So I have a sketchy older man asking for my number, my email address, looking at me sideways at inappropriate times, asking me how he can best learn English, asking what there is to do in the area, or asking what I'm doing tonight, or when I'm returning to my home city and if he can visit me later this week, or if he can have my cell phone number (after I'd already given him my work business card, which has a phone number itself), or or or!
And then, I have this other older guy who comes to visit me, offers to let me sleep at his house, organizes a series of meetings so they better fit my schedule (and confuse other people), collects my different phone numbers and the contexts for them, remembers pieces of previous innocuous conversations and quotes them back at me, wants to give me free old t-shirts from volunteer events, when I refuse to accept the free t-shirts, looks up my mailing address and mails them to me in a package, adds me as a friend on IM, comments on the fact that I seem "unhappy" in messages that were never addressed to him and wants to know why, and and and!
Fucking scary shit.
It's fucking unfair that there is no socially acceptable way to respond to this bullshit with a "HELL NO, get away from me, you're fucking weird and scary and I DON'T LIKE THIS!" as long as they keep all their comments in public, their hands to themself, and act like they just want to be "helpful" or in need of "help". Do they even know that their behavior is shockingly out of line???
I call (scream) gender norms foul.
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Oh heeey, is this your blog? Funny, that you have a blog! I thought you might, so I did a google search for exact phrases that I know you use a lot, and (after two weeks of searching -- you're hard to find! It's great that you're so concerned about privacy online) here you are! Just wanted to say I think your posts are really insightful and if you ever need a proofreader or just someone to come over and keep you company while you write, I'd be more than happy to! I found your address, and it's not hard at all for me to get to your place from mine. Oh, and I have your work and cell phones, but I wondered if you had any other numbers...? I'm just asking because if you call me from a number I don't recognize, I probably won't pick up, so you really should just give me any numbers you might call from... well, let me know :)
ReplyDeleteWhoever posted the above is hilarious =)
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