It Doesn’t Count Unless I Know You’re Hitting on Me.
thetechnobody.com
thetechnobody.com
The author's issue not with men hitting on her, as she clearly explains. Her issue is with men obtaining her contact information ostensibly to do business and then using that contact information to hit on her.
Really, is that distinction so hard to understand? Stop excusing bad behaviour under the guise of "biology" or other lame rationalizations. They are as demeaning to men as they are insulting to women.
To the posters here: Getting a girl's number to ask her on a date on the pretense of networking is creepy.
To the author: Some guys are creepy. Deflect them like you usually do.
This doesn't seem such a big deal!
It's not beyond the realms of possibility that the following is the case:
The men "hitting on" her are perfectly polite and
interested in her professionally, but also want to see if
there's a chance of a date. If she were to reply, "sorry
no", they would leave it at that.
It's also obviously totally unprofessional of the person. I mean, what are they going to say to their boss?
I met the smart freelancer we're looking for,
but then I asked her for a date and now she isn't
returning my calls. Sorry boss.
If I wasn't interested I'd say "no thanks" and expect them to get on with life and not harass me. Granted, this may not accurately describe the situation in the article, but in that case the author has not made her point well.
But if you develop a business relationship with someone it seems fine to ask if they'd like to go on a date - just like you might as something in the office.
From my observation, though, the former is probably more common than the latter ;)
She's not complaining about being hit on. She's complaining about a bait-and-switch -- pretextually getting her number or other contact information in a business context, and using it later for personal contact.
The bulk of the post, the actual problem she's complaining about, is being hit on by "stealth", where she can't bluntly reject without compromising other interests, whatever the context is supposed to be on the surface.
EDIT: Whoever downvoted you is an asshole. Explaining the reasoning for your interpretation is a necessary part of this conversation.
She's saying that anyone who wouldn't hit on her, but still take her card and use it to get a date, are the types of guys she'd want to reject if they did suddenly decide to hit on her.
Hmmm....
Um...yes, actually. Yes I would think that.
And it's not exactly surprising that someone writing about being hit on, and their concerns with being hit on, does such a thing. It's all a part of the same visage.
To bring up Reddit, because this is a very Redditesque story, this reminds me of the hilarious comic someone submitted there of the difference of guys and girls showing off something in a picture for other Redditors to appreciate, be it a game, animal, etc: every guy picture is just the object. Every girl picture is 90% the girl, 10% the object. Wish I could find a link to it because it is far too true.
Casting that aside for a moment, biology happens. I'm a guy, married and have been hit on in the past (my best defence was to stop working out and put a few pounds on, hasn't been a problem since then although it may have introduced new problems which I'm now working on).
It's natural for men and women to flirt, to hit on each other in an attempt to achieve evolution's goal. It's what we're all wired for. However, having said that as long as boundaries are made clear it shouldn't be a problem.
I'd also like to say that I have both been 'that guy' and been hit on by 'that woman'. In both cases there are worse things in the world to worry about. In the case of 'that woman' I made a pretty good friend and business associate, in the case of being 'that guy', you chalk it up and move on, or in my case make friends with someone who you wouldn't have perhaps spoken to if you weren't initially attracted to.
I'd also second the context. A woman being hit on in SF is nothing like being hit in Cairo, Delhi or even Paris.
If all you do is schmooze then is it really so strange that someone might mistake your intent as unrelated to acting as a supplier, partner or client to their business? How cut and dried really is it? It's not like she's a developer looking for a new project or something that would clearly qualify as "serious business".
It does have the not-so-faint whiff of life is so hard everybody wants me.
Whether or not you think women are treated unfairly in the industry (I used to bristle at the idea, then watched my wife interview for jobs and radically changed my take), and whether or not this particular woman endured any real unfairness:
It is still worth considering how totally unprofessional and inappropriate it may be to ask a woman for her business card in order to abuse it for your personal benefit. It's not something I had thought of before. It's worth discussing.
If gender politics makes your brain turn off (and, it used to do that to me too), just pivot the story in your head so that instead of asking for a date, the guy takes her card at a tech convention and later calls and tries to sell her a dental insurance policy. It's spam. Spam is bad. There's an implied agreement when I give you my card that you're going to use it for its intended purpose: to contact me about something relevant to my business.
I have been propositioned for this kind of thing in a business context and have refused and not had negative blowback from doing so. That was actually the first mental shift I tried to see if it made any more sense to me that way, but it still seemed overblown. I can't think of an invitation that it is socially acceptable to make to a new acquintance that it is not socially acceptable to make to a new potential business contact, admittedly I guess that might be a consequence of the extremely limited array of things I consider to be socially acceptable invitations to new acquaintances.
Just saying no thanks is really not so hard, and if it continues after that point it becomes a hell of a lot less ambiguous or defensible.
This is not to say this is absolutely positively an instance of either of the above, merely that it is too ambiguous and unclear to not come across poorly.
The question is: is taking someone's business card under the auspices of a business inquiry and then using it solely for your own personal reasons unprofessional or not? The answer (I'll go out on a limb here...) is: yes. It's unprofessional. Interesting point, blog author! Thanks!
Honestly, I don't know if this is really the most important function of a social media consultant. They are really a domain expert. Like any consultant, their job is as not just to perform tasks in the domain, but to offer expertise and help make decisions as well. Knowledge of effectively using Twitter, Facebook, Yelp, etc can be leveraged for shareholder value. This could be marketing campaigns, coupons, contests, tech support, retweeting when relevent or almost any other use of social media.
Now, not every company needs this. But for big companies with large support and customer relations staffs, it's not unreasonable that a few social media experts can save enough money to make it worth their while.
Gender issues are important. They are important everywhere and they are especially important in industries like ours where the gender ratios are so unbalanced.
That being said, I find it extremely difficult to take this author seriously. I don't think I can critique her writing in a way that doesn't either come off as mean or completely expose me as the curmudgeonly bastard that I am, so I will just say that I found her style distracting. It's her blog and she should by all means write however she wishes - and to be fair she may not have expected the attention she is getting - but it's disappointing to me to see this issue represented in this way.
Hopefully, though, people will be able to see past that and realize that it's pathetic and rude to collect someone's personal contact information under the guise of business networking with the intent of calling them later for a date.
Sure, it's underhand, but she hasn't said anything to suggest that they're not interested in her both personally and professionally.
This is agreement with you: she's very unclear.
She could also make it clear on the card that it is a business number.
For those that don't, you should be able to deal with them quite candidly. If they persist and start harassing you then block their number or report them.
If you can't do this, then maybe the problem lies on your end. Stop putting yourself in the position where you are helplessly being tormented.
1. You're a woman, and men will hit on you, and that's not a bad thing; it's biology.
2. If you think SF men are aggressive, then obviously you haven't been out much. I don't think I've been anywhere in the world that's LESS aggressive than SF when it comes to dating/mating. Go to Brazil and see what aggressiveness is.
It's a simple rule: if you meet a woman and you're interested in her in that way, then hit on her properly and ask her for her number in a way that makes your intentions non-ambiguous. If you're interested in her professionally then by all means exchange business cards. If you're interested in her in both ways then... well, choose one.
Does a woman not have the right not to face that? If you've got a girl, don't you feel personally that she shouldn't have to face that?
At what point are aggressive come-ons just harassment?
She should have to deal with harrasment? Nope, but that's a different thing entirely. Somebody scoping out your card and then asking you out on a date isn't harassing you. They're asking you on a date. It's what happens after you say 'no' that things become different.
Are you speaking for ALL women?
In Brazil, women love it when you aggressively peruse them.
In SF, men don't talk to women, and women's number one complaint is exactly that.
>> when we’re at a business networking event, and we exchange cards
You're really stretching the definition of subtext if you're suggesting that a woman giving you her business card actually means she wants to get personal with you.
(That doesn't excuse any men from being douches about it, but if they're polite and take no for an answer then I don't see any problem)
And there it is: Pure sexism.
Knew you couldn't hold it in.
Edit: Just to prove the point. Find a picture of a man that you think qualifies as "His appearance suggests to me he's open to the suggestion of initiating a romantic relationship with someone suitable."
And that's perfectly fine if she wants to trade on her appearance this way, but the minute someone suggests she may be doing so, suddenly they're "sexist." How does that work?
"Find a picture of a man that you think qualifies as "His appearance suggests to me he's open to the suggestion of initiating a romantic relationship with someone suitable."
I, for one, would not be terribly turned on by a guy wearing red lipstick, etc. That's just me, being straight and all. Men and women have different signals, that's just how it is. If the pictures where all of an aquiline Abercrombian staring off into the distance with his shirt off, casually slung over his shoulder, showing off rippling pecs and abs, well....what would YOU say he was doing?
Men and women are different when it comes to (at least, heterosexual) relationships, and signal their interest differently. If observing that makes me a sexist, then so be it.
Regardless of how goofy she wants to make her blog look, I think she still has a good point (although, granted, it was a rant and thus not exactly written in the most positive way possible)
Seriously? You miss her saying that trading business cards is not an invitation for personal contact?
I found it blatantly obvious that she finds direct flirting acceptable while the subterfuge of faking a professional interaction to acquire contact information to be creepy and spineless.
I think a lot of people here are taking this woman's complaint personally which is actually quite funny.
>> why can she just not say "no thanks"
You don't rant when some business contact you just met asks you if you'd like to go hit a gay pub later. You do it after it has happened for the hundredth time this month.
The environment in tech sounds about like the military: women have to be prepared to physically fight their own team. Which is deeply unfortunate.
This is what the flag button is for, IMO.
It probably also violates HN etiquette to link your comments to your female friends and ask them to upvote it. Please don't do it anymore.
I understand what she's saying, and I empathize, I really do, but its is a hazard of being attractive ...
SUCK IT UP.
Its bad form to rant about that kind of stuff ... its almost like some dude who owns a Ferrari/Aston Martin/whatever, complaining about how people are always crowding around his car wherever he parks it. (Yeah how dreary it must be to own a Ferrari!) ... It just comes across wrong.
If she really wants to solve her problem and stop ranting ... let her put on 30 pounds. I promise the shennanigans will stop ... abruptly.
I've seen a lot of comments in social media from SF women stating that they can't get a guy to even look at them.
It is an interesting topic, at least for me: I'm male, so I haven't had to go through a situation like that and I don't have a clue how I would respond to something like that if I were in her shoes. Had I heeded your summary without reading the blog, I would've missed a mildly interesting topic.
A lot of people go to networking events to meet partners as well as network.
And American men are aggressive? Try Italian, Spanish, French, ...
A girl with barely any experience who goes to networking events. WTF does she expect?
P.S. 10/10