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Need help with students who've turned my class into a dating service

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Re: Need help with students who've turned my class into a dating service

#171

Earlier quoted context omitted.

eh, there's really no good signal for women to display that says "hey, i'm open to being hit on right now" or "please don't hit on me right now"

Well that's the issue. It's not their fault. The idea of dating today has been reduced to hitting on people and jumping right into high commitment situations instead of slowly building a lasting relationship built in solid fundamentals, the kinds of advances which are rarely rejected in practice compared to just hitting on someone as if they are a checkbox to be ticked.

eh, i guess i get the point now. on a dating app atleast you have consent of some sort (they're both there, both signed up, both made profiles, both interested in a common goal)

whether it's "predatory" for a senior in college (21) to prey on a 100-level STEM student (basically an 18 year old/pre-college according to my friend), that's a whole different question from "consent to being hit on" in my opinion

Re: Need help with students who've turned my class into a dating service

#172
post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

eh, there's really no good signal for women to display that says "hey, i'm open to being hit on right now" or "please don't hit on me right now"

Women signal interest or a lack thereof in a thousand ways. Picking up on that is a basic social skill and like all skills some persons are more capable than others.

Keeping track of a thousand subtle signals is a "basic" social skill?

Re: Need help with students who've turned my class into a dating service

#173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why would you think that? Young women aren't oblivious to their own charms. They know what they're doing. They're getting free 1-on-1 tuition from a nerd, and the nerd gets to be within 3 feet of an attractive young woman - maybe even more than that, let's not be naive about college campuses - which might otherwise be impossible. Everybody wins. You might even upset the women most of all! When the quiet part is said…

Because I have an attractive daughter studying engineering, and she tells me that her single biggest problem is that she constantly has to reject, avoid, or otherwise fend off male advances nearly every day. It's exhausting, it makes her never feel at ease in her classes, and she is constantly being distracted when what she really wants is quiet time to figure out integration by parts or whatever. As a male, this is…

[flagged]

Re: Need help with students who've turned my class into a dating service

#174
post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are appropriate times and places to pork yourself out, academia is not one of them. Go pork yourself after you've "punched out".

This has to be one of the worst pieces of dating advice ever written. Universities are one of the best places to meet people as a student.

Let me clarify: You don't pork out during your academic day; you get acquainted during the day to get the ball rolling, and then proceed with the porking once you've punched out and are now spending your private time.

Re: Need help with students who've turned my class into a dating service

#175
post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

eh, there's really no good signal for women to display that says "hey, i'm open to being hit on right now" or "please don't hit on me right now"

Women signal interest or a lack thereof in a thousand ways. Picking up on that is a basic social skill and like all skills some persons are more capable than others.

do college guys have the right to attempt to flirt/hit on college girls (their peers) in any capacity?

Re: Need help with students who've turned my class into a dating service

#176

It is absolutely insane that the professor cannot eject an auditing student from their class. The relevant university is apparently a joke at the expense of fresher student safety.

Could you clarify how student safety is being threatened by what's described in the post?

Several components stand out to me as a safety risk:

1. There are senior students leading labs who may not have completed relevant OHS training that a listed employee would run. This is a no fly zone in any training scenario and is the most important point IMO.

2. The (fresher) students have commented on the remarkably high number of seniors in the class. This has a slightly less direct safety issue: a perceived power imbalance. If you have ever led a class you may notice that too many "big" personalities can cause less confident students to withdraw, and, crucially, ask less questions. This can lead to accidents (the seniors 'trying to lead' doesn't fix this in my experience).

3. The nature of the interactions itself is a distraction. If I am getting hit on, I am probably not thinking about the content of what is being said - I am thinking of the quickest way to excuse myself from that situation. Once again, this can increase risk.

While I'm here, I also have issues with this from a non-safety perspective.

4. While lecherous behaviour does not constitute harassment, it 'sets the bar' for student interactions and makes particularly socially ill-equipped students feel more confident in pursuing people. This just ends up making the environment less pleasant for the people being approached, as well as the onlookers.

5. Further, this is actually worse than flirting at, say, work ,or a social gathering, because college is expensive. Distracting students from a highly expensive experience designed to provide skills and challenge thinking is arguably wasting someone ELSE'S money. Which is just not cool.

Re: Need help with students who've turned my class into a dating service

#177
post #43

> This might be hard, as no unwanted advances are taking place. We simply have students excelling at the course, and drawing-in a crowd. I should've been more clear with my "leching" comment. Still, it seems harassing in nature. It seems increasingly that society demands a world where dating only happens during designated and approved dating times and venues, and outside those strictly delimited places, men are to be…

serious question, are deliberately ignoring the context of the question to post your victimizing dribble? it's male seniors borderline harassing freshman woman, not "someone asked someone else on a date in my class!"

Re: Need help with students who've turned my class into a dating service

#179
post #129

Re-read every comment but imagine a Ferengi posted it. I suppose a lil demographically predatory behavior and imbalanced power dynamics are just water under the bridge for some of y'all.

"engineering students looking for fee-males"

Re: Need help with students who've turned my class into a dating service

#180

I still have clear recollection of the 50:1 men-to-women ratio in my CS2xx classes and higher. Your odds weren't good if you were hoping to meet Mrs. Right. I imagine things have gotten better since. Still, seems like a fairly high effort low outcome place to meet someone who is likely not even receptive to advances in that context. Do colleges not offer many other opportunities for people to meet outside of class in…

> It's interesting that one of the highest-voted responses suggests bringing in the ten ton hammer of legal governmental involvement against a bunch of kids trying to score a date. Yikes.

I think the bigger "yikes" to me is the implication that being young, male, and lusty as a motivation is a sufficient to dismiss any possibility of illicit behavior.

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