Here’s a story about a young woman, and a benevolent older married man, and the awkward dude who was obsessed with her. Go read the story, with this in mind:
When I tell this story to women, they spot The Question right away. The men don’t; they think that Dr Glass behaved like a gentleman, neither doing too much nor too little. They are feminist men, and good people. They have read “The Gift of Fear” and they talk about privilege and the patriarchy, and they don’t spot it.
I’m a woman, yet I didn’t spot The Question (I was too busy looking for it in the wrong place, alas. I got the creepy sinister vibe from the beginning, so when The Question should’ve popped, it was lost in the noise of ZOMG all of that is so fucking wrong. I felt like a right proper doofus when it was pointed out, because it went from well that had the potential to be a really awful situation to oshit it almost happened right there, and I didn’t see it). Tell me if you spotted it. For those of you who didn’t, what made you miss it? Did the whole tone of the story change once it was asked? Or were you not in the least surprised?
Don’t miss the original post that comment was left at. The whole thing is necessary, and bears repeating a hundred million times until our culture gets it and changes, but here’s the takeaway message:
I don’t know how we fix it, but one step has to be to stop tolerating it when it happens to us and when it happens to people we love. Making our social circles and spaces safe means making them AWKWARD AS HELL and UNSAFE for creeps and predators. It means constantly reframing the conversation away from the dominant narrative, so when stuff like the situations in these letters comes up we can say “That’s called sexual assault and it’s a crime. So I need you to stop talking to me about his feelings and pressuring me to invite him to parties.“
Direct your don’t-get-it guy friends, family and acquaintances to the two posts above. Tell them to read for comprehension. And don’t give them a pass if they don’t get it. We can’t stop repeating the message until it’s sunk in: this creepy, predatory behavior is wrong and has to stop. The people who can’t stop engaging in it cannot be part of our social spaces. Period.
I guess I half-got the question: when I read the part about coming back for the hike, I was all, “Hey, that’s weird, why would he be waiting for her?” and I was all creeped out, but when The Question was mentioned, I didn’t realize that was it. :/
Whoa, though – some people are just creepy.
I kind of assumed they had switched the lights on and that IT was “safe” close to a lot of people, so I missed the question. This didn’t change much – I’d already been shouting in my hrad that the harassment and stalking should have been called out sooner. But yeah, the realisation was an “OMG that is how rape and sexual assault happen” moment.
Thanks for the link
I essentially missed it because I was not at all surprised. Given the clingy behavior described earlier, I probably should have even seen it coming.
Which probably isn’t a good thing. Because that means the behavior seems “normal,” though obviously it should not be that way.
I recall reading this comment back when these Captain Awkward blog posts were new in August 2012, and then as now, I was rather too impatient at reading to the end to actually spot The Question in the course of doing so. However, on a little bit of reflection it’s plainly obvious that there is no other purpose for Awkward Dude to be waiting in darkness except to catch Luminous Girl by surprise, thereby putting her at an initial disadvantage for however their interaction might proceed after that point – which is a classic example of utter creepiness and disregard for her as a person (e.g. see Nussbaum’s criteria for sexual objectification and see which ones apply). I’m not too cut up about missing it again; there might be a point to make that this is the sort of observation which would tend to occur to AFAB* people (more so than AMAB*) because of gender socialisation, but a response to that should entail that education about sexual harassment must include those who would tend to be oblivious to it. It’s something people of all genders should be aware of.
* In respect of gender socialisation AFAB (or AMAB) usually means people Assigned Female (or Male) At Birth.
I missed it, too. But I did get a different Question.
In light of the paragraph in which Mrs. Glass tells Mr. Glass, “Whose workshop was ruined because she didn’t feel safe?”, and in light of the conversations we’ve been having about sexual harassment policies at large gatherings, I thought the question was going to be, “Why didn’t you report this guy?”
I thought the lesson was going to be about how it isn’t always effective to just “handle things on your own”. Perhaps Glass and Luminous should have spoken to the course director, for example, who might have also received other complaints from other people.
I guess it’s a privilege that I haven’t had to develop the level of situational awareness that would have told me “dark hallway = not good”.
It didn’t strike me a the Particular Question to look for, since it was escalating creeperness the whole way. Why did Glass at least not report and sooner? Although I think being there, rather than reading a narrative, my reaction would have been different assuming that I/we had let it get that far in the first place. The mere blow-off while imparting the idea that what she did is none of the creeper’s business is correct if wildly insufficient at that point. And what do you do then, on the last day? (Maybe creeper would have some kind of credit or something revoked?) Which isn’t what I’d be thinking immediately but I’m sure it would occur once I reported, whether due to what I’ve seen and read or because the PTB made it clear that they can’t/won’t do anything, or do much of anything ( creeper needs more help or restraints than some workshop can provide). Which is just another reason that the cultures of institutions as well as individuals needs to change.
like @Scr… Archivist at #5, I was thinking “why isn’t anybody reporting this creep to the workshop’s authorities?”, so I missed the actual question. In fact, I had to go back and read that paragraph again, because I haven’t even noticed the fact that “the halls were completely dark”. It’s striking how we men clearly don’t have to deal with this sort of things to the point that we don’t even notice… We need to start paying more attention.
Glass didn’t report right away because “…Dr Glass wanted to assume good intentions on everyone’s part. They’d all lived together, after all, eaten together, worked together. Emotions had run high. It would have been pretty terrible for the Dude if he’d been ostracized right at the beginning, just because he wasn’t very good at talking to girls. After all, he was there for the workshop. They all were.”
Glass himself missed The Question. He only believed that Awkward Dude was just awkward; not potentially dangerous.
(That last comment was in response to F’s second sentence. This next comment is in general.)
I remember reading that comment when those posts were new. And yup, I completely missed it until elodieunderglass pointed it out. I could feel Doctor Glass’s awkwardness/unsuredness throughout the whole story, even through elodie’s narration. But when she pointed out The Question, it was like a punch in the gut.
I look for it every fucking time, now. Whenever I read stories even mildly similar… “Awkward Dude tries unsuccessfully to get Attractive Woman to notice him; escalates attempts”… I basically just start looking for that question. elodieunderglass’s comment really changed the way I saw interactions between people in real life, as well… especially between men and women. And I started realizing that I was seeing this all the time. It also made me start really analyzing past interactions I’ve had with women, and if I’ve ever come off like Awkward Dude.
Wow. I am the dumbest woman ever. I didn’t think of the question. Seriously, I didn’t. And I am extra careful at night with strange men. And I still didn’t get it. I did, however, wonder why the program director did nothing, or why no one reported him. I mean, wasn’t his obtrusiveness during classtime and work enough to get him booted from the program?
I didn’t think of that question as “the” question because I was expecting it. So much so that my question was “why didn’t she ask Dr Glass to walk her to her door” because I fully expected creeper to be waiting for her.
And that’s sad, because it means that’s so normal to me that I know it’s wrong, and don’t expect it to be any different.
Guy here, but I had a similar reaction. It all looked like a progression to me, so a confrontation in the hall didn’t seem out of place. Except that I forgot some of the details of the story, so I didn’t see exactly *how* fucked up it was. There was a steady progression of “asshole,” so I missed the big leap into “dangerous” territory.
Well, he was waiting in the dark becasue that was the only option for waiting at all – the residence halls had their lights turned off: “It was after curfew when they walked back to their rooms,and the halls were completely dark;” He was probably waiting there before curfew becasue he was clearly obsessed with Luminous and wanted to spend any/all time possible with her (and yes, this is creepy in and of itself – obsession is often normalized as “romantic” by common romance tropes, which absolutely reinforces our rape culture). I read the waiting when and under what circumstances as a function of when they returned from the hike, and too much of the read on this in the post seems to focus on the “in the dark” part versus the waiting at all.
I do think it’s entirely appropriate and reasonable to be extra-sketched out by the particular circumstances on Luminous’s part, becasue if creepy dude had bad intentions, that made Luminous even more vulnerable. I don’t actually think that can tell us much, if anything, about creepy dude’s intentions – at least, I don’t think it tells us anything more than if he had been waiting if they returned from the hike before curfew. I’m actually a little bit surprised at the reaction described here:
Just the other night, I was waiting by my (male) friend’s house for him to return home from the bar, in the relative dark, and he wasn’t suddenly freaked out becasue it was dark out. This is entirely male privilege – the privilege to not be constantly concerned we’re going to be assaulted becasue we’re much less likely to be targeted. What’s weird to me isn’t that dudes are privilege-blind, but that the conditions apparently make such a difference, as the men I know aren’t really additionally sketched out by the dark. Thus, it doesn’t really occur to me to consider that others are additionally sketched out; I’m glad I read this, as it will likely cause me to alter my behavior in the future.
Long-time reader of the good Captain (hi Xanthe!) and I too remember this thread when it came out.
It wasn’t so much that I didn’t spot The Question, more that I assumed the answer based on the rest of the story; we, the reader, knew damn well why he was waiting for her.
“The Question” didn’t occur to me for the same reason others have stated. To me the question was why was it allowed to get this far?
As someone who has been in analogous circumstances to Dr Glass I think there is another side to this that has not been noted. While I expect this also did not occur to the good doctor (nor his wife apparently) another reason he may have forestalled reporting or dealing with the creep is that he was enjoying the role of protector, friend, and confidant of a luminous young woman. Under those circumstances I can certainly see the appeal of some creep driving such a woman to seek out my company and the temptation to do nothing to interfere with this arrangement over the course of the event. The events in the dark hallway put a rather sharp point on why such self indulgence is not appropriate.
In similar circumstances my response to such creepy behavior has always been to deal with the creeper as quickly as possible. In one case this was the organizer of the event so the methodology was a bit complicated. Fortunately there were enough sharp, strong willed women and decent men around that the creepiness was fairly well contained and those subject to it were well protected (aside from an unexpected incident with a stuffed moose plushy toy).
Perhaps I am being a bit unkind to Dr Glass. I do not find his behavior particularly laudable, but rather minimally decent with overtones of questionable self interest. I can’t help but feel that there is a bit of the “White Knight” in this (an actual real life example that is, not the ones of feverish MRA imaginations).
I did not get that question as the question because it was so distant from the time of telling; at that point in the story, I thought “so he’s freaking stalking her? creepy bastard, run away!” at the time of the questioning, I was wondering “Why is HIS possible embarrassment so much more important to Dr. Glass than HER constantly being harassed?”
I guess I kinda figured out the question based on things i had read to that point. But to me the main concern was why were the hallway lights off period. It’s a safety concern. I know it was after curfew but still the lights in a dorm hallway should not have been off- what if there had been a fire how would they know a way out? These people were staying in a place that’s not very familiar to them and they should expect to have well lit access to things no matter what time of day.
It’s by keeping places not well lit that creeps can get away with hiding in them.
I also missed it…knew exactly why he was waiting in the dark, and wasn’t surprised that he would be.
Stories like this, though, do point out why it’s important to have norms and policies around reporting this sort of behavior. Dr. Glass was doing the only thing he could think of – let Luminous use him as a bodyguard – because it simply didn’t occur to him that he could and should pull aside whoever was in charge of the workshop and explain why Awkward Guy needed to be sent home.
Sadly, in my younger days I handled a similar situation* as Dr. Glass did – the leadership would have backed us up, and they were horrified when they found out (years later), but it didn’t occur to any of us that we could tell them. Awkward Guys were a fact of life, and you dealt with them as best you could. I know better now, but had to be taught.
* This happened at a science camp for high school students. The teachers were recent alums of the program (college students, including me), and college professors. The creep – we’ll call him Dr. Pedophile, because the students did – was a middle-aged professor with a taste for jailbait. He never crossed the line, but his wandering eyes and sleazy “jokes” were hard to miss. The female students didn’t feel safe around him. Of course, they complained to us – the recent alums – rather than the other middle-aged male professors.
The alums arranged to have him chaperoned at all times while dealing with students. We were swamped, and really didn’t appreciate baby-sitting a grown man, and it might have showed some. The other professors pulled us aside at some point and lectured us about letting “personality conflicts” interfere with our work. What I said, at age 19, was something like “(grumble) FINE”. What I should have said, and would say now, was something like “I just spent my entire afternoon following that SOB around to make sure he didn’t molest anyone. You bet I don’t respect him.” Hadn’t learned I could do that yet.
Dr. Pedophile was there for years. The previous year’s alums just made sure the next year’s group knew he needed a chaperone, and he got one. He left for other reasons, and the leadership overheard the alums celebrating …it was the first they’d heard of it.
Whenever I see bumps of stats around the Question I really do try to ignore it, but occasionally I feel like it’s time to pop in and clear up a few things, because it’s always frustrating when your trickle-through traffic ends up on my blog feeling the need to be rules-lawyers on a two-year-old comment. So with my apologies, I’m going to respond here with you, En Tequila Es Verdad, so that they can feel their feelings here and not take them to my house. Here’s the standard Caveat Package to go with The Question:
1. Don’t worry too much if you don’t “GET THE QUESTION.” It’s not about that. It’s not a TRICK where all the people who don’t follow the giant flashing neon signs in a long, meandering random internet comment are EVIL RAPISTS. This was an internet comment written in ten minutes, not a personal commentary on how you are a terrible person. I’m not sure why people who read it go “DID YOU GET THE QUESTION??!” as if it’s a game that people can lose, but really, don’t worry too much about it. If you “got it,” cool – don’t worry about it. If you “felt shady” about different elements of a deliberately pretty shady story, don’t worry too much about it.
2. Don’t worry too much about THE DETAILS. Like, don’t feel like you need a floorplan of the dorms and a chart of sunset times and a map of the light switches and a discussion about Dr Glass’s physical strength and an in-depth document detailing the State of the Marriage of the House of Glass in order to decide whether it’s important. Too often, someone presents THE QUESTION like “exhibit A! this is an example of rape culture!” and the comments devolve into “BUT MRS GLASS DOESN’T REALIZE THAT HER HUSBAND IS BONING THE CHILD LOL” and so on. It’s a little worrying, because you can see how this directly translates into how people act in discussions of rape; people prefer to demand random bits of information that supposedly justify toxic behaviors than to condemn the toxic behaviors. Honestly, you can relax about those things, because…
3. This was a heavily fictionalized, edited story presented in the way that I wanted to tell it at the time. It’s how I related it to my friends around the time that it was relevant to us. It’s how I was chatting to my internet pal Captain Awkward and my dear friends there. It’s got a twisty “gotcha”, but it is not a HISTORICAL DOCUMENT that you have to ANALYZE for SECRET LEVELS OF TRUTH because it is deliberately presented in this way for a reason. It is deliberately presented in this way because the reader – I was assuming the original LW’s boyfriend and similar types – is supposed to be the sort of dude who identifies both with the fictionalised Dr Glass (as the POV narrator) and with Awkward Guy (because this sort of dude endlessly dispenses passes towards those who are socially awkward.) So this guy is meant to read this story and go “WHOA, I AM PART OF THE PROBLEM, THE PROBLEM ALSO INVOLVES ME” in the same way that our acquaintances did when we co-told this story in the pub.
When I [used to] tell the story, as I did here, I made Dr Glass out to be kind of thick and slow-witted in order to make the point better.
When Dr Glass tells the story, he points different details/anecdotes that I don’t (I go for the very obvious route leading to the DARK HALLWAY) and stresses that he reported the behavior to the directors, was more switched-on than I made him out to be during the whole thing, that Luminous was also “escorted” by older women on the course, whom he communicated/coordinated with as well, to make sure she was never alone, while also feeling able to enjoy herself. (The nasty predatory guy only reacted badly when Dr Glass was doing it, and that’s what awkward dudebros identify with, because they immediately identify with perceived SEXUAL COMPETITION.) For extra-extra added detail, the situation was somewhat derailed when the older female course director, who was on top of it, had a really bad accident halfway through, and a panicky young dude had to step in to save the workshop, and his view of the situation was “I can’t deal with romance problems, I’ve got to save the workshop.”
So, for those who REALLY HAVE THE BURNING NEED to interrogate ALL OF THE MOTIVES AND ANGLES HERE before they consider whether rape culture is real and whether young women should be protected at all costs, there are the answers you needed.
I’m not sure why you need them so much, but y’all demand them from me every time this goes around again, so now you have them.
The reason why I feel it’s important to say it again and again (rather than closing my contact form and drinking heavily) is because I see the same thing every time, and it is so much a reflection of what people go through when they try to talk about actual sexual assault. Like I said, people have this immediate urge to understand/dissect the behavior of everyone involved – to the actual detriment of the young woman who needs to be heard, believed and protected. They’d prefer a secret love story between Luminous Girl and Dr Glass; they want to know why Dr Glass doesn’t punch people in the face; they want to know how hot the girl was, and what she was doing to lead all of these men on. They’d rather fight about Who Is Really Responsible For the Creepy Guy than to say “WOW, let’s eliminate creepy guys and their behaviors when we next see them.”
“Wait, were the lights on automatic timer switches or did someone turn them off? But wait, why didn’t you TELL SOMEONE that he was being creepy? But wait, why didn’t you MAKE people believe you? I don’t believe you; I think your short skirt was leading him on. I’m not going to believe your story because you’re hot and you were wearing a skirt!”
Just think about that.
I personally witnessed two instances of harassment in public, one in which I intervened (the guy started to put his hands on the woman) and one (purely verbal) in which I didn’t. That time, both myself and my girlfriend were present and indecisive whether to intervene. Upon reflection, I found it troubling that the presence of a lot of people in the vicinity made it worse; nobody intervened and everyone probably thought (like us) that the creep couldn’t do any harm because it was in a public, crowded place. So yeah, a general update to social norms is needed, not just policies at special events. (Though those would be a good start.)
I never saw the question coming-it blind-sided me completely. Awkward dude seemed to me to be more nuisance than menace, and I wouldn’t have waited as long to confront him about it, but due to having a great big, hairy heaping of male privilege it never even occurred to me that there might be a threat in the dark, much less what that threat might be. Am I really that obtuse?
No, I think you get the point entirely – that so many men never have to watch for these situations themselves that they have a hard time seeing why it’s an issue for so many women. That what many men brush off as a nuisance is seen my a lot of women as a huge menace.
And now that you’ve been blindsided by it, you can be more aware of similar situations in the future.
It doesn’t mean you’re obtuse, just that you’ve not been threatened in the same way, and it’s difficult to see threats that aren’t directed at you.