Delphic Maxim 102: Control the eye
I’ve set myself the challenge of responding to each Delphic Maxim for 15 minutes a day.
102. Control the eye
It’s a mark of the time we live in that my first thought when I read this maxim was of the #metoo movement.
Wouldn’t it be spectacular if so many of the men who ignored the signals from women, or who were completely unaware of them, had ‘controlled the eye’? This maxim isn’t just about the kind of ogling that people do — which happens at a kind of animal, automatic level. It’s about controlling these impulses. I would never imagine that it’s possible for people to just ignore attractive people around them (I’m a gay man, and I know what we’re all like when a hot person walks past) — this is libido and desire.
But there’s a difference between a slight double take and a full on, creepy stare. Worse, interrupting a person’s day with an uninvited approach, or a comment, or a catcall.
Here we go, I’m wandering into this fraught debate. I had originally intended to briefly check off how this relates to sexism and sexual harassment, and then go on to discussing envy, but I think once you open up this debate, you need to see it through to conclusion.
A lot of people online — young men, sometimes incels, often perfectly innocent guys who don’t realise that they might be offending people — flag issues with the whole ‘don’t approach women uninvited’. The most obvious is “but what if they might be interested? How am I supposed to meet someone?”
First up, the sort of ‘romantic encounter on the street’ you are imagining is a fiction from Hollywood. It basically never happens in real life. When was the last time you bumped into someone, spilled coffee on them, and then locked eyes and fell in love? Have you ever heard of that happening to someone in real life? No! It’s total bullshit! That person would probably be furious with you, and you’d either awkwardly apologise and they’d run off to clean their shirt or buy a new one, and you’d be flustered and annoyed.
If you want to know whether that hot person you saw on the street is interested in you, then leering at them like a stalker isn’t the best approach. More likely, if they glance back at you and bashfully smile, and you glance away (rather than awkwardly stare like some dumbstruck caveman), then maybe she is flirting. And maybe she will stop and come back to say hi, but if she doesn’t, perhaps she is busy and doesn’t need the offer of a date. Too bad, so sad, don’t be disappointed because there are literally another 7 billion people in the world.
And I have some news for you: true love is not a thing. You’ll find someone else if you want. Maybe you should learn to be happy with yourself first.
Next issue: some women (one really good friend of mine, in fact) claim that they like being wolf-whistled. I don’t know if this is strictly true, but for a great number of women they don’t, and the safer bet is to not do it. Mostly for the reasons mentioned above, maybe in some cases it’ll be flattering, but in a lot it will be creepy (statistically, you are not Brad Pitt or Chris Hemsworth, and even if you actually happened to be Brad Pitt or Chris Hemsworth, you would be too respectful to actually do it in the first place).
Even if a majority of women liked being harassed, there would still be a substantial majority who don’t like it. So it’s actually safer and more ethically sound to just leave people alone: it’s not your job to make everyone feel good about themselves, it’s easier to just let them go about their day (and if you think it is your job to do that, then start working for a charity, Mother Theresa).
This is not rocket science, it’s basic courtesy. I think one of the problems with the way a lot of young men read this advice on the internet is that they see it as somehow negating perfectly natural instincts. Nobody is telling you not to check women out — that’s as unreasonable as saying to women ‘ignore all men’, or somehow asking people to switch off their biology.
But you are a human being who has a brain and lives in a culture. You actually have the power to not make people feel uncomfortable. By all means, think that someone is attractive. But control the eye: don’t stare like a pervert, don’t feel compelled to approach a random person on the street (seriously, only crazy people and annoying spruikers do that), and give people the space, respect and courtesy that they deserve.
And if you want to meet someone, go to a bar or download Tinder. At least you know you’re both on the same page.
