What Is the Biggest Form of Sexism You've Encountered?

I'm an apprentice at a workshop which builds Chinooks for the UK armed forces. Initially, I had applied for a course at a truck repair & mod service but I was declined as "a woman would only slow everything down and give us a bad name."
My mum was disgusted to say the least, and made the guy who said it fairly 'well-known' among our area and when the workshop I work in now heard, they were like "You know what, fuck lorries, come and help build Chinooks instead."

I'm super glad I was declined, actually, otherwise I wouldn't have been able to go on this course which I love so much.

Last year, I admitted myself to a mental hospital because I was suicidal. When I got out, they wanted me to go to a day program which worked kind of like school. Went there in the morning, therapy, group sessions, watched a movie, etc. I was obviously not feeling good, so I wore yoga pants, a sweatshirt, and Uggs. One of the nurses called me out and berated me because a UPS guy that passed us in the hall was "staring at me in a creepy way". Like it was my fault he likes to eye up teenage girls in a freaking mental hospital. I ended up crying because I was fragile at that point and they forced me to change. yoga pants, mind you. They didn't even ADDRESS the fact that I was embarrassed and upset, they just berated me more. After my mom picked me up in the afternoon, she called them and told them how upset and humiliated I was and that we would not be going back, even though I was supposed to go for a week. A few months later, I sent them a complaint email and was told they'd "investigate and try to retrain their staff".

Lately, since I'm in town a lot more to meet my boyfriend, go out places and stuff, I've been getting a lot more 'male attention'. The most ridiculous was at the weekend there when my boyfriend wanted to take me out for a meal and we were sat in this lovely Italian restaurant. My boyfriend told me he'd go up and order since it was kind of like Nando's were you go up, order and get your drinks etc at that time. So, I'm sat waiting and the next thing you know, the guy at the next table to me starts whistling at me while his friends are sat laughing and I just tried to ignore him. Eventually he moved over and tried to touch my leg while saying he'd do certain things to me and I tried to push him off and eventually did, but he fell off his chair so he made a big fuss about it. That and I was swearing at him 'cause I wanted his hands off of me!

My boyfriend noticed this and came over and the man said "teach your woman to hold her tongue. She's got a filthy mouth on her for a damn girl." It riled me up the fact he thought he could just touch me up etc. because I was a woman and when arguing with my boyfriend, he even said that he shouldn't have left me alone for other men to have their way with me. Seriously? Just ugh.

The restaurant gave us a free meal coupon for two, though so it'll come to use at some point. It was handled really well as the man was escorted and we were about to leave. It's just ridiculous that there's men out there that just feel the need to treat women like that. But yet again, women can be just as bad.

I grew up in a household where the women stay inside and do "women work" and the men do nothing but maybe heavy lifting. It was programmed in my brain that women should always stay inside wash the dishes, cook, clean, make the babies and then stay with them. That's it. My parents, (by the way my mom has no problem with this) had made me cook and clean for the family since I was strong enough to hold the broom. I'm to saying its correct, or the right thing. It's just how I was brought up.

My sister...well my sister can't boil water. To my family "she will have to marry a rich man" or she will have nothing. By the way that's what my mom says when I complain about cleaning. "If you don't like it marry a rich man who can get a maid to do it." Because my sister is unable to do a thing, I usually do it. The only thing outside I'm allowed to mess within the gardening tools. The rest is "for men's work". Girls aren't supposed to touch the lawnmower or any tools. Especially fishing supplies, i'll get yelled at for that.

When people ask what I do all day, I reply with "Women's work". Even though I don't believe in women and men being separated in chores or things of that matter, I can't help but think like that. I get told so many times, "You are going to make a man very happy," because of my upbringing.

I don't like it one bit. So my worst encounter has to be living at home. Plus my whole town is full with morons.

@ rabbat
'Control your woman because I can't make her do what I want and sexually harass her quietly.'

Ooooooh, I would have hit someone. I'm glad the restaurant handled it well.

@ druscilla ever after
Pretty much what it comes down to! It's ridiculous!

I'm quite proud of the fact that I didn't lash out violently towards him physically in all honesty, but it's still in the back of my mind that there are people out there and it's just unsettling. But yeah, the restaurant handled it very well. I have to give them props for doing so. :)

When I'm constantly told that I should be gearing up for family making - seeing that being a wife and mother is the ultimate goal of every red blooded woman. I'm 20. I'm still waiting for my life to start.

@ flutter.
When I was 24 a woman told me not to worry because I still had "some time" to find a man and settle down. O_o

A friend of mine has had a crush on me for literally the past six years. He's in the Navy now. Recently I told him that I was kind of dating somewhere. No big deal, then he found out that I lost my virginity. Oh boy....

He started going off on some bullshit about how I betrayed him and asking how I could do this to him and shit. To clarify, I never dated this guy and I was never going to date this guy. He just liked me and decided that that meant he had dibs and that I'm not apparently a slut because he couldn't get anything after six years, and the guy I'm with now I met recently.

@ Siriano;
Did he use the term "friend zone"?

Me and my boyfiend both had the same job, and yet instead of splitting the household chores since we both work I have to do almost everything because I am a female.

@ BornInTheJunkyard
Why do you have to? I'm just curious. I would have said no and refused and probably dumped him.

dru sighs no more.:

@ BornInTheJunkyard
Why do you have to? I'm just curious. I would have said no and refused and probably dumped him.

I should have but I can't.
Im whipped. XD, who ever heard of a whipped female?
Its true though, I love him enough to do whatever I have to no matter what it is.
In fact Ive done a lot worse than that to keep him.

Not verbatim, but that was his argument. @ dru sighs no more.

@ Siriano;
that attitude has been pissing me off so much more lately. I've been getting really into 'feminist/gender issues' and I've been getting so angry about everything. Grrr.

Same here. Aurghhh. Trust me. I called his ass out on it. @ dru sighs no more.

I went to a comic shop today. The sexism from one of the other customers was that bad and I got that pissed with it I ended up buying only half the stuff I’d gone in for before coming home to buy it off of ebay instead because the only other comic shop in the area didn’t have what I wanted in stock. I'm genuinely surprised the words 'fake geek girl' didn't come out of his mouth come to think of it.

I’m pretty much 100% done with comic shops and this kind of thing because seriously I get it 8/10 times that I go into one. I’m thinking buying off ebay might be easier from now on even if the shipping does cost more than a bus/train journey because then I won't have to put up with that kind of crap.

@ the governor
That's unfortunate. My boyfriend and his friend play Magic and one of the best players in our city is a female (who is married to one of the best male players in the city). I've gone to shops with them a few times and I always see a few other females in there and everyone has always been super nice to me. Like, not just customer service nice but ridiculously nice. I make friends there and I'm not even into comics. I'm usually read a Little House book in one of the aisles or playing a game on my iPod.

But I live in the Midwest, so maybe that's part of it . . .

@ dru burnt the ashes.
amen to that sister... facing the same issues. Whenever I'm in the pressance of a guy at church events I have to wear a skirt. Even if we have church members who are of the male gender come to either my house or a house that we are getting together at I have to cover myself with long sleeves shawls and long skirts with stockings or something. That's not it, even if its not my house I (and the other girls) have to attend to them when they need something. Like getting them drinks or water or whatever... I hate it.

Posting here today has had me thinking a lot about this now This stuff probably tops the stuff I posted about earlier because I had to live with it and couldn't get away from it. I don't usually think of this stuff as the biggest form of sexism I've encountered, but it probably is...?

I'm at uni and basically in my first year I went into halls/dorms down at one of my university’s student villages and I had a really bad time of it there.

When I applied I was given the choice of living in a same sex or a mixed sex flat, and I was wary that I sometimes don't get on with other girls so I put mixed to play safe in that respect. When I got to uni it turned out the flat I’d been assigned to had five rooms, so I figured it’d be a 2:3 ratio. It ended up being a 1:4 ratio with me being the ‘mix’ in the mixed gender flat (the hilarious thing about it though was that downstairs some poor guy was the only guy in a flat of girls, so it wasn’t even a case of the numbers not letting me be in a flat with a 2:3 ratio.) honestly though for the first week it was fine. The first night it was only me and one of them. The next day when they all moved in there were still no real problems. On the like third day, one of them, the nicest of them came to my room that morning and asked me if I was okay and was really nice about me being the only girl and told me if they could ‘make it easier for me’ then to let him know. A few days after that someone made a joke about me ‘being in my natural habitat’ while I was making cooking myself dinner. And basically it just went downhill from there.

It wasn’t just me that they did that kind of thing with though. They’d leave like rotten food around for our cleaners to deal with (one of them apologized to me for having to live there) even though they only swung by once a week and that wasn’t in their job description. Once when I spoke up about the mess I got told it was my job to sort it – 'haha only joking!!' They also used to invite this girl over, and I think she really liked one of them, and he’d sweet talk her into cleaning the bathroom because that was ‘a girl’s job’ (the comment was shouted so I could hear it in my room, and I think that was because I point blank refused to clean up after them). It was just a really gross, uncomfortable environment to live in and I had very little support from the people who were meant to help. I ended up having to move back home before the year was even out (about six/seven weeks early) because I just couldn't live there any longer.

I got compensation off the uni though so I guess that's something? (That was mostly for this demonic mold that was making me quite ill though I think.)