WILLIAMS AND LEBSOCK
a small group of men are being required to abandon the stereotype
that “real men” need to be unrelentingly sexual without regard to
context or consent.
The not- unreasonable assumption is that work relationships
should be about work. Some organizations have no- dating policies
for that reason. If yours doesn’t, remember that you must not take
a relationship with a colleague in a romantic or sexual direction if
doing so is unwelcome. Whether you can ask a colleague out is the
source of much anxiety, especially in all- consuming work environ-
ments where people date coworkers because they spend so much
time on the job that there’s little opportunity to meet anyone else.
The only way to safely tell what someone else wants is to ask
that person. Some men seem to have trouble discerning whether a
woman is interested; Charlie Rose and Glenn Thrush said that they
thought their feelings were reciprocated when women who received
their overtures say they were not. This is not an unsolvable problem.
If she’s a work colleague and you’d like her to be something more,
here’s what to do: Imagine telling a woman who’s been your friend
forever that you’d like to take the relationship in a diff erent direc-
tion. Ask in a way that gives her a chance to say that she prefers to
remain a friend. No harm, no foul. What if your work colleague says
no when she really means yes? Well, then, she’s got to live with that.
Let her. Let her change her mind if she wants to.
We all know that deals and crucial networking happen over
lunch, dinner, and drinks. Socializing in this manner is fi ne. But
if you do socialize with work colleagues, you need to realize that
you can’t behave inappropriately. Roy Price resigned from his
job as head of Amazon Studios after Isa Hackett, an Amazon pro-
ducer, publicly accused him of repeatedly propositioning her in a
cab on the way to a work party, telling her, “You’ll love my dick,”
and later at the gathering whispering “anal sex” loudly in her ear in
the presence of others. Hollywood commentator Nellie Andreeva
noted that in a post- Weinstein world Price’s behavior would have
hurt Amazon’s ability to attract female showrunners and actors. He
would have been “completely ostracized,” an anonymous source
told Andreeva.