Adam makes a very interesting argument in
MP It’s not OK: How men enable rape culture at work
I already have a couple of comments there... Thoughts?
MP It’s not OK: How men enable rape culture at work
I already have a couple of comments there... Thoughts?
13 comments:
Sorry, but I'm not buying it. In 30 years of trade shows, I haven't much noticed "booth babes." What I HAVE found is some attractive women who just happen to know a LOT about the product. In one case, her name was Chrissy Lovitt (really), and she was the owner and chief engineer. Kitty-- her real name-- was pretty sharp, too. You cannot and never should judge the babe by their babeness, you're liable to embarrass yourself. Men don't need to "call out" other men on this, the ladies can put the few remaining Neanderthals in their place all by themselves.
In short, I think the time for that article passed about 20 or 30 years ago.
From MP
"Now doesn't anyone else find the following to be the strangest assumptive flowchart... The idea that somehow rapists are created because women wear sexy clothing in public? Or in front of a booth?
Will he next be saying that women should be dressing more prudishly because to do otherwise is to enable the rape culture? What am I missing?
"To those men (and they were all men), let me show you where this path leads.
So I like looking at pretty girls …
It’s just a joke …
Hey, take a freaking compliment …
Well, with those heels and that skirt …
Don’t tell me you don’t want it; you wouldn’t dress like that …
You liked it …
This is what we mean when we talk about “rape culture.”" G2A
"Cause and Effect. The rape culture is what decides that it's a good marketing idea to have the "booth babes" appear.
"Will he next be saying that women should be dressing more prudishly because to do otherwise is to enable the rape culture?" The rape culture should just go away, and women should be allowed to dress as they please without men sexualizing them.
I don't especially like this line of thinking, but let me ask you--don't you have daughters? Leaving aside your rational homo economicus thinking, how would you fell if one of them was valued largely as an ornament for a bunch of leering trade show attendees?" RB
""women should be allowed to dress as they please without men sexualizing them"
Now I had a Springer Spaniel who had been bred for centuries to hunt birds. I did not need to teach her much of anything except to stay close to me and come when I called. Otherwise she instinctually knew what to do. Now if you think men are going to stop being sexual attracted to beautiful women, I think you have a long wait coming.
What is frustrating me here is the slippery slope argument that somehow being attracted to sexy women leads to rape... I have many friends who go to strip clubs and have great time. But none of them will ever rape a woman, it just isn't in their psychological make up. Please remember that rape is an act of control / violence.
As for my 3 beautiful teen+ daughters, they occasionally wear things that I deem questionable. But as their Dad, I know nothing... :-) So all I try to teach them is that their choices strongly influence how others perceive them. And thankfully they seem to understand that and for the most part make good choices.
Now if one of them wanted to enter the modeling / booth babe world, I would do what I do with all of their choices. I would explain the pros and cons, then allow them the freedom to choose. There are a lot of worse jobs out there." G2A
From MP
"Sometimes a beautiful flower is just a beautiful flower.
There are thousands of booths all trying to stand out. They all try to attract a potential customer to stop and enter into a discussion. Many techniques are used to do so...
Flashy stand, Entertainment, Free stuff, Newest product, Attractive people, etc.
I mean do you think that Tech Firms should also stop using attractive people in their TV and Internet ads? Give me a break...
Besides what would all the models in the world do if we "robots" stop noticing them... :-)" G2A
"A beautiful flower, used as a prop, is nothing more than a dying womb with attractive parts. It's both appropriate and illustrative that a woman used as a beautiful prop should be likened to a beautiful flower...
Beautiful people are great for ads, where they need nothing more than to read their lines. But, at a trade show, it's not too much to ask that the people doing the advertising actually be knowledgeable. That's not to say that beautiful people can't be smart--I know tons of people who fit both descriptions. But being beautiful shouldn't be the basis for being hired for a booth at a trade show. Casino, fine. TV show, fine. Fashion magazine, fine. Trade show...nope.
As a consumer and participant of lots of things that aren't typically in the "female realm", I expect someone knowledgeable at a trade show. Otherwise, I'd just plop my rear in front of the TV to watch some commercials where the smoke can be blown where the sun don't shine without having to go anywhere.
I once went to a car dealership where the salesperson that "helped" me was clearly hired to be blonde hair on a pair of heels. I was so disgusted that they didn't hire someone competent and female. Couldn't answer a single question, while all of the male sales critters seemed to have at least a basic knowledge of the brand and car models. Fortunately, their service department has made better choices. They have a great female technician that I interact with about every other time I get my oil changed. By the way, I had purchased my current car before the sales babe showed me another car, so her presence did not influence my purchase whatsoever. My fiancé had an even more negative reaction than I did to her, by the way. So, yeah... I'll also note that we left a car dealership while I was shopping and never came back because one of the salesmen made a racist comment. I don't care what kind of deal I could have gotten." Rachel
"It seems you are not in the target market that they are aiming for... Maybe they want young foolish men who are happy for any excuse to work with and talk to an attractive sales woman... (or old foolish men) Thankfully I need little from car sales people except the capacity to give me keys and spend time with me while I test drive. A beautiful flower is just as well suited for this as anyone.
As for at trade shows, I used to work at a big company who maintained a stage Conexpo and had performers to draw in the customers. No one expected the cast of Stomp to answer questions about construction equipment. They were simply the shiny lure to draw the unsuspecting fish into the net.
" G2A
Jerry,
I agree that I think women are very capable of handling this whole situation on their own. Maybe the writer thinks they need his help. A Sir Galahad if you will.
Another thing I find strange is why does he want to take away the jobs from these nice young attractive women?
I will confess that when selecting a lawyer, doctor, or dentist, I tend to choose female professionals, simply because at the time they received their training they had to be better than most men to succeed (not nearly as true today). They are not being chosen for their attractiveness, though most of them, like most women, are attractive. Not booth babe attractive, but still... Were I choosing a booth babe the criteria would be substantially different and more superficial. Not that there's anything really wrong with that. They are certainly "competent" for the purpose for which they are hired.
Here's a quandary for you. The company was once challenged because we deliberately hired a receptionist who was a well-dressed and attractive woman, over some dumpy-looking guy that apparently wanted the job. She was quite competent and a "people person" and did very well. Were we wrong?
""women should be allowed to dress as they please without men sexualizing them"
LOL! Why do you think women dress up, add makeup, wear heels and perfume and have their hair done? We're all too civilized to allow the simple release of pheromones to attract a mate, and even after the time women pass the age of fertility, the habit (and the sex drive) are still intact. It's not nice to fool Mother Nature, so women try to help Her out.
I have the "importance of an attractive receptionist" argument with my Mrs every so often. She being the practical woman thinks that it is unnecessary and wrong. And me disagreeing.
The irony is that if I try to wear my garage work clothes in public, I get the speech about how people judge others based in part on their appearance... Go upstairs and change ... :-)
For the same reason you keep the lawn mowed and the hedge trimmed, sweep the sidewalk and maybe even plant some flowers in front of your perfectly functional office building. We fell back on "appearance" being an essential part of the job description and she was "more qualified" on that basis (as well as all others, as it turns out). We would not have put an airhead in the job. And she stayed on for about 20 years, long past her "bimbo years" if she ever had one.
I suppose it comes down to showing that appearance is a "qualification" for certain jobs, but when it becomes the ONLY qualification you are risking accusations of male pigginess. "Rape culture," though, is WAY, WAY over the top. Such nonsense actually does more harm, IMHO, to women's reasonably equal treatment, than does allowing a little natural leering. I've heard that the proper response to the wife when you are caught noticing an unusually attractive woman on the street is " Sorry, honey, but I'm married, not dead."
I have used that before. However I usually remind her that I may not be as proper, mature, etc as she wants to me to be, but I am much more so than when she started dating me some ~30 years ago. :-)
Another saying I find humorous goes something like.
A man marries a woman expecting that she will not change.
A woman marries a man expecting that he will change.
And often both end up disappointed... :-(
It is amazing that ~half of marriages survive given the stresses of time, money, kids, personal changes, etc.
Not sure what happened to Laurie's comment, but the article she cites, for me, proves exactly the opposite from what she intended. It says, for me, what is the absolute truth: "The conclusion that follows from such sizzling philippics is that anybody, literally anybody, wearing an “R” by his name should be preferred to the demonic Clinton."
And what offends me most about this idea is that Clinton's entire appeal seems to be the massive demonization of Trump. There is no positive recommendation for her other than gender and nobody will accuse her of being a "booth babe." Trump, on the other hand (after totally discounting all of the sludge tossed at him), is that he has a positive and common sense program, admittedly more pragmatic than ideologically conservative, and that's what we need rather than 12 years of liberal fantasies.
"Sexual Attraction. Rape culture is not about sexual attraction. As you say, it is control/violence. Put another way, it is about dominance expressed in sexual terms. Being "attracted" does not necessarily lead to rape, but when a woman is evaluated solely or largely on the basis of her conformance to an ideal, she is being devalued as a person. That is where the slope starts turning slippery.
"There are a lot of worse jobs out there." True enough, A childhood friend had what may have been one of them. She was the waitress at a hotel tiki bar in the late 70s whose job was to mix the bar's signature cocktail tableside. She had to wear a grass skirt and dance a short dance after she mixed it. Of course, she would get pinched by men having a "great time," who would of course never rape a woman. She told her comeback was to ask how they would like it if someone did that to their daughter." RB
"Assuming your friend was not an indentured servant, did she quit immediately or was the pay check and other perks worth continuing her employment at that job even though there were some annoying customers?
I guess I trust women to make the right choices for themselves." G2A
"It's the woman who should change, not the disgusting men.
Perhaps men should be taught and should understand at a very early age that you don't do that to a woman...or anyone." Joel
"The reality is that there are annoying men and women in the world...
And there will always be annoying men and women in the world.
I am fine the restaurant manager kicking out patrons who behave poorly whether it is a man or woman. However male and female employees in the end do need to decide what they are willing to put up with to earn their income... Be it that annoying customer, unsupportive Manager, obnoxious co-worker, etc.
Or do you want to become the morality police and try to control how every man / women is allowed to behave in the USA?
Should we shut down all the strip clubs because they allow men to objectify women?" G2A
I think one of our problems in this country is that we want to pass laws about behavior that used to be controlled by personal morality, self-control and social norming. It simply doesn't work. This way, society can adapt over time to what it finds acceptable. It used to be that every business, certainly auto shops, would have a nudie calendar or poster on the wall. That has become unacceptable, and it didn't require a law. (Actually we have a law now, but it's stupid and unnecessary).
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