When is a compliment earnest and when is it unsavory?
In the last few weeks I’ve been approached by strangers (all men) to tell me they like my dress or I carry myself well or that I must have a “lucky fella” at home. I was even told in the airport, “Don’t take this wrong. I’m not gay or anything but I wanted to tell you look great. That outfits works for you. And for me.” I could hear his heavy breathing hubba hubba as I walked away. In a business meeting a man greeted me with, “Hello Sunshine.” This was in a room of mostly men. I doubt he greeted them with a similar moniker. And then there was the time a friend’s husband ogled me and stalked me at a fundraising event. He was millimeters away from being touchy, and he most definitely entered my personal space. I saw him recently at another fundraiser, and Mac Daddy literally stood between him and me so he didn’t have an opening to speak to me. I can’t even talk about the time a fellow parent at my son’s school made harassing remarks to me in front of the first grade teacher and my sons. Some people had the audacity to say I should feel flattered.
We are telling women to feel flattered for being harassed? I can’t even wrap my head around this. I only half joke that my parenting goal is to raise sons who don’t grow up to be assholes. I pray they never become the sort of men who denigrate women through harassing “compliments.”
Flattery will get you nowhere.
Sandra Bartky wrote a heart-wrenching piece in _Femininity and Domination_ about the experience of catcalling (which this is barely a step up from). Catcallers can’t just appreciate from a distance, or even objectify women in silence. No, they have to make sure WE KNOW they are objectifying us, THAT WE ARE OBJECTS. She calls it a ritual of subjugation. That shit pisses me off.
You do have a fantastic sense of style, though. Don’t let ’em dull your sparkle.