Men behaving badly

And I’ve had enough

Photo by Mihai Surdu on Unsplash

I was at a business event two years ago when the man chairing the meeting—a man in his late fifties in a senior role—insisted on telling me about all the extramarital sex he was having. He wouldn’t shut up about it.

In the space of an hour, he talked about his iron man training regime; his athleticism; his lust for a 30-something swimmer he described as ‘fit’; how his behaviour was putting his long-term relationship at risk; and how if he had a late night with the swimmer, he’d struggle to get up for his morning gym session because of all the sex.

I tried to change the subject—talk marketing and business because that’s why we were there—but each time, he’d steer it back to the women, to the sex, to how fit he was.

In a previous meeting, he’d told me that women over 25 were ‘past-it’. In most meetings, he’d take pleasure in discussing the looks of women he and I worked with and why he found them attractive.

I’d flagged his behaviour several times with the organiser of the group (a woman), as had other women, but each time, she fobbed us off. ‘That’s just him. You have to know how to take him. He’s like a naughty schoolboy, saying things for attention.’

A schoolboy? The man was pushing sixty. He was also in a position of power, so people made excuses for him. If he behaved badly, the trick, it seemed, was to laugh it off.

That day, I’d had enough. I left the meeting and returned home.

‘How was it?’ My husband asked.

I told him what had happened.

‘I thought we were past all that,’ he said.

‘So did I! Obviously not.’

I felt as powerless as I had in my twenties when I was starting my career, when sexism was part of the world of work. The only way to deal with it then was to ignore it and not make a fuss. If any women dared to challenge, they quickly became the ones who couldn’t take a joke. I’d force myself to smile and laugh at men and their inappropriate comments when they really weren’t in the slightest bit funny. I wish it had been different, but as I worked in a male dominated environment, that’s how it was.

I thought times had changed. After the #metoo movement and Harvey Weinstein, I really believed we were in a much better place. The language regularly used in the nineties was at last seen as inappropriate and offensive. That was progress. Attitudes were changing. Lessons had been learned. We no longer tolerated that kind of behaviour.

Yet, here I was, sitting through a networking event in 2023 with a man who had no respect for women and no filter about the language he used and because of the power dynamics, expected that I should smile and nod and ignore his behaviour—just like back when I was in my twenties.

This time, though, I wasn’t afraid to call it out. I approached the woman who organised the event.

She nodded, all too aware of his behaviour. ‘I will talk to him,’ she said. But then came the excuses. ‘He’s going through a difficult time. He’s like a naughty schoolboy, saying things for attention.’

‘I’m not bothered,’ I said. ‘It’s not acceptable. He’s a disgrace.’

‘I’ll talk to him,’ she promised.

When challenged, he said he behaved like that because he didn’t feel he was ‘at work’.

I’m not sure why. He was at a corporate venue, in a boardroom with business professionals. If that doesn’t scream work situation, I don’t know what does.

I refused to put up with it. I left the group. He stayed and as far as I’m aware, is still there doing what he always has.

Like many women, I’ve had to deal with a lot of inappropriate behaviour from men over the years. I’ve been groped. I’ve been a victim of upskirting when a photo was taken underneath my dress without my consent. I’ve been flashed at when I was out running, followed, intimidated, and forced to put up with casual sexism in sport—when you beat a man in a race some of them call it ‘being chicked’.

And the most frightening—realising that the man who lived across the road from me when I was growing up—the one who used to sit in his bedroom window watching me in my bedroom was actually a sex offender.

I was thirteen. ‘What’s he doing?’ I’d wonder. ‘Why is he staring at me? Why is he always sitting in his window?’

The younger me naively thought he was waiting for someone to pick him up for work, but he was there such a lot, at all times of day, and he stared, really stared.

Twenty-five years later, I found out he’d been convicted for sex offences against a child. It was a chilling moment.

It’s not all men, of course. There are lots of amazing men, like the ones at the networking event, who were just as appalled by the chair’s sex comments as I was. They are good men who respect and champion women and work hard to make a difference.

When the man in question is in a senior position, which gives him power, it is hard to challenge for fear of what might happen. But it is necessary.

I am tired of putting up with inappropriate behaviour from men, especially the ones in senior positions who know the boundaries but still say and do what they like. Boys being boys will not cut it anymore.

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I’d love to know what you think. Have things got better? Are they still the same? Is it still a boys’ club? Comment below or hit reply. I’d love to hear from you.