Anyone who has been through high-school knows a lot of unattractive or socially undesirable men get tremendous backlash for behaviors that a desirable men get away with.
I didn’t go to a coed highschool, but I imagine a lot of that backlash was status signalling, and the target of the advance wasn’t genuinely aggrieved. So, that isn’t just.
But factoring that out, I think it’s quite right to view a guy making a bunch of unwanted advances as rather a jerk, depending on how much he makes rejecting him suck for the targets. He’s generating a bunch of negative utility.
When I see guys with poor social skills complain about this, it basically amounts to saying that it’s not fair. Sure—it’s not fair that looks and charm get parcelled out unevenly, but so what? You still don’t get to make your problem someone else’s.
It’s not fair that we become more unattractive as we age, but a 70 year old man who constantly makes unwelcome advances on young women is rightly viewed with contempt.
It’s not fair that gay men and women can very seldom hit on strangers with a good expected utility either. It doesn’t make it okay for them to just “assume they’re gay until stated otherwise”, given that most people are straight.
“I think it’s quite right to view a guy making a bunch of unwanted advances as rather a jerk, depending on how much he makes rejecting him suck for the targets. He’s generating a bunch of negative utility.”
Yes in that situation one would be jerk, but not everyone was complaining about a bunch of advances (and I did say that some of the grievances were justified), but even one advance or something that could have been miscontrued as an advance. If we (safely) assume the anecdotes come from people who have freely given out their number or have let a guy talk over them, then it sets a tone that the socially awkward should come off as asexual as possible to avoid offending a member of the opposite sex. That doesn’t seem like a reasonable expectation to put on others.
I didn’t go to a coed highschool, but I imagine a lot of that backlash was status signalling, and the target of the advance wasn’t genuinely aggrieved. So, that isn’t just.
But factoring that out, I think it’s quite right to view a guy making a bunch of unwanted advances as rather a jerk, depending on how much he makes rejecting him suck for the targets. He’s generating a bunch of negative utility.
When I see guys with poor social skills complain about this, it basically amounts to saying that it’s not fair. Sure—it’s not fair that looks and charm get parcelled out unevenly, but so what? You still don’t get to make your problem someone else’s.
It’s not fair that we become more unattractive as we age, but a 70 year old man who constantly makes unwelcome advances on young women is rightly viewed with contempt.
It’s not fair that gay men and women can very seldom hit on strangers with a good expected utility either. It doesn’t make it okay for them to just “assume they’re gay until stated otherwise”, given that most people are straight.
“I think it’s quite right to view a guy making a bunch of unwanted advances as rather a jerk, depending on how much he makes rejecting him suck for the targets. He’s generating a bunch of negative utility.”
Yes in that situation one would be jerk, but not everyone was complaining about a bunch of advances (and I did say that some of the grievances were justified), but even one advance or something that could have been miscontrued as an advance. If we (safely) assume the anecdotes come from people who have freely given out their number or have let a guy talk over them, then it sets a tone that the socially awkward should come off as asexual as possible to avoid offending a member of the opposite sex. That doesn’t seem like a reasonable expectation to put on others.