Hello ladies (current and former) of Lemmy (current) - I’m curious how your experience of the male gaze has changed as you moved in and out of young-woman-hood.

How has your opinion of being seen changed through this process?

  • Clay_pidgin@sh.itjust.worksOPEnglish
    4·
    5 months ago

    I try to do drive by compliments, but not while literally driving … Just stuff like “cool hat!” and walk off so they don’t need to respond or engage with me.

    I would like to be told I have a nice ass, but that’s because it doesn’t happen (even though I think I deserve it). It sounds like being hit on often cheapens it.

    • Pandantic [they/them]@midwest.socialEnglish
      3·
      5 months ago

      I do drive-by compliments too, especially if someone is sporting a fandom I like. I think it’s different when it’s a stranger complimenting a body feature - it implies sexual attraction which can feel objectifying and, unfortunately in the world we live in, unsafe. I don’t know this person, I just know they felt comfortable enough to anonymously shout a comment about a sexual part of my body, so what else do they feel comfortable enough to do?

      • Clay_pidgin@sh.itjust.worksOPEnglish
        2·
        5 months ago

        Gotcha. Yeah, I would never comment on a stranger’s body/face/smell. Even if I don’t mean anything by it, creepy is in the eye of the beholder.