Expressing sexual interest: “Would you like to go out sometime?”. Jesus. How did we get to this.

You & the other commenters are being far more patient with this individual than I would be. His whole line of argument just reeks of bad faith. But good on you for your generosity!

I’m reading tihs whole thread amazed that you won’t—not can’t, but won’t, bceause I’m getting the feeling that one of your kinks is prolonging this stupid discussion—make a distinction between mutual behavior such as flirting, which YES WE KNOW YOU DON’T DO BECAUSE YOU DON’T DATE COWORKERS, and one-directional, blunt…

The point I’m attempting to make is that a lot of relationships and interactions people in engage in, I find to be inappropriate.

NO. You do not one free shot at sexually harassing someone. There is no harass pass. Repeating the offense is bad b/c it is an offense. Women should be able to go to work without being treated like a sexual object. Disrespecting people, even just one time, is one time too many. We’re here to earn m9ney we need to…

Oh no dude, we get it. “Oh, Carol, I’m so SORRY! I had no IDEA I wasn’t allowed to stick my dick in the intern’s mashed potatoes and ask what her lady parts smelled like. I merely meant it as part of a cheeky welcome to the organization! I’ll do my best going forward, apologies but maybe you should revise your…

“So the question to me is, is it harassment for one coworker to ask another if they wish to have sex”

It’s not the act in question; it’s the context of the act. And yes, walking up to a relative stranger in a workplace and saying, “hey, wanna bone?” Or “hey, could you blow me?” Or “how about we go and dry hump?” Would all also have been wrong. Because of... THE CONTEXT!

“But there are people who do do this. Who do so while operating within in the bounds of sexual harassment policy.”

See, I don’t think the “advances” part should take place at work. You might be getting entirely the wrong impression and then making an advance, even if you accept a “no” the first time, puts the person on the spot and make them nervous about your reaction. Nobody needs pressure on the job. In essence, respectful…

“Thus are the many faceted ways of the heart.”

soliciting the opinions of the commenteriate on this observation

You’ve said you don’t engage in romance with colleagues like 50 times in this thread.

I personally agree, that people should not engage in romance at work. The problem is lot of people seem not to agree with me and engage in this regularly.

The thing is that even if the two of them were totally fine with his proposal, this is behavior that shouldn’t exist in any workplace. Even on a porn movie set, if that’s not what you’re paid for, keep your innapropriate offers to yourself.

Asking your colleague if you can masturbate in front of her isn’t “expressing sexual interest”, it is abuse. Fuck off with your verbose bullshit, you know exactly what’s going on here.

But surely whether or not a person is receptive to sexual advances is not the metric as to whether or not they are appropriate.

Met my husband when he was a resident and I was a medical student. He was my supervisor, but very briefly (for a week or so).

1. He decided it was a good idea to masturbate at work. Incredibly inappropriate and it creates a terrible envrionment for, you know, the people who don’t wish to see/hear him masturbate while they try to go about their jobs.

Here’s the full paragraph: