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Comment by chris_mc | Hacker News Reader

> For women on real life, appearing single has become a minefield

FTFY, women have had it hard forever when trying to be normal people with normal lives, but some men don't seem to get that they aren't just a sex object to exploit. Whether it's on Twitch, Twitter, Facebook, or on the street, women get hassled day in, day out.

The only way to truly fix it is to get male society, as a whole, to respect women more, which will take a ton of work since I am sure half the comments below mine here will be about how I'm wrong and men are all paragons of moral virtue, explaining how women can be bad people too, or some other logical misdirection/fallacy.

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Like most of the animal kingdom, we also live in a world where men must approach the women, and women are the "sexual selectors".

I think that asymmetry of the social economy explains a lot more than we think. But we frequently ignore it.

For example, why are incels only men? Why is it so hard for a woman to bother a man with sexual harassment?

I think there are deeper issues and underlying realities to explore than just "ugh, men!"

Every morning I watch my tiny rooster chase the hens around until one gives in and lets him mount her. That is closer to the reality of humans than we like to admit, we just have more ritual in our sexual script.

We don't live in a world in which men must approach women. I was approached by my partner, as have been several male friends of mine. One female friend of mine even proposed to her boyfriend--reversal of the usual situation, which is uncommon but not unheard of.

Incels aren't only men. There are female incels, but they're not violent because women aren't socialized to solve problems with violence. There's a lot on the subject of female incels; google around a bit and you'll find it.

It isn't hard for a woman to bother a man with sexual harassment, either. My first job out of school, one of the admin staff was a "playful" woman who kept a riding crop on her desk. She started swatting me with it "playfully," except it wasn't playful and I was made to feel very uncomfortable by this overt sexual harassment in the workplace.

>> Why is it so hard for a woman to bother a man with sexual harassment?

Oh, that's actually very easy. All the woman has to do is walk up to the man and shove her finger up his asshole (even over clothes). That is a) totally sexual harassment and b) absolutely unwanted by the vast majority of men.

I think you're just unnecessarily restricting your definition of "sexual harassment".

I think the point of the article is that men feel empowered to especially awful on a platform like twitch. But you're totally right - we need to see this as what it is - constant, and ubiquitous.

Advertising companies spent decades telling men that this was the purpose of women.

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