Companies are responding to the sexual-harassment panic by banning alcohol from office parties and instituting policies on how long and how close personal interactions should be. Bosses who hug their employees are even making headline news. Stanford’s survey data show that office romances reached their peak in the 1980s. At the time, there was a flush of women entering the workplace. No doubt some men of that era were a bit too forthright with their affections. Fast forward to 2017, just after an international panic over sexual harassment, and the number of workplace romances is at an all-time low. Given that most of us spend the majority of our waking lives at work, this is a pretty depressing development.
The truth that no one seems willing to admit is that many heterosexual women, even today, expect men to make the first move in a relationship. Women will drape ourselves over the printer, wear our best dresses to the Christmas party and talk loudly about the imaginary man texting us, all to subtly signal to our target that he should make a move. But in the post-#MeToo office, unless you send a memo to the guy you fancy, signed with your consent at the bottom, it is understandable that he wouldn’t want to make the first move for fear of being hauled before human resources. While most normal guys are able to tell whether a woman likes them or not, the erasure of any ‘grey area’ in workplace interactions means more and more people are feeling nervous about taking the first step. And so they’re turning to Tinder, where you can safely state your preferences and expectations within a word limit.
Join the conversation as a VIP Member