I met my current girlfriend, I saw her on the street coming out of the metro, we exchanged eye contact and I walked over, talked, flirted and asked for the number...
We met the same night and she thanked me for coming over to talk to her. She's from France, I'm from Eastern Europe... we'd never meet otherwise and over the last year we experienced the most beautiful thing, that people call love.
In some places, like Manchester, this is now sexual harassment... I feel sorry for the world you live in...
There is nothing wrong with that.
But I can't think of a single reason to do that in a workplace (correctly), let alone with people you are directly working/involved with. It seems to be careful not to date them. There are tons of people outside (or maybe inside the same company but in different departments you don't deal with).
... there's recent legislation in Manchester, where if you talk to a woman on the street she can just accuse you of sexual harassment ... I guess we're running out of places to meet women we actually want to get to know and heading towards a world where your only 'safe' options are a lifetime porn (or sexbot) or waiting for some woman to choose you whether you like it or not ... not a nice place to be in my opinion but good luck to those aiming for it
Link to the legislation in question? (or maybe news link about it?)
"A police force has become the first in Britain to recognise misogyny as a hate crime ... It also includes ... uninvited verbal contact"
That's now classified as hate crime... while I agree with all other stuff, that little insert there makes a world of difference... it's Nottingham not Manchester, there are undergoing efforts to implement this elsewhere too
* Don't be unattractive
If sex was better accepted across the culture, there wouldn't be a need for these ambiguous games perpetuated by both sides.
More to the point, this kind of "no sex with coworkers" mentality has many of us Europeans rolling our eyes at the New World. It's absolutely possible to both respect women and have sexual encounters with people we meet at the workplace and do so in a professional manner.
There's a huge difference between playful, consensual flirting and fucking on the photocopier. My experience is that the people who fail to make these distinction constitute -- in fact -- a highly ideological minority.
Why do you think you have the right to decide whether someone else should find a comment inappropriate or not?
I understand a common idea nowadays is the subjective standard of any group member (victim) is considered paramount in assessing conduct. But this descends into meaninglessness because all people tolerate others' conduct at differing levels.
This is why the common law has long assessed standards of behaviour using the "reasonable person" as a hypothetical objective measure of appropriate conduct in the given circumstances.[1]
The commenter may not have the right to decide appropriate behaviour, but at some point we must ask "would the reasonable person in X situation presented with Y conduct be harmed?".
As it damn well should be.
To be clear: if you're making unwanted 'transgressions' against women in your workplace then you are in the wrong. Women are not your playthings.