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Now re-think this situation and replace the woman you assumed was doing this with a woman that you found absolutely repulsive. Would it change your opinion?
Repulsive means so many things to so many people. I would not feel harassed by a woman of any variety doing these things to me.
Location: Montreal -> CT -> MA -> Montreal -> Ottawa
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Machjo
I don't like to discuss my sexual past, but it would appear that you and I, though both men, have had very different sexual histories that affect our respective interpretations of the OP.
I have been sexually and otherwise abused as a child and that has affected me in many ways into adulthood in terms of my ability to understand sexual boundaries among other things, which also made me vulnerable to psychological sexual coercion as an adult. Again without getting into detail, a beautiful woman who'd sexually coerced and manipulated me in early adulthood had eventually pushed me to attempt suicide. I later turned to alcohol and eventually switched from that to sex addiction and other behavioural addictions and compulsive behaviours. Sex addiction has little to do with sex so if you've never read about it before, you might want to read up on the subject.
A woman's physical appearance has nothing to do with it. Sexual coercion can be one single act or occur repeatedly over an extended period of time as a part of manipulating a person into a sexual relationship, aka grooming, which can even happen to a physically strong adult man especially if his sense of sexual boundaries have already been damaged since childhood. Physical strength has little to do with it too. A woman can beg, engage in emotional blackmail, and even threaten suicide to manipulate a man; and a man who has already suffered emotional, physical, or sexual abuse or any combination of these as a child will already have entered adulthood in an emotionally vulnerable state with warped sexual boundaries making resistance psychologically difficult.
One therapist had described some of my adult behaviour as akin to that of a severe PTSD sufferer and ascribed it as possibly stemming from abuse both in childhood and adulthood, though for financial reasons I had to quit before the therapist could make a definite diagnosis. He did make me aware of sex addiction for the first time though and informed me of a local 12-step group that specialized in treating sufferers of sex addiction, and that helped.
Question: Do you know anything about whether the man in the OP had suffered any kind of emotional, physical, or sexual abuse or coercion or any combination of these either as a child or as an adult or both? And if so, what was the degree of the abuse? What do you know of that man's mental health or mental state at the time that he was being harassed?
I'm not particularly violent. In fact, I'd usually rather run away than fight, though granted that will always involve an assessment of the situation. For example, running away might be an effective form of self-defense but might not be an effective way to defend another person. Or in the example in the OP, a person might not have the option of just walking away due to his job responsibilities, etc.
While a person suffering PTSD-like symptoms, any form of addiction to which these symptoms might have contributed, or a combination of these would probably not visit nightclubs often and, if so, would probably go with friends for support, a person who works at a nightclub has little option but to be there. Yet, if I were in his position, I can guarantee that I would have felt a fight-or-flight response. I might have been physically stronger than the women, but their behaviour would no doubt have triggered memories in me. Rarely, very rarely and always when forced into an unusually triggering situation, I have been known to flip into a blind rage that I can barely remember afterwards since I remember it as if in a dreamlike state. From my knowledge of myself, I doubt very much that I would have flipped into such a rage even the situation described in the OP (mainly because I usually try to compose myself until I'm alone before unleashing, sometimes on objects or usually just by yelling or running in a fit or hitting things that I won't break; but knowing myself, I can guarantee that even if I kept my outward composure, I'd be raging inside.
The following might seem extreme to you, but to me, it would have triggered memories of past sexual and other abuses. It would have reminded me specifically of past violations of my sexual and emotional boundaries. Even though the harassment described in the OP was far more moderate than my past experiences, the principle of having violated my sexual boundaries would have been identical between what is described in the OP and far more serious past abuses and so as a result, my mind would have equated them. This mental equation along with past trauma is what would have triggered the flight-or-flight response. Though unlikely based on what I do know about myself, I can say that if I were that man, the women there would have faced a small rick of my unleashing on them. Though the risk would have been small, the consequences to them could have been severe had I unleashed. More probably though, if the situation came to that, the women would probably have picked up on my emotional state and the impending threat and so backed off before I snapped so as to de-escalate the situation, or if I really feared that I was about to snap and they weren't getting the hint from my facial expressions, I might have given a clear verbal warning that either she back off or face unspecified consequences.
In fact without getting into detail, in one situation where a woman violated my sexual and emotional boundaries when I was an adult and didn't heed my verbal warning faced severe consequences. I didn't hurt her physically (and had not even touched her physically), but I had unleashed on her emotionally in such a way that she called the police on me in fear for her physical safety even though I'd never even threatened her physical safety nor intended to hurt her physically (but I admit that at that point, triggered and unleashed, I intended to traumatize her and I succeeded all within five minutes).
Though that was only the second and last time in my life and only time as an adult that I'd unleashed on a person to that degree, I did not even need to touch her physically to make her fear for her life. In hindsight, I think she did not know that I had that in me (otherwise I'm sure she would not have crossed my boundaries to begin with). After all, I'd never told her about my past sexual trauma because it's not something I like to discuss so she could not have known how her harassing me could have triggered me. She did back off and got the hint, and never crossed my boundaries again after that. In fact, she soon left and broke all contact with me, and good riddance for that.
I can imagine that depending on a man's past sexual experience and mental state, a woman who violates his sexual boundaries and does not heed his warning could even potentially put herself at risk of emotional harm if he snaps. We have all read stories of men suffering PTSD or other ailments snapping and killing people at the slightest triggering or women killing or maiming their abusive boyfriends. Though in those cases it usually involves someone they know more personally (as it was with the person on whom I'd unleashed as an adult), still we have these women purposely violating the space of a man they know nothing about.
"Surveying 284 high school and college students, researchers at the University of Missouri found that 43 percent were victims of unwanted sexual experiences. In 95 percent of those cases, women were reportedly the aggressors."
OP...the gals can sex harass me all they want...as long as I can touch back...or even if not!
What if you are not attracted to her? This type of response confuses me as I could not in a million years be okay with the idea of having sex with someone I was not attracted to.
Thanks. I've often found it ironic that women are more understanding of the seriousness of female (or male) sexual abuse of men than other men are. As I'd mentioned earlier, many men use the female sexual abuse of men as material for slapstick humour, and I see that as a major problem in our culture. As per the statistic I'd quoted above about the female abuse of men, let's remember that studies show that the abused often become abusers, and so if we want to fight the sexual abuse of one sex by the other, we need to break the cycle by fighting sexual abuse on all sides.
In fact, my sexual abuse has given me a unique perspective. Though I am not sexually attracted to children nor to sadism towards or sexual assault or coercion of others, my past abuse has made me sexually compulsive in ways I won't describe here other than to say mainly in masochistic ways bordering on the macabre. Though I'd long learnt to control my behaviour at least enough to limit my harm to others (limited to dominant and sometimes sadistic women) and have since learnt to control it completely, the compulsive feelings have never disappeared and might never either. In some ways I consider myself lucky that the compulsive behaviour took the turn it did. Imagine if I had become compulsively sexually aggressive or attracted to children? Anyone who knows the definition of 'compulsive' understands that had that been the case, though that alone would not guarantee that I would necessarily have raped anyone or abused children, it at least would have increased the risk factor until I'd learn to control the compulsiveness. In short, the abused learn to use sex in the same way that an alcoholic learns to use alcohol or a heroin addict heroin or a compulsive gambler gambling as a way to medicate himself mentally as a way to regulate negative emotions. Without the drug (even in the case of gambling or sex or even internet addiction), because that drug serves as an analgesic, to deprive himself of it leads to withdrawal which can include severe depression and mood swings. This is why the behaviour can be so compulsive. Though participating in it might only worsen the addiction, it at least provides a short-term temporary escape that is difficult to refuse. To resist leads to withdrawal and gradually learning to control the behaviour, but it is painful since it forces a person to face emotions that the behaviour allows him to escape.
As I said earlier, sex addiction has little to do with sex. It's just a way to medicate ones emotions.
Men seem much less willing to speak out or report sexual abuse that they where the victim of.
My husband is very conservative and religious and would seriously be furious if a women other then me touched him sexually and would respectfully pull away and I could 100% ensure if that person did not listen they would harshly be told off. My husband could make a stone cry when someone tests him boundaries or rubs him the wrong way. I feel horrified for any women that pull that on him lol. Women need to make sure they are respecting men's boundaries too ex if you start grabing some guy and he asked you to stop and you dont listen at get pushed, hit or told off YOU LOOKED for it so dont dare complain.
"Surveying 284 high school and college students, researchers at the University of Missouri found that 43 percent were victims of unwanted sexual experiences. In 95 percent of those cases, women were reportedly the aggressors."
That's not quite what is says actually. 43% of males were victims of unwanted sexual experiences and of those experiences in which males were the victims, females were the aggressors 95% of the time (so I guess that leaves 5% for male on male).
Location: Montreal -> CT -> MA -> Montreal -> Ottawa
17,330 posts, read 33,036,872 times
Reputation: 28903
Quote:
Originally Posted by Machjo
Thanks for the precision.
I think that your quote was taken out of context because, probably, the article made clear that the "284 high school and college students" were all males. I didn't read the article, but that would be my guess because of the article's title. But the quote, on its own, left it open to interpretation.
Didn't you just say the same thing the quote above it said, but in different words?
The way you said it made it sound like 95% of victims were victims of female aggression, as opposed to 95% of male victims were victims of female aggression.
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