"How not to be a creeper" and assorted followup discussion.

If you are at all interested in male-female interaction culture of both the positive and negative variety, how to deal with social awkwardness of both the neurotypical and the Asperger's varieties, how to teach social rules to young people, scifi convention or geek culture, and the like: I would like to direct your attention to a rich and engaging discussion thread at Whatever, the blog of scifi author John Scalzi. (This isn't just about scifi conventions, so bear with me.)

The scifi/geek-con blogosphere has been buzzing somewhat about a perceived culture at conventions in which unwelcome sexual advances and other "creepiness" have perhaps been overly tolerated (I am qualifying with "perceived" and "perhaps" only because I am not a con-goer and cannot give a first-hand opinion of the scene). In response to an emailed query, "Any tips on how not to be a creeper?" Scalzi wrote a post entitled "An Incomplete Guide to Not Creeping," in which he suggested ten rules for interacting with people -- in general, not just at cons -- in order not to inadvertently transgress other people's personal boundaries. Here is a sampler from the middle of the pack:

4. Acknowledge that other people do not exist just for your amusement/interest/desire/use. Yes, I know. You know that. But oddly enough, there’s a difference between knowing it, and actually believing it — or understanding what it means in a larger social context. People go to conventions and social gatherings to meet other people, but not necessarily (or even remotely likely) for the purpose of meeting you. The woman who is wearing a steampunky corset to a convention is almost certainly wearing it in part to enjoy being seen in it and to have people enjoy seeing her in it — but she’s also almost certainly not wearing it for you. You are not the person she has been waiting for, the reason she’s there, or the purpose for her attendance. When you act like you are, or that she has (or should have) nothing else to do than be the object of your amusement/interest/desire/use, the likelihood that you will come across a complete creeper rises exponentially. It’s not an insult for someone else not to want to play that role for you. It’s not what they’re there for.

So those are some overarching things to incorporate into your thinking. Here are some practical things.

5. Don’t touch. Seriously, man. You’re not eight, with the need to run your fingers over everything, nor do you lack voluntary control of your muscles. Keep your hands, arms, legs and everything else to yourself. This is not actually difficult. Here’s an idea: That person you want to touch? Put them in charge of the whole touch experience. That is, let them initiate any physical contact and let them set the pace of that contact when or if they do — and accept that that there’s a very excellent chance no touch is forthcoming. Do that when you meet them for the first time. Do that after you’ve met them 25 times. Do it just as a general rule. Also, friendly tip: If you do touch someone and they say “don’t touch me,” or otherwise make it clear that touching was not something you should have done, the correct response is: “I apologize. I am sorry I made you uncomfortable.” Then back the hell off, possibly to the next state over.

6. Give them space. Hey: Hold your arm straight out in front of your body. Where your fingertips are? That’s a nice minimum distance for someone you’re meeting or don’t know particularly well (it’s also not a bad distance for people you do know). Getting inside that space generally makes people uncomfortable, and why make people uncomfortable? That’s creepy. Also creepy: Sneaking up behind people and getting in close to them, or otherwise getting into their personal space without them being aware of it. If you’re in a crowded room and you need to scrunch in, back up when the option becomes available; don’t take it as an opportunity to linger inside that personal zone. Speaking of which:

Go check it out, it is worth reading, and almost certainly worth showing to your teenagers.

Anyway, the post sprouted a very long and interesting discussion, which Mr. Scalzi has carefully moderated (meaning, he deleted egregious trolls and off-point material), so that pretty much the whole thread is worth reading -- note, this does NOT mean that I endorse every opinion expressed in the thread, just that the remaining discussion, while heated, is mainly respectful and thoughtful. Warning: the discussion may be triggering, as a few people describe past unpleasant experiences.

One of the sub-discussions that I found particularly interesting had to do with people making excuses for individuals who, in their mind, simply lacked the social skills to avoid being "mistaken" for a sexually aggressive creepy person. (Most of these alluded to or mentioned Asperger's syndrome, but others cited cultural differences as the cause.) There ensued a fairly lively debate about the agency of socially impaired individuals. I think the strongest voices came from people who live with and love someone who is so impaired, and who argued that in fact they still need to be held to the same standards of behavior as everyone else, because they are capable of doing so as long as they understand it is necessary.

Another good sub-thread had to do with the responsibility of assertive people (particularly men) to intervene, either as a bystander or especially when the creeper is one of their friends.

Scalzi followed it up with a "Tangential Personal Note" in which he described a personal experience struggling with the temptation to be a creep:

On the flip side of this, I noted that the rules I noted yesterday are ones that I use myself when I try not to come across as a creeper to people I’m meeting. I didn’t use a specific example of a time where I was concerned about being considered a weird, creepy dude because although I did have a story that applied, I hadn’t cleared it with the other person involved. But now she’s cleared it, and now I’ll use it.

Back in 2006, at Readercon(!) I was wandering around the dealer’s room when I saw John Joseph Adams talking to a woman I didn’t know. I knew JJA very casually, so I went up to say hello. The woman he was speaking to was the art director of Shimmer Magazine and her name was Mary Robinette Kowal. JJA introduced the two of us, and Mary and I started chatting and within about five minutes I was aware that I was really intensely attracted to her, in a way that actually kind of spooked me and which I was sure was immediately and clearly obvious, and possibly immediately and obviously creepy.

So here’s what I did...

He goes into detail describing his conscious behavior intended to avoid making the woman uncomfortable, and then explains:

...I mention this for two purposes. One, to make the point that I think the guidelines I set out work (or at least work for me). Two, to make the point that saying that only certain types of men — ugly ones, aspie ones, socially sheltered ones, ones who aren’t going to pay attention to someone offering advice — have the potential to be creepers is kind of stupid. Hi there, I’m generally considered to be socialized, neurotypical and a decent guy. And oh my I had quite the potential to be a creeping assbag on Mary, among others. But I haven’t been, because I’m responsible for my own actions and I realize no one deserves to be creeped on by me even when the reptile portions of my brain are howling TAKE HER TAKE HER TAKE HER NOW. At the end of the day, as regards being a creepy assbag, it’s not about who you are, it’s about what you do.

Since Scalzi was married at the time, and says (in the comments) that he immediately came home and described the events to his wife, there's plenty of food for thought there about marriage and trust as well as about -- for want of a better term -- deliberate nondouchebaggery. The comments there are highly recommended as well.

What do you think about the posts? Is Scalzi's guide a good start? What tips would make it less "incomplete?"

 

 

Comments

[Jenny]

What does "triggering" mean in this context?

[Bearing]

Ah, sorry. "Triggering" means "liable to cause persons with certain kinds of trauma in their past to experience flashbacks or other types of post-traumatic discomforts."

As in "after surviving a sexual assault, she avoids watching crime dramas because they often contain triggering elements.
"

[Jenny]

Thanks. I was vacillating between that explanation and some weird "near-occasion-of-sin" one where the person reading would decide to try the same creepy techniques for himself. Anyway. Thanks for the clarity!

[MelanieB]

Interesting posts. I keeping thinking about the points about people who lack social skills. Still mulling it over. On the one hand I do agree with Sclazi that the responsibility is with the person who is transgressing boundaries and not with the person whose boundaries are transgressed. I do think that they need to try as much as possible to attempt to meet expectations. At the same time, I have spent so much time being the person who cares for the person who is on the Asperger's spectrum. I have often found myself trying to interpret the lack of social skills to others and trying to communicate what the social expectations are to someone who is just baffled at why others react the way they do to her best efforts to interact. It is heartbreaking and I do wish that the world in general had more understanding and empathy for those individuals to whom social interaction is a mystery.

I'm always befuddled when I come across a term like "triggering". I figured out what it meant from the context fairly easily; but I was puzzled by the fact that it seemed to be used by everyone as if they assumed everyone knew what it meant and yet clearly from my reaction and Jenny's the term is not actually in as wide a circulation as the blogger and commenter's use of it would seem to suggest.

I stumbled across another term like that in this discussion that has come to my attention several times in various internet venues in recent weeks. My first reaction when I saw someone mention something as being indicative of "Rape Culture" was befuddlement. Then I felt some push back against what was clearly a concept arising from feminist academia. I have a general suspicion of feminist academia and also I don't like it when jargon is used to assert a controversial paradigm that isn't explained, just assumed. Then again I followed a couple of links to discussions about what "rape culture" consists of and my mind began boggling as I couldn't believe the kinds of behavior that men and women routinely excused. If people are giving each other passes for this sort of behavior, then maybe there is some truth to the idea of there being a "rape culture". Sorry that's really getting way off onto another tangent but it was something that came up in the discussion threads.

One other thing... this blog post at Pentimento today seemed to feed directly into the Scalzi discussion about personal responsibility.