hurt, but if the recent scandals have taught us anything, it's that people who get away with unacceptable behaviour do so in a hinterland between yes and no where nobody is talking. One thing we could do better to have is a more frank and open culture about the vagaries of sex and being prepared to say no is one of the things we could do to make it absolutely clear that shit like that isn't okay.

I'd also like to point out that it's generally not done to engage in discussion of degrees of victimhood normally. A person who's been sexually assaulted isn't less of a victim than someone who was raped and beaten. The two are both hideous crimes that affect the victims for the rest of their lives, and I'm worried about the predilection people have to use degrees of abuse to justify failing to act because of a fear when if you look at it the other way it's minimising the experiences of people who were "just" sexually assaulted.
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Re: Is it complicated to say "No" to men?

Postby iMURDAu » Tue Jan 16, 2018 1:55 am

aviel wrote:
iMURDAu wrote:If a woman is so terrified of how a man might react then why would she put herself in a situation where she'd be alone with him?

Maybe she only became terrified upon seeing his behavior when they were already alone?

This is how confusion happens. A woman says something happened that wasn't okay and never tells the man that it wasn't okay. Hinting around doesn't always work with men, especially when they're feeling all sex nuts and retard strong. You can't leave things open for interpretation. You have to be emphatic.

The obligation is on the party seeking consent, not the party trying to deny it. It doesn't matter that she said it wasn't okay. What matters is that she didn't say it was okay. In the absence of that kind of affirmative consent, Ansari wouldn't be justified in presuming it.


If she was terrified once the behavior starts then it's time to get out asap, contact the police, do something. But the whole thing of having in the back of your mind that something bad might happen should mean that you'd listen to your instincts and avoid the situation. Especially if there's no established trust between the parties already. Stranger danger.

And what obligation is on the party seeking consent? The obligation of signing the official decree that sex is consensual and having it notarized? Sure Aziz Ansari acted like an idiot. But apparently he wasn't getting a clear enough signal from his date to quit. I've seen too many women be "nice" to guys who were clearly lecherous pieces of shit who keep doing it because nobody calls them out on their pervy behavior in the moment. When that behavior isn't condemned by women it cause men to claim they've been led on or got mixed messages.
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Re: Is it complicated to say "No" to men?

Postby DamianaRaven » Tue Jan 16, 2018 2:19 am

Marcuse wrote:I'd also like to point out that it's generally not done to engage in discussion of degrees of victimhood normally.


It's also a bad idea to "broad-brush" every sexual crime as "the worst thing that can possibly happen, full stop." The whole world is painted in shades of grey, and sex crimes are no different. Acknowledging that reality is NOT tantamount to victim-ranking, or any other manner of disrespect. If God Almighty were to get in my face and tell me that I am fated to be raped tomorrow but if I wish, may choose from a list of scenarios that involve different degrees and types of violence, I'd at least read that list. Wouldn't you?
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Re: Is it complicated to say "No" to men?

Postby Learned Nand » Tue Jan 16, 2018 2:31 am

iMURDAu wrote:If she was terrified once the behavior starts then it's time to get out asap, contact the police, do something.

Unless you're scared to leave. In this particular scenario, every time Grace moved away from Ansari, he followed her very closely.

And what obligation is on the party seeking consent?

To obtain consent before initiating sexual activity. You don't wait for a clear signal to quit before you stop. You wait for a clear signal of consent before you start.
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He tested with Turing,
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and now we'll have peace for a spell.
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