I’ve always liked it if my man called me honey, sweetheart, dear, sugar. It made me feel I was special to him.

But one benefit of the #MeToo sexual harassment movement has been to make it clearer that I don’t have to accept such terms from men who aren’t the special guy in my life. Men who are often my colleagues, and sometimes men who are complete strangers.

One incident comes to mind from when I was very new in the workforce. Our section had an admin guy who was supposed to keep our supply closet stocked. We were out of pencils, and I asked him to get some from central supply. He replied:

“You know what you can do, dear, you can go down to central and yada yada yada”

He didn’t appreciate my reply, telling him that I thought this was HIS job. But as I look back, it was that “dear” that stuck in my craw as much as his laziness and condescension.

What is it about “dear” in this context? It feels like a verbal pat on the head, a putdown. It says the speaker thinks I’m beneath him in some way. I can’t imagine myself calling a male colleague “dear” except perhaps in sarcasm. So, the use of the word is not a level playing field.

A few years later, I had an interview for a job I really liked the sound of. My new potential boss drove us to lunch for the interview and meal. All was good, except by the time we were driving back, he must have called me “dear” about fifty times. He’d offered me the job and I wanted it, so I thought to myself: “Oh boy; this is a deal-breaker for me. I’ve got to tell him how much it bothers me.” So, I told him I’d take the job but only if he promised not to call me dear.

Apparently after I’d left their office, he asked the other women at this agency, one of whom was his boss, if he’d ever irritated them by calling them “dear” …. And got an earful. These women were grateful to me for tackling an issue than had been grating on their nerves. I took the job. Ever after, he would apologize if a “dear” mindlessly passed his lips. So, my boldness, my risking that I’d blown the job offer out of the water, paid off.

Decades later, I was trying online dating and had been in a few conversations with a man who lived some miles away. We were talking about meeting for coffee, potentially a 20-mile drive for us to meet halfway. The same issue raised its head--- although we’d never met, he kept calling me “dear”. Did I want to drive 20 miles for more of this? I felt I should give things a chance. So, I said: “I’ve really been enjoying our conversations and I’m looking forward to meeting you; there’s just one thing.” “What’s that?” he asked. I told him that, especially as we didn’t know each other, I wasn’t comfortable being called “dear”. His reply: “Well, in that case I don’t think we have as much in common as I thought.” Click.

He’d hung up on me. His way or the highway! Oh dear!