is THIS why men get so weird when i hold the door open for them?? omg
so many times… i approach a door first and hold it for the person behind me. (i’m a woman.)
women always thank me politely and smile.
men often insist to take the door (that i’m already holding) from me, to hold it for me. like dude- i’m already holding it.. FOR YOU! i’ve already offered, im already holding it. you’re making me hold it longer by fighting with me so that you can regain your masculinity by holding the door. holy fuck. please just get through the door that is already in my hands and positioned for you to enter instead of making me awkwardly move for YOU to now hold the door 😭 PLEASE make it make sense
There are a lot of families that pound into their kids a lot of things about how you have to help women and if you don't your a monster who everyone will hate
Eventually the fear wears off but the habit remains
It becomes the default to help carry things, hold the door, or just do simple task
They aren't trying to say you're incompetent or incapable or even trying to be mean
They aren't looking down on you or trying to say that you're not able to do it yourself
They have just been told if they are not helpful they are worthless
i was raised a gentleman, so wanting to hold the door is just second nature
however gentlemen should also be able to allow someone else to hold the door. ill speed up to get the door first to be a gentleman but if someone else is already holding the door i will offer to take it and if they say "no" than you thank them and walk through. trying to fight over the door is rude, disrespectful, and ungentlemanly behavior. the converse should also be true though imo, if a gentleman offers to take the door from a lady then the lady should allow herself to be pampered, especially in this day and age where chivalry is on a serious decline. it isnt a weird or misogynistic thing to offer to be a gentleman unless you start a fight over it.
ladies, let us gentlemen pamper you gals a bit, and gentlemen, respect the ladies. i also agree with other comments that mention if you are both part of different groups to try and insist (again, keep it respectful, maybe even mention you are part of a group to explain the why) on taking over the door.
same goes for car doors, chairs, jackets, umbrellas, tea/coffee/hot cocoa, bags, etc. just offer, if the lady says no then respect the decision and maybe use it as an excuse to snag the door because she is carrying bags or the umbrella or what have you. nothing wrong with offering, and nothing wrong with refusing. everything wrong with insisting to the point of it becoming an issue
This is how I was raised in the south. It was literally pounded and beat into my f****** head that you, the man
must treat the ladies properly, hold doors, throw your jacket over a puddle, so they can cross it s*** like that. I just do it subconsciously, at this point I don't even think about it
For me, it’s not necessarily that I’m worthless, but rather that it is a show that I do have manners and a gentleman. In a way, it adds to my worth?(again, not that I’m worthless if I don’t do it). But I see it can be taken to that extreme
They aren't trying to say you're incompetent or incapable or even trying to be mean
They aren't looking down on you or trying to say that you're not able to do it yourself
That is the origin of those stupid practices and it's the kind of culture those practices create. These guys may or may not be bad people on an individual level, but they are participants in the system. How we were raised isn't our fault, but being better than our parents is our responsibility.
I've long since learned you often can't find rhyme or reason in why anything gets upvoted or downvoted.
In this case what probably happened was that my comment kind of "felt" like it was blaming guys for being raised a certain way - I explicitly said the opposite, but the first few people to read my comment read it as being more combative than it was, so it got downvoted a little. Then other people just sort of followed their lead.
Then when I made my position more clear further into the thread my posts got upvoted because the vibes were clearly not combative.
I wouldn't mind so much if the guys that do this shit would just listen to the many, many times women politely explain to them that what they're doing is inappropriate and sexist.
Every time I have tried, this Type of Guy has doubled down and insisted that I should just put up with having my space and autonomy violated because he's "trying to be nice" and "it's just how he was raised"
🤷 I was explicit that these guys can be good people and that it's not their fault how they were raised. I pushed back on the idea that this absolves us of any responsibility to change our behaviour once we learn what's wrong with it.
To be fair, despite who may be holding the door for me, I'll usually try and take their place if I'm coming in with my group so they can continue with their group and I hold the door for mine. Very much not a gender thing for me there, just don't want someone to hold the door longer than they need and have to squeeze past my people to get back to theirs.
That's all hinged on if I saw they had a group though, if they're alone holding the door, all the power to them, thank you.
this is so fair, and i appreciate you for that!! groups are definitely a different situation haha.
the scenario i described in my earlier comment almost always happened to me when it was just one or two guys, which is why it was always so baffling lol. it seemed like so much extra work, and for what! 😂
yeah i always thought its easier if you all hold the door for whoever's behind, like unless someone's holding something you go through push it open a bit more then then go forward and the next person dose the same, as long as its not swinging shut its almost 0 force needed to keep it open and ill use my foot as i step through
It’s the same reason some women insist to be the ones cooking for their boyfriends / husbands. Even if you know on an intellectual level that those gender roles are bullshit, fitting them has been internalized so much as a condition of being accepted / loved, that it’s very hard to overcome.
right?? like I’ve already committed to doing this (very very) small act of kindness for you, please just accept it and let us all move on with our lives instead of doing this silly lil dance 😭
I was just raised to say thank you to any person holding a door for me, and I will likewise hold a door for any person coming in. Gender doesn’t matter, it’s just common courtesy
I like when life lines up to just be a series of strangers holding the door for the next. I hold the door for parents, children, the elderly, women, random dudes who look groovy, etc... it's fun to pass the door-baton and hear the kind chatter continue :)
Yes, or when I'm in an elevator back in the rear corner and some man in the front near the door tells me to exit first. :/ Why should I squeeze past you and waste everyone's time when we can just walk out normally when the doors open, like OMG, enough with the drama.
Like, it's one thing if the guy goes through the door first and holds it open behind him for a sec since I'm right there. I'll do the same for anyone behind me, that's common courtesy.
But some guys make it into a whole street theater improv production where you're cast as the Damsel In Distress and they get pissed if you don't agree to be part of their theater troupe.
The whole "hold the door open and step back and insist I go through first like they're ushering in the fucking pope" thing is one of the best ways to make my mood instantly worse. Not to mention the guys who will fucking run ahead to make sure they can open the door for me, or the guys who've literally body-checked me out of the way to open the door that I'm halfway through opening.
I'm aggressively Canadian and will jog to hold a door. Men don't usually mind but also that may be because my Canadian overrides the woman in their mind? IDK
Oh god that awkward moment when you're stuck holding it and someone refuses to walk through. I was raised to be a gentleman and at the age of 10 I did that for my girlfriend at the time and she felt embarrassed about it as a teacher was nearby seeing it and wouldn't walk through, insisting I go first, which in turn just made the whole thing awkward as I was already standing there holding the door. It wasn't some manly or gender-based thing, just a "it is polite to hold the door for the person behind you" thing.
I’ve had women get offended when I held the door for them and waited. One bitched me out and said something along the lines of “do you think I can’t open a fucking door myself?” Distinct minority but it does happen on occasion. I just smile politely and let it close and walk away.
But then I’ve had others demand it and insinuate I wasn’t raised right if I don’t run around and open the car door for them before I get out / in, etc. It’s kinda exhausting and makes me stop caring either way.
I had a roommate who always did this, he absolutely refused to walk through a door if I was holding it. I eventually said it made me uncomfortable and I felt like it was sexist because it made me feel like he saw me in a certain inferior way as a woman. He was so offended that it kind of permanently wrecked our relationship. I think he was really proud of "treating women right" as part of his identity, but for me I was like... can we not just be people on the same level, please
Heh, once at a gas station I held the door for a guy behind me. He froze, looking utterly shocked and appalled. Eventually I decided he wasn't coming through, and I let the door go...unfortunately, just as he stepped forward and it hit him in the face.
I get weird about people holding doors open for me because I have an irrational fear that they are going to violently slam it closed on me while I'm in the middle of the doorway, does that help?
I got wierd with the concept of the door in general. Me as a men got the door opened by someone else then me, my brain freezes and I can t move for a second or two then I am pussing myself through the door 😅
Yess this is so relatable especially in my country because in Arab societies you're expected to do this fight about who gets to hold the door and who gets to go first even when it's 2 men 😂
Depending on which way I'm walking through will determine if I hold it or not. If the door is swung away from me and the person is holding it then I'll just walk through. If they are walking in the same direction as me and they hold the door then I'll normally take over holding the door to allow the person to move on, and I'll hold it for the next but if people just walk past it without taking over holding the door that actually annoys me a bit especially if there's a long line of people cos when do I get to fucking move on without just letting go of the door. Sometimes to avoid this I just push my hand against the door long enough while I'm walking past, so the person behind me should get the point to hold the door.
But if they are trying to take over holding the door when it's swung away from them that's a lil weird and inconvenient lol...
the comment about masculinity was directly referencing the comment that i was replying to.
If I’m holding the door for one (1) single person and they try to fight me to take the door from my hands and hold it open for me, then NO, I don’t consider that them just trying to be nice! It’s some weird power struggle at that point.
If I watch a man wrangle a door out of a woman’s hands when she was already holding the door for him, yeah it’s him that I’m going to be judging lmfao. WTF is this argument HAHAHA
yes my friend, and isn’t that the whole point?
it may be them trying to “be nice,” but from the perspective of the person already holding the door, it just comes across as RUDE. Extremely so, if you insist on taking the door out of my hands.
You need to take some time to reflect on this conversation I think. You’re so close to getting the point, but right now you’re part of the problem. Your perspective isn’t everyone’s perspective.
edit: lmao okay he blocked me. i’m willing to bet he’s one of the ones that will spout “facts over feelings!!!” but can’t handle when the facts hurt his feelings. coward had to have the last word and blocked me before i had the chance to respond 😂
Just chiming in here- No nose ring. Constantly insisting that it’s a nice thing despite people telling you it’s not, shows me that you’re part of the problem. My perception of /this/ situation is that you’re being an ass!
I’m guessing you’re taking offense because you’re doing the thing she’s describing, and you’re not willing to accept that you’re doing something that many other people don’t like.
Willing to bet you’re single.
Nothing to do with regaining masculinity. Random acts of consideration do not happen when you are a regular guy.
You, a woman, are acknowledging a random man’s casual existence and being considerate rather than annoyed or threatened. That is such a mindfuck you can’t expect them to fluidly deal with the situation. You are behaving so strangely that turning one’s back to you seems unsafe.
walking through a door that i’m holding in a public place is unsafe? 😅
if your first reaction to someone acknowledging your existence is to feel threatened by them, then i think that’s something you may need to work on for yourself!
(i promise i say this with kindness, because I also had to work on this. growing up as a young woman, you’re taught not to trust men and acknowledging them could be dangerous. this is something i’ve had to seriously work out of as an adult since the majority of people you interact with mean you no harm! funny how there’s two sides to that coin, huh?)
You missed the point. As a woman, getting polite consideration from random men is normal to you. You don’t notice it. It’s the social norm. You can’t fathom experience of life where that consideration is so rare that receiving it is weird.
Of course, speaking only of people going about in public behaving in normally acceptable manner as vast majority does. Also not suggesting that this experience is specific to being a male. Attractiveness, or lack of, is probably a major factor.
876
u/speedingticketqu 7d ago
is THIS why men get so weird when i hold the door open for them?? omg
so many times… i approach a door first and hold it for the person behind me. (i’m a woman.)
women always thank me politely and smile.
men often insist to take the door (that i’m already holding) from me, to hold it for me. like dude- i’m already holding it.. FOR YOU! i’ve already offered, im already holding it. you’re making me hold it longer by fighting with me so that you can regain your masculinity by holding the door. holy fuck. please just get through the door that is already in my hands and positioned for you to enter instead of making me awkwardly move for YOU to now hold the door 😭 PLEASE make it make sense