Tales of Men Who Fear Making Advances Lest They Be Accused of Date Rape

Posted by Richard on Saturday, 18 June 2005

Seth Kugel: “For Brazilian women, who come from a place where public displays of affection are a way of life and men rarely lack for amorous gusto, the task is particularly confounding. Ask Brazilian women what they think about American men, and most respond precisely the same way: with gales of laughter. Then they tell disturbingly similar tales of men who fear making advances lest they be accused of date rape and who coldly calculate how many days they need to wait between meeting a woman and asking her to dinner.”

The article goes on to interview three Brazilian women in New York City, all of which would much prefer dating Brazilian men over Americans, since the latter do not call the next day, do not approach them in bars, do not affectionately or flirtatiously touch or even kiss them when men first meet them at a club or a party. A little bit paradoxically, though: “American men are less reserved once they learn that a woman is from Brazil. Some politely ask about Brazilian culture; others just start talking about Carnaval and string bikinis. In nearly every case, their faces light up immediately. And that offends the women.” I've heard stories of female Brazilian international students going to a club and instead of walking to the dance floor will go off to the side, sit down, and expect men to approach them, as this was what they are used to in Brazil. No idea if that's true, but a Brazilian music fan (who is not Brazilian herself) is wondering whether such stories are true.

A note about the link: the article in question is now behind a subscription wall. I tried using both persistent-link generators (one at blogspace.com, another at windbag.org) and none had the article in their database. I saved a copy of the article to my computer, but would rather visitors to my weblog would be able to visit the original article, so I'm willing to pay $10 USD via PayPal for anyone who has a persistent link that does not require registration. The title of the article, if it helps, is "The Girls From Ipanema Are Not Impressed".

Comments

Joey deVilla (not verified)

Mon, 2005-06-20 13:24

Hey, Richard! See if this works for you... http://www.nytimes.com/2005/06/05/nyregion/thecity/05chas.html?ei=5070&e...
Submitted by Joey deVilla on Mon, 2005-06-20 13:24

Ingrid (not verified)

Wed, 2006-03-01 12:14

The comments above are TRUE. But I think it's part of culture. Men in Brazil are like Italians, cannot see a woman without talking about them or to them, and you don't need to be a model. You just need to be a woman. It's a Latin culture, it's part of the mentality. Here in US we see women in bars showing her breast, kissing others girls, because I think it's a way of getting attention, since they presence only does not do anything for them. There was a article at Oprah's magazine that said: "if you want to feel good about yourself, go to Italy, since men in US sometimes think you are invisible".
Submitted by Ingrid on Wed, 2006-03-01 12:14

Anonymous (not verified)

Thu, 2007-10-04 17:51

Yeah that's also true, but it's not just American MEN who're at fault here. We tend to ignore women here because that's the only way we get their attention! And if we go up and talk to them, they don't welcome us like latina or african or even a lot of european women do, they mostly act like we're stalking &/or assaulting them, and then if they do talk they play silly games usually... UGH. It's the culture as a whole that sucks - not just blaming women here either. But this also explains why everyone's into online dating here now, since we can't just meet in public!!! IDIOTIC.
Submitted by Anonymous on Thu, 2007-10-04 17:51