CMV: What a woman decides to wear has no effect on the amount of unwanted attention she receives

nightsofthesunkissed · 2024-09-05T19:59:00+00:00

This isn’t my experience at all.

I’ve received much more attention generally if I’ve been dressed in a feminine or sexy way and always have.

I also got way more sexual harassment as a girl aged 14 - 21 than any other time in my life.

Fair-Bus-4017 · 2024-09-05T19:44:33+00:00

Ehhhh, certain way of clothing yourself makes you stand out more. And this will very much increase your odds in getting unwanted attention. This doesn't mean that any of it is excusable. Or that people should put the blame on women. But trying to go to this extreme is not helping anyone.

Savings-Bee-4993 · 2024-09-05T19:49:15+00:00

Almost everyone agrees that a woman is not morally responsible for the attention she receives due to dress.

What people mean when they say she is “responsible” is that her actions, behavior, and dress do play some causal role in what happens to her.

Do scantily clad women deserve unwanted sexual attention? No. Is it a woman’s fault if a guy rapes her? No. Should we tell women to make wise decisions in general and about what they wear and where they go more specifically? Yes.

Women should consider dress, environment, time, place, etc. for their own sake and others. And women, like men, should be encouraged to make good decisions and be called out for doing stupid things.

KikiYuyu · 2024-09-05T20:00:22+00:00

I've never experienced or witnessed two women dressed like that having remotely similar experiences whatsoever. It's hard for me to even know what to say because what you are suggesting just seems so obviously ridiculous on its face.

They are both going to get unwanted attention, but for completely different reasons that manifest in completely different ways. The first women will get unwanted sexual advances, and the second will have her appearance degraded for how disheveled she looks.

The way you dress makes people see you and treat you differently. Nothing about that is victim blaming, it's just fact. Someone who harasses or assaults is always the one 100% in the wrong, even if you still admit that what you wear is likely to illicit a certain response.

In a perfect world, a woman could walk butt naked down a dark alley and come out unmolested, but we don't live in that world. Being aware of that and being mindful of that is in no way blaming the victim.

If I tell someone to lock their doors, am I blaming victims of theft? Of course not. Even if they left their door wide open with all their valuables in view, the thief will always be the one 100% in the wrong. But it's still something you want to avoid.

Men should treat women with respect, and that should always be promoted and upheld. But women have to realize that we live in the world we do live in, not the world we should live in

PaulStamentsHat · 2024-09-05T21:37:01+00:00

People, for the love of God, stop commenting on this account’s posts. this is so obviously a troll account. If you have any doubts, check the post history.

Morally I agree with the sentiment of this post, which is that women should be allowed to dress however they want, and that they are not responsible for the behavior of men. This post takes this obvious truth and and exaggerates it to an extent that it becomes a bad take. That is what this account does in pretty much every single post. We seriously need to just start ignoring this account.

SaBahRub · 2024-09-05T20:03:03+00:00

As a woman, nope. My presentation vastly affects the way people treat me, which is the whole reason I even bother; I certainly don’t do it for “me”

What it doesn’t do is change culpability for behavior. Clothing (or cosmetics, or hairstyle) is not motive nor consent

Sad_and_grossed_out · 2024-09-05T19:29:22+00:00

Yeah it's never really mattered for me, I could wear booty shorts and tank top outside or I could wear pants 3 sizes too big and a huge jacket and get catcalled all or followed/bothered the same. Covering myself up has never made a difference.

Bikerbats · 2024-09-05T19:32:35+00:00

You're insane, or at least this idea is! In order to actually debate, you're going to have to explain exactly how you think the 2nd woman is going to get nearly as much attention as the first? I'm sorry, but very few men, young or old are going to hit on the 2nd one pictured. This is a ludicrous and fallacious point of debate.

peteypete78 · 2024-09-05T19:49:33+00:00

I notice far far more women in the summer V the winter.

Thunderjaw4955 · 2024-09-05T19:45:02+00:00

I’m inclined to think more revealing outfits increase the frequency of that behaviour but it’s objectively not the woman’s fault that she gets treated that way.

nightcall379 · 2024-09-05T19:58:48+00:00

What a woman decides to wear has no effect on the amount of unwanted attention she receives

Would a woman receive attention even if she was dressed in a burka?

Sure

But would she receive the same amount of attention as a woman dressed in the "modern" way?

Lol

Wasn't there even a social experiment of a woman in a burka walking around town with a body cam?

Pretty sure she received significantly less attention than the women dressed "normally"

Basically instead of policing women's fashion choices, we should be teaching males to treat us with respect.

Explain how that logic makes sense when the problem isn't in the principle of harassment itself, but rather in who it is that "harasses" women?

The problem with these sorts of complaints is the blatant double standard

Women only define male attention as unwanted, and harassing when it's coming from an unattractive man(in other words, the majority of men)

But when it comes to attractive men?

All rules of immediately fly out the window, and that man is allowed to wolf-whistle, and "sexually harass" them as much as he wants

It's not harassment when the guy is attractive, it's flirting

onlypham · 2024-09-05T19:33:16+00:00

Changing styles doesn’t eliminate ever being hit on but common sense would tell you that frequency of these terrible interactions would be affected.

ThatLilAvocado · 2024-09-05T19:56:07+00:00

Frankly it depends on her body type, age and face. Some women won't be left alone no matter what they dress, other can pretty much conceal their body and get off men's radar easily. These women might still be occasionally harassed, but they won't be ogled and cat called everywhere they go.

Hefty-Lobster-5513 · 2024-09-05T19:56:33+00:00

I still remember back in the days when guys used to sag their pants below their waist and you would hear echoes of people all around telling them to pull their pants up. Ahh good times. The idea that you would get the same amount of unwanted attention no matter what outfit you wear is a flat out lie. Women who go out dressed like prostitutes are going to get more attention than they would if they didn’t. That attention can include the unwanted sexual interests from men you don’t like. Doubling down on the skimpy clothing doesn’t sound like a strategy to avoid or reduce it.

IronDBZ · 2024-09-05T19:57:07+00:00

And still receive the same amount of unwanted sexual attention from random strangers

This is a quantitative claim about a qualitative experience. Amount is a real empirical thing that has to be measured. But I don't have a study and you're sharing Instagram reels, so let's put that to the side.

I think, and I could be wrong, that it definitely has an effect. It's just that there's no way to get to zero if you're getting attention in the first place.

Men's attraction to women isn't primarily presentation-based. How you present can affect how much attention you get, but if you're not starting from nothing all you can do is turn the dial up or down.

If your ass is showing, you'll get a different level of attention and kind than if you're just covered head to toe and so on.

But so long as you are perceptibly female, then someone is going to have their attention drawn to you.

I think it's sad how much imbalance in experience exists between men and women. People that can't help but notice a woman from 100 yards away being paired up with people who can't notice a guy in the same room is just a terrible mismatch. I feel for you, but there's more to discuss on this.

It is victim blaming to suggest that she bears responsibility for how she's treated by males in public.

I agree. The men harassing women are responsible for their harassment.

we should be teaching males to treat us with respect.

I don't know what kind of fallacy you'd call this but folks have got to stop it. The men who are going to listen are already listening. Yeah, boys should be taught respect, but most of them already are.

As the focal point of indiscriminate attention, you are going to attract anyone willing to make themselves known to you. And so long as human beings are in contact with other human beings, someone is going to get hurt. That is life.

I'm not saying nothing can be done, but people have to stop pretending like the obvious things haven't already been tried. Women being harassed when they're out and about is not a problem born from general apathy. People care and have cared for decades. You're no longer in the place and time where a seminar and some HR guidelines are the dividing line between having your boundaries respected.

If you want to fix harassment and assaults, then structural changes have to be made. We've already taught the boys all that they can learn under the current social environment. If they're not on the program nowadays it's not for lack of trying, though it may be for lack of resources or institutional support.

On the positive side, public schools need to be empowered to handle the discipline of children while they're young, have the resources to adequately address these things and have access to the expertise to properly instill values in the boys who don't get it.

Economic redistribution, I believe could help as well. People are better adjusted when they are comfortable and not under stress. Access to mental health services for people who have been abused or have developed asocial paraphilias.

On the negative side, if you want to do something about that for adults, then civil liberties have to be curtailed, male specific curfews, re-education camps, near complete sexual segregation, etc. Perhaps even eugenics, chemical castrations for low level sexual misconduct.

There are possible means to get rid of these things, but they entail restructuring society for your comfort and safety. It's never going to be as easy as just telling the boys it's bad to do x.

It's a can of worms and if you're not on board for all that, then you'll have to pick your battles. But if that's what you want, there's your program.

UpbeatInsurance5358 · 2024-09-05T20:48:17+00:00

I find what you wear has nothing to do with it, so long as you look vulnerable. I found it happened at its very worst I was between 9-16, then in my early 20's when I worked service positions, and after that was when I was pregnant and had very small children. It taught me that all these men wanted was to be a bully. To feel powerful. And to frighten a woman.

a_minty_fart · 2024-09-05T19:51:17+00:00

Bullshit. Advertising works.

If a woman is wearing a T-shirt that says "hotwife" she's going to get excessively more sexual attention than a nun.

Your whole post is cap.

TommyBarcelona · 2024-09-05T19:44:33+00:00

This is rage bate dumbass post

3gm22 · 2024-09-05T20:03:16+00:00

As a man I can tell you that your perception is not true at all.

Men find women extremely beautiful, sent by God, a gift from him.

We are biologically driven to want to please and to admire and to care for women.

Women can be beautiful or they can be ugly, And ugly is the same as fake is the truth.

A person that doesn't embrace what they are and is not trying to perfect it, to be healthy, Is ugly and unattractive.

What I'm trying to say to you is that it's not about your makeup. It's about whether or not you embrace the beauty and the form which you have been born with, whether you seek to perfect it and value it.

Sitting around eating Cheetos and watching garbage soap operas does not make you attractive.

Taking care of the health and function of your body, educating your mind, developing harmonious relationships with others and with the world we live in, those all make a woman attractive.

What I find is it is women who refuse to understand that truth, goodness and beauty are the true currencies of this world, They are the transcendental values which all human beings aspire to.

The same way we love Truth goodness and beauty, We hate lies, evil and ugliness.

To address your comment on power, you're missing something.

Only knowing what is true, good and beautiful, Will give you the power you need.

Weakness is not good, a lack of self-control is not good, relationships which are not harmonious are not good.

What power you have derives directly from the truth, goodness and the beauty that you understand and know how to wield.

It is an evil person who has to resort to using their power over others, And a good person who uses their power over themselves.

mlo9109 · 2024-09-05T19:42:37+00:00

In a perfect world, this would be the case, but we don't live in a perfect world. I was SA-ed in a parka, jeans, and turtleneck. However, I also realize that how you dress determines the kind of attention you receive and the support you get if you are assaulted (namely, the "what were you wearing?" question).

I live in a college town with a large retiree population. It makes me so nervous to see college-aged girls go to the gym in tight short shorts and just sports bras with creepy old men around. Not because I want to be a prude, but know they'll be blamed if anything happens to them because of their clothes.

FirmQuarter6623 · 2024-09-05T19:47:40+00:00

Another women are victims of patriachy post. Male's sexuality is already repressed, still not enough. Women, at the same time can't do no wrong. They're wonderful angels, while men are evil predators. You are strong independant woman, deal with attention like you want. Self defence is allowed. You want respect, you should earn it, and wearing little to no cloths is not a way to do that.

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Barneysparky · 2024-09-05T20:33:04+00:00

untrue for the most part.

I have a gal pal who loves to dress up.

I on the otherhand don't wear makeup and dress like an old hippie. Objectively I have pretty amazing facial bone structure, shoulder length curly hair that some men love, breast's that I keep being told are awesome 34F, and am thin. She's honestly while fairly thin, large and gagaly.

When she puts on that little black dress, she is the center of men's attention when we go out dancing

However, there is a difference between attention, and harassment.

I have a beautiful 17 year old that both works with me, and is a family friend. In her grocery store uniform, hairnet and no makeup, she receives at least one unwanted sexual comment from a customer a week, and was sexual harassed big time (he's fired) by a late 30s coworker.

thedarkracer · 2024-09-05T20:36:05+00:00

Sure, wearing a bikini or a suit and tie will recieve the same amount of attention, right? Sure she will still get attention but to be clear one set of wear will indeed get you more attention.

The only way we can settle this debate is having two twins exact copy of each other and then wear different clothes and see the attention.

John_Oakman · 2024-09-05T20:36:30+00:00

As others have already noted, some supporting evidence (whether it be studies, amassed anecdotes, youtube tier social experiment, etc.) would be a good start.

Moving on from that, most of the contention seemed to be lack of differentiating between the hardcore/professional misogynists (who'll will harass/rape women regardless of their attire) and the casual misogynists (who do notice women depending on their attire). The former number is mostly unchanging, while the latter changes wildly. However as there's no way to differentiating the two types of men/males the overall perception would be that attire would make a difference, even if there's a base level of harassment regardless of attire.

OkProfessional9405 · 2024-09-05T22:57:04+00:00

Where is your evidence that those two women will receive similar unwanted sexual attention? I assume you have some study you are referring to? Or is that just your opinion?

SlyStocks · 2024-09-05T23:39:54+00:00

That’s absurd. Of course clothes amplify attention. Without question.

wtknight · 2024-09-05T23:48:26+00:00

It's all about how women look relative to the women around them. In a time period when it wasn't socially accepted for women to show their ankles, one who showed her ankles got a lot more male attention. In a time period when women are wearing sports bras and tight shorts in public, women who wear long dresses that show only their ankles aren't going to get as much attention.

bifewova234 · 2024-09-06T00:06:49+00:00

Delusions

Alfred-Adler · 2024-09-06T00:14:13+00:00

LOL, no. The hobo gets less attention then someone like this: https://www.instagram.com/p/CztoKt9PCEx

LouisdeRouvroy · 2024-09-06T00:37:40+00:00

My reasoning is because sexual harassment is about power, not sexual interest.

This feminist mantra needs to die. Power and sexual interest aren't mutually incompatible.

evo1d0er · 2024-09-06T00:42:05+00:00

This whole premise is patently false. But go off.

TheHouseSomalian · 2024-09-06T02:46:25+00:00

This reminds of a sad story from 20 years ago or so. A young girl in NYC was out with her friends, gets black out drunk so they load her in a cab. Cabbie drops her off literally on the sidewalk where she passes out totally drunk. Eventually she gets sexually assaulted.

A day or two after this assault, a woman authors a op-ed in one of the major newspapers concluding that “women should be able to get blackout drunk, pass out on the sidewalk and expect that no one will sexually assault them”.

Of course, in an ideal world that’s how things should be. But we don’t live in an ideal world. We live in a world filled with of creeps and predators who are looking for easy victims. I find sentiments like the one expressed above to be simply naive and unrealistic. Will a woman who dresses provocatively sexually be at a higher risk of harassment? You bet! Should she be harassed? Absolutely not, but the sad truth is that it will probably happen because the world is not perfect and there are a lot of weirdo creeps out there. Nobody is sexually harassing a dirty homeless lady. But many men get off on harassing women they perceive as powerful due to their sexuality.

So should you be naive and stupid because OP told you you are as likely to get sexually harassed if you wear Daisy Dukes and a crop top as if you look like the female version of Uncle Fester? I don’t think so. We need to accept that reality isn’t always the way we want it to be.

YetAnotherCommenter · 2024-09-06T09:21:03+00:00

My reasoning is because sexual harassment is about power, not sexual interest. Power doesn't depend on how "sexy" the victim is. It's why Grandma gets wolf whistles the same amount as a Victoria Secret model.

This is an empirical question. Do you have any proof? Are there any studies showing this?

Basically instead of policing women's fashion choices, we should be teaching males to treat us with respect.

"Teach Men Not To Rape" is basically Duluth Model logic, and the Duluth Model's very founder has rejected the model and openly confessed it was based on confirmation bias (see Ellen Pence's 1999 article "Some Thoughts On Philosophy"). The idea that male misbehavior is due to a pervasive cultural norm that encourages disrespect for women is ideology, not social science. The cultural norm does NOT encourage men to rape, but the opposite. The cultural norm pedastalizes women, it doesn't hold them in contempt. I actually am a man and my childhood drilled chivalry into my head ruthlessly. As Camille Paglia correctly pointed out, the rapist is not the product of social conditioning but an example of that conditioning's failure.

Men who commit rape are usually conscious predators who know exactly what they're doing. Whilst there IS a role for consent education to prevent mixed-signals/coy-courtship-mind-games-related mistakes and men moving too fast because of societal dating scripts, women are just as likely to need consent education as men are (and arguably need it MORE, since women seem to actually like the indirect communication/subtle longing glances/no-means-try-harder/I'm-not-going-to-be-direct-because-that-makes-me-feel-like-a-slut thing).

KingBembi · 2024-09-06T11:39:58+00:00

Um yea it does, just because you might get attention in both outfits doesn't mean there isn't t an obvious option that would lead to more attention.

SandBrilliant2675 · 2024-09-06T16:10:33+00:00

Honestly, it’s not the clothing that’s at issue here. It’s the sexualization on the female body (clothed or unclothed) which is so far beyond the secondary sexual characteristics (breast and female external genitalia) which is the problem. When women’s legs (especially above the knee), shoulders, arms, neck, stomach, back are sexualized, any clothing can be claimed sexual.

The female form, even in silhouette, is sexualized, in a way the male form is not unless the silhouette of a penis is also shown.

TLDR: The only way to stop policing female bodies is the stop sexualizing them.

Pezzza_ · 2024-09-06T16:54:23+00:00

🥱 Troll post. Move along people. 🧹

MaxDureza · 2024-09-06T18:04:27+00:00

Do you think a 600 pound 80 year old grandma wearing a winter coat gets the same amount of attention as an 18 year old Victoria's Secret model wearing only lingerie?

No-Meet6948 · 2024-09-08T05:32:22+00:00

Wrong. Women choose clothes based on how it will appear to others. They dress like slvts but somhow its wrong to stare at them? Nope

apresonly · 2024-09-05T19:48:59+00:00

i mean babies and children get unwanted attention from men so you'd think this would be obvious

man-frustrated · 2024-09-05T19:46:54+00:00

You could get every single woman on Earth to one by one insist to me personally that what they wear has no effect on how much attention they recieve from men, and I still would not believe you.

I know this because I know that how much I pay attention to women and how much every single heterosexual male friend I've ever had pays attention to women is 100% directly proportional to how much of her body we can see with our eyes.

It's not complicated. If I can see ass, if I can see tits, if I can see hips, if I can see legs, if I can see waist, I will continue to look until I lose line of sight with them or I fear I might be about to crash my car if I don't direct my eyes back onto the road in front of me.

ambrosedc · 2024-09-05T20:23:16+00:00

Been awhile since I've been on here but I can see the female of the species is still delusional as ever

Cunnin_Linguists · 2024-09-05T21:00:51+00:00

TIL women can't discern between dressing for people to look at you and receiving unwanted attention

SupportRemarkable583 · 2024-09-05T19:42:40+00:00

So if I wear a t shirt that says fuck "Fuck able Lincoln for freeing the salves" I shouldn't bear any different treatment from people as well?

Title	CMV: What a woman decides to wear has no effect on the amount of unwanted attention she receives
Author	Windmill_flowers
Upvotes	0
Comments	266
Date	September 5, 2024 7:24 PM UTC (1 year ago)
Subreddit	Posted in /r/PurplePillDebate
Original Link	https://old.reddit.com/r/PurplePillDebate/comments/1f9v0fu/cmv_what_a_woman_decides_to_wear_has_no_effect_on/
Archive Link	https://theredarchive.com/r/PurplePillDebate/cmv-what-a-woman-decides-to-wear-has-no-effect-on.1529513 https://theredarchive.com/post/1529513

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