This is why I get the guy’s number now. I freaking hate that move. I’m just giving you a series of ten digits so you will go away. Maybe one day, sir fakenumber, you’ll realize that that one word answers, moving away from you repeatedly, and looking around the room at anyone but you means that I’m not interested and also quite possibly vaguely threatened. So now that you have totally ignored all these signs the only thing left to do is feign interest so I can get away.

Wait…is this a thing in the Real World? Guys who immediately call up the number to make sure it’s real? How’s that work—-I mean, whether the number is real or not. If it’s fake, what does he do….keep pestering the shit out of her? And if it’s real, it’s an immediate announcement that he doesn’t trust her and is likely to second-guess everything she says and/or stalk her?

And yet these are precisely the same bozos for whom the honest response of “go away, I’m not interested” doesn’t elicit a respectful response either.

I’ve always been sorta paranoid about making sure I don’t know someone’s number unless it’s explicitly given with an invitation to call.

Amanda, how could you miss Pink?  She wrote the best f u song about exactly this situation!  U and ur hand.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YUtHjOvPKT0

I must correct my above post. It usually goes fine, but I tried this move with an annoying guy who wouldn’t stop bothering me while I was volunteering at an event recently. Finally after declining several invitations, he said he’d give me his number in case I changed my mind. Fine, I planned on deleting it anyway, but I was in the middle of sending a text and my phone doesn’t have the most intuitive number saving process, so as I fumbled he remarked “I don’t really like giving out my number unless I know it’s going to be used.” Now I know I should have said, “well, I don’t like taking numbers from people who don’t get the hint that I’m not interested, either.” but of course, hindsight 20/20. I mean, what did he think that line was going to accomplish? Blurgh.

And yes, La Lubu, they exist and I hate them.

#1 twg - I felt bad reading that.  It made me remember that when I was younger, I felt the same way you do.  There is another option.  It’s a really great one! 

You can look them straight in the eye and tell them you’re not interested, you’re here to enjoy a night with your friend, go away.

I’m in my early 40’s now and I still get stunned at how i can’t go to a bar with a friend to just sit there, drink, enjoy music, and talk all night.  Very recently I had a real prize slobbering all over me the minute my friend went to the bathroom. I told him right out, I’m not interested, you should move back to the other side of the bar, good bye. 

It feels so good to be free.  I do carry mace on my keychain, and I wouldn’t mind using it.  But I’ve never had a problem in a bar, you’ll be surprised, if it comes down to it - the bartender and the bouncer will side with you.  They don’t want to get the rep as a place women can’t go.

I have less problem with this now than I did when I was younger (the 30 thing! it works so well), but I have almost always had really bad reactions from people when I’ve actually tried to be honest that I wasn’t interested, so I stopped doing that and normally will take the path of least resistance. You’re right though, about the only time I’ve had success with honesty was when I was with a friend and used that line.

A few weeks ago I said I was married and the guy said “oh no, we can just hang out as friends!” and then steadily moved in closer. When he started to get handsy I said I had to go.

Being a person who will go to the bar for a few drinks alone compounds my problems; no woman could ever want to go to a bar just to have a couple beers and watch the game. She must want some dudely attention.

Yes, I just remembered why it’s nice to get beyond the obviously young stage, where even if you’re upfront about not being interested, douches think they can convince or shame you into giving them your number. Now I get less interest overall, and when I say No Thanks, they’re more likely to accept it.

My opinion on causes: stupid meet cutes in rom-coms and ladymag stories, the privilege that means lots of men don’t have to think about how it feels to be obnoxiously pursued, and the social conditioning that most women get so guys like this very rarely get told straight up that they’re being creepy(at least when they’re young).

The last time I made the drunken mistake of giving out my number, the guy called every day for a week, getting increasingly belligerent and accusing about me not calling back. Yeah, that will definitely make me MORE likely to want to spend time with you buddy! After that, I changed my message to just me saying my number in a monotone without my name, so they wouldn’t know if I gave them a wrong number. People who know me will leave a message and I’ll call back, and those who don’t, too bad.

I like the Nerves’ version of “Hanging on the Telephone” a little more than I like Blondie’s cover, so I used that:

1. All Kindsa Girls - Real Kids
2. WHips and Furs - The Vibrators
3. You Tore Me Down - The Flamin Groovies
4. What Love Is - The Dead Boys
5. Bored Teenagers - The Adverts
6. Sniffin Glue - Exploding Hearts
7. Murder City Nights - Radio Birdman
8. Black and White - The dBs
9. Don’t Look Back - Remains
10. Psycho - The Sonics

Does anyone else who was in NYC in the early 2000’s remember “The Rejection Line?”  It was a 212 number to give out, and when dialed, the caller would be greeted with a moviefone type announcer saying “You’ve reached The Rejection Line!  Congratulations, you have been rejected…” and then instructions to press 1 if dumped, press 2 if trying to pick someone up, etc.

Did other cities have this too?

Anyway, I never actually gave out the number but pretty hilarious & perfect, I thought…

I’ve got nothing to contribute on asking for phone numbers; I don’t think I’ve ever asked someone for their number when out at a bar. Or been asked for mine. Not spending much time in bars might account for it. That and being with same person for the last 20+ years.

But enough about that. I just ran through the Genius 10 and I’ve got all of them in iTunes library. What a fun listen.

That’s “the greatest all-time pop song about the dangers of giving the creepy person (in this case, a lady) your phone number”?

How could you not go with X?

(I suppose that’s the #1 pop song, but Exene’s got it all over Debbie here.)

Surprised you didn’t use Tommy Tu-tone’s 867-5309 or B-52’s 6060-842, both seem rather stalker-ish…

I suspect text messaging could be worse now, as well as video messaging.  Last fall I started receiving a large number of text messages from some kids, I think one of them gave out a wrong number and that number was mine.  There were about 20 of them, and since I don’t use text messaging, there was a fee for every one.

don’t forget faster pussy “bathroom wall”!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RsjR8ynnIz8

As someone who has been victimized by having his very real phone number given out as a fake phone number, please, please, please, pick a number which doesn’t exist. It really isn’t very fun being awoken several times during the night by a drunken jerk who doesn’t want to believe that S____ doesn’t live there, and that I’m not sleeping with her.

Jesus I thought it was the simplest easiest way to swap numbers.  Fcking Christ I thought I was clever for it.  I had never contemplated this entire line of logic.  Fair enough, never again will I call the number so you have it until 3 days have passed.  Thank heavens I read this site.  For the record this is an entirely serious comment.

I *almost* went with X, but there’s something deliciously creepy about the way Debbie Harry sings this song that makes it just perfect.

The fake-number behavior may seem strange until you know a woman who still gets calls from some random creeper years later, because she gave him her number and shouldn’t have. And she has to keep his number in her phone so she’ll know not to pick up. Or makes a habit of not picking up if it’s an unlisted number or there isn’t call-ID because the dude has tried to trick her before by calling from a different number.

I’ve never given a fake number, but there have been a few times when I wished I did.  Most notably, when a guy I never would’ve conceived was interested in me (and in whom I never would have been interested) asked for my number in front of a few dozen people in close quarters.  Had I not simply complied, I would’ve had to reject him in front of an audience.  He then called me that night, twice the next day, and every day thereafter until I finally decided I needed to call him (and reject him) to make it stop.

We ran into each other several months later, and I guess he confused me with a woman who rejected him since she was (supposedly) in a relationship, because a few days later he tracked me down on a social networking site, saying something about how it was “unfortunate” that I wasn’t available to date him.

*shudder*

Related songs:

“Girl On The Phone” - The Jam
“Shove” - L7

Unrelated songs stuck in my head:

“Pull My Strings” - Dead Kennedys
“Debaser” - The Pixies
“Ultra Twist” - The Cramps
“Sliver” - Nirvana

pete shelly “telephone operator” and midnight star “operator” are also germane music videos

Lijakaca @8:  Yup, speaking as a guy who was exactly that idiot in his 20s, that’s about as concise an explanation as I’ve seen.

My now 40 year-old ass didn’t comprehend the scenario Amanda was describing until a few comments in; I was thinking the number was a land line, and they’d call after numbers were exchanged but before the gal* gets home.  They call right in front of her?  I’m imagining the guy getting his phone handed to him by his wingman, looking like the Nazi sadist from Raiders Of The Lost Ark, punching in the number while eyeing her suspiciously.  Fucked the fuck up.

*gal for female equivalent of guy.  A little quaint, but why not?

While a few guys might call a number immediately in order to see if it’s fake, I think a fairer explanation is that they are just trying to casually swap numbers.  If nothing else, getting his number on your phone means you can label it “Ugly Dude 3 from Thursday” and later ignore it. 

And Daisy is right, if you’re not interested in a guy, just look him in the eye and tell him “Sorry, I’m not interested.”  If the guy hasn’t picked up on the subtle clues so far that you’re not interested and still asks for your number, it might be less awkward for you to give a fake number but it also infantalizes him.  Most men can handle and accept rejection.  If a guy refuses to leave you alone, just tell a bartender or bouncer.

I don’t know if anyone’s mentioned yet but Shakespear’s Sister comes from Tennesee Williams The Glass Menagerie. That’s what the gentleman caller called Laura.

CW21, I wouldn’t say tell them the truth because being evasive “infantalizes” men.  I don’t care about them.  And saying that most men can handle rejection may or may not be true, but it glosses over the ones who can’t.  Men can get very aggressive even violent when rejected, especially with younger women as pointed out by several of us who are no longer in our 20’s above.  That’s why I would be very careful what advice I gave women outside of a bar setting.  In my experience, in most bars, you’re pretty safe in telling them right out.  Even the one who would love to get aggressive and teach that bitch a lesson, won’t do it in the bar.  THe ones who do, will be removed period. 

But women can sense when a guy is getting pushy and pressure comes in many, many forms.  She has no responsiblity to tell him the truth if she feels lying is an easier out.  No way.

The last time I made the drunken mistake of giving out my number, the guy called every day for a week, getting increasingly belligerent and accusing about me not calling back.

Wasn’t it Jezebel that posted that Crap Voicemail from a Dude where Captain PUA kept yelling “I CALLED YOU ELEGANT,” outraged that he put his dollar in the Pu$$y Machine and nothing came out?

Now that I’m just shy of 40, I’ve figured out a foolproof way of keeping guys from even asking for my number in bars. 

Bearing in mind that I’m in Southern California, where the possession of adipose tissue is against the law and will generally get you shunned socially.  However, there are still a few chubby-chasers or BBW admirers who target the biggest woman in a group, figuring that they’ll get her number because her self-esteem is lower than that of her skinny girlfriends whom she met at the bar to visit with in the first place. 

When said big woman steps outside for a smoke, if she pulls out a set of keys with a status-car emblem (MBZ, BMW, Audi, Porsche), that keychain works as an absolute talisman against unwanted attention from creepy dudes who are just out collecting phone numbers anyway.

YMMV, but here in shallow SoCal, if a guy perceives that a woman he spots in a public place has all her own material things, he quickly figures out that she probably won’t give him the time of day because he has nothing to offer her.  They specifically like to target women who are younger than 30, of course.  But if she happens to pull out her car keys while searching for a lipgloss, and they see a status emblem, they scatter like frightened cockroaches. 

And yes.  I absolutely love to do this when I’m in bars.  It’s just so funny to watch their dicks shrivel up as they slink away. 

I’m with James@ 13, Aardvark @15 and CW21 @21 (assuming a controlled public place). 
As someone who has received calls at that “fake” number (as have my spouse and both my children), I am imploring, please, give out a number you know doesn’t belong to someone (perhaps a pay for sex line, a dating line, etc) if you can’t get up the nerve to just tell him to fuck off (in the nicest possible terms, of course). 
Damn it, just because you don’t want to deal with that asshole doesn’t mean you have the right to fost him off on me (or anyone else unfortunate enough to have a phone).  You may not have a obligation to tell him the truth, but giving out someone else’s number makes you equally an ass.

I don’t know if phones here have this fancy feature ... living overseas I had guys use the infrared to beam their info to your phone, and they expected you to do the same.  I suppose in that case you’d want to make up a fake phonebook entry to beam to them, but they could always do the “call your right then” move, which I also had guys do. 

Bad bad bad.  And it always took me a good 20 minutes to figure out how to block phone numbers, since I had to do it so rarely that I always forgot how or where to look on my phone menu.

One of those fun things you learn in classes about sex/gender or just about nonverbal communication (since I’ve taken both) is that men are generally not too good at picking up on nonverbal cues.  I have found this to be SO SO SO SO SO true when dealing with these sorts of guys.  You’re giving every signal beyond kicking him in the head that you *do not want to talk to him* and he doesn’t get it.  I had a guy keep trying to put his arm around me even though I was leaning the opposite direction (we were sitting in close quarters, so it was impossible to actually get up and move).  But, as someone pointed out, it’s not exactly safe to just say, “Leave me alone.”  I’ve had guys get really really angry and start cursing and being really *SCARY* when I told them to leave me alone.  So that doesn’t work either.  And if they already have your number, it seems to be some kind of invitation to call MORE.  Ugh.

NY Expat, at least you learned, better late than never. Now if you try to educate other guys/young guys, that would be fantastic, because some guys never learn, and sure won’t take a woman’s word for it.

One of the things I think most young guys don’t get, and many never get, is that it’s always a balancing act and women really do feel like a wrong choice could be dangerous. If I reject him in front of all these people, will it make me safer because there are witnesses, or will he feel publically humiliated and just get more angry? If it’s on the street, how far will this guy go? Will he follow me home if I say no bluntly? And with all the info that’s available online once you give a number out, women are even more paranoid.

Whether it’s statistically likely or not, women have been brainwashed with the fear that any strange man is a potential stalker/assaulter, and if anything goes wrong, it’s our fault for not being more careful. And of course it’s a Catch-22 there, where if we tell them no we’re a bitch, and if we’re evasive we’re leading men on, so either way they have an ‘excuse’ (in the eyes of many) to get angry.

ugh the fake number thing is harder now, because they’re like oh, give me your number and i’ll call it right now so you can save mine or because it’s easier than creating a contact for you, etc.  sometimes i say something inane like “oh this is my friend’s phone” before i try to get away, but it is awkward in any case.

Back when i was a huge young monster and used to take gigs as a bouncer, it was always fun getting rid of the pesky drunks who wouldn’t take “No/Not Interested/Fuck off, weirdo” for an answer.  It had the added bonus of making me never EVER want to be that sort of asshole.

Meanwhile, for musical selections, it’s that time of year, so I’m catching myself in a bit of masochism and reminiscing over a relationship that quietly imploded years ago and that, truthfully, i’ve never really gotten over (although, i - unlike my aforementioned bar patrons - took the hint and never pulled the creeper routine…again, saw it too many times to ever want to be even remotely guilty of it)

10.  Buzzcocks - Ever Fallen In Love
9.  Smiths - I Know It’s Over (or Unloveable… either one)
8. Joy Division - Love Will Tear Us Apart
7. Muse - Undisclosed Desires
6. Beatles - Hide Your Love Away
5.  Radiohead - Creep
4.  H.I.M - In Venere Veritas
3. Chris Isaak - Wicked Game
2. Neil Diamond - Solitary Man
1. Social Distortion - A Place in my Heart

I agree with your point Daisy that anyone should do what is necessary to get out of an uncomfortable, potentially dangerous situation (a common example that springs to mind for me is a pack of drunk guys walking by on the street at 3am who decide they want to harass you). 

Unlike some who disagreed with Amanda, I don’t have a problem with giving a wrong number because it’s dishonest to men and blah, blah, blah.  My concern is that on a broader scale, routinely giving pushy, douchey men a fake number instead of assertively saying “No. Thanks.” has the unfortunate externality of rewarding and encouraging further tone-deaf, aggressive behavior.  If the guy never calls or thinks he just took down the wrong number, the takeaway is “she played hard to get, but then she gave in after some sexy persistence.”  Or a shy college-aged guy across the room sees a dude that acts like an ass, but then gets a number as a result, and thinks that maybe he’s been doing it wrong and aggro-flirting works.

To put it in admittedly infantalizing terms, if you don’t like a guy who comes on aggressively and ignores your hints, I think its better to roll up the newspaper and slap him on the nose than to throw him a fake bone. 

I’ve never given out a fake number or been in a spot that I was tempted to (wasn’t much for bars before I was married)—I’m sort of curious about the pattern of behavior that leads to giving out a fake number. Do guys seriously just walk up to a stranger and demand her phone number, or will they do the whole “buy her a drink, make smalltalk thing” and then ask for her number?

It’s true that an immediate call-and-hang is used to swap numbers - I do this all the time, albeit never with someone I’ve just met in a bar. I hadn’t thought of how it might be abused by assholes. And that’s sort of the thing. The nature of the predatory asshole is to be delighted when another avenue by which women can escape harassment by a creep is closed.

Probably no one knows Back of My Hand by The Jags (1980’s power-pop, new wavers), but it manages to combine the creepiness of phone number-abusing and threats of actual physical abuse by playing off the double implications of I’ve got your number / Written on the back of my hand. Inspired a whole post over at my place, if anybody wants the album, which is actually very well done and catchy.

helen, it’s not about nerve.  It’s often about safety.  I don’t think women are wrong to size a guy up and realize the safest way to get away from him is to allow him to feel he’s “won”.

One of those fun things you learn in classes about sex/gender or just about nonverbal communication (since I’ve taken both) is that men are generally not too good at picking up on nonverbal cues.

Sadly, I saw some research recently that shows men are just as good as women at picking up nonverbal and verbal cues that someone is rejecting you without coming right out and saying it.  So it’s not ignorance but belligerence when a man won’t allow himself to see that you keep shoving your shoulder in his face and continue to refuse to look at him when he insists on speaking to you.  “I don’t know better” is a cheap excuse for actually thinking “women owe me their attention”, no doubt because he’s a Nice Guy.

By the way, if creepy men actually struggled to understand human communication as they often claim, they would have as many negative interactions with other men as they do women.  But when dealing with other men, they often miraculously recover their ability to pick up on nonverbal cues.

Like everything, there’s a range.  Some men are very adept at picking up smoke signals of disinterest, others are terrible at it.  The average dude is average at it.  I don’t think it’s a slam dunk logical or inevitable conclusion that the annoying lurker guy has deliberately ignored the cues or feels entitled to a woman’s attention.  I’ve found that more often than not that when a guy just doesn’t get it, its usually in a very loud, usually crowded place, in which subtlety flies past his face at a 1000 miles an hour without registering. 

Or it happens in a quiet coffee shop, where for some inexplicable reason the guy is usually wearing bike shorts.  What the hell is that about? 

Either way, 99% of the time a firm and direct “not interested” (with an appropriate edge of meanness depending on the situation) is perfectly effective at sending him on his way without any vitriolic backlash.

By the way, if creepy men actually struggled to understand human communication as they often claim, they would have as many negative interactions with other men as they do women.  But when dealing with other men, they often miraculously recover their ability to pick up on nonverbal cues.

Rubbish - grunts are a form of verbal cue, and surprisingly expressive when you’re male.  That’s why we use them.

By the way, if creepy men actually struggled to understand human communication as they often claim, they would have as many negative interactions with other men as they do women.

What makes you think they don’t?

Also, would you have a link to the research you mentioned?  The usual caveat applies:  If it’s an initial study, it shouldn’t be used as evidence of anything; too likely to have passed the initial 95% confidence test by chance.  Much more likely to be measuring a real effect if it’s a follow-up.

Sorry if that comes across as rude or mansplaining:  It’s 1:30am here, and I can’t think of a better way of formulating it.

I was a stickler for never giving out my number.  “I don’t give out my number to people I barely know.  I’ve just met you.  You’re not getting my number.  But feel free to say ‘hi’ to me when you come back here.”  Most often they didn’t either come back or say hi.  It also helped that I didn’t give out my real name either.  I’ve also done the “I don’t have my phone on me” trick.  Since I usually leave the phone in my purse when I’m at the bar unless I’m expecting a call, it can be pretty convincing.  I’ve also lied and said that I didn’t own a phone, and the number I use is a friend’s number, and she’s really unreliable at getting me my messages or that she’s said that I can’t give out her number like that.  I’ll also go into lamenting about how I’m the hardest person to reach and how my friends know never to call me.

Somehow I was the magnet for creepers and it made me adept at ditching them.  It wasn’t 100% foolproof, but it worked most of the time.  Thank heavens for Earth Mother Woo and Strawfeminism when I couldn’t ditch someone.

Rachel, that’s hilarious. I’m heavier than conventional hotness demands, and there are always guys who think that the fat chick in a group is desperate to get laid, and thus their best target. And if they’ve encountered the PUA concepts, they inevitably decide that “you would be so hot if you’d drop 15 pounds” is a really great opening line. If I can’t make them go away with my formidable death stare, and were in a group of people, I sometimes amuse myself by saying, “that’s really interesting. Is your dick, like, really small? Because it’s almost always the case that guys who think that turn out to have smaller than average dicks.”  Which usually makes them think I’m a total bitch, and amuses the hell out of everyone else.  And the other guys fall all over themselves to affirm that I am in fact the hottest chick evar.

The mercedes key chain, though. Gonna have to try that.

I often have guys argue with me on the “not interested” - “Why not? You have a boyfriend? He doesn’t need to know!” for example. Have you seen some of the PUA stuff? They instruct on how to do this, to not accept a negative answer and to keep badgering until your get the sex reward. Saying “women just need to be firm and direct” doesn’t always work when the other side is telling them to ignore this. Oh sure, you could start screaming at them or something, but then you’re the crazy bitch. And although I’ve never given out fake numbers, instead preferring the avoiding them idea (leaving early, for example) - I can’t really blame women feeling cornered and taking a less resistant path rather than feeling unsafe - and it does really feel unsafe to have someone blocking your exit, unwanted touching of hand or elbow, etc. I had one guy pinch the shit out of my arm for “lying” to him, not over a phone number, but misheard something I’d said. Fun night. So no, even if it is a small percentage of guys who are going to be obnoxious like this, I don’t really see why I should have to bother (except, as noted, making sure it is a fake number and not someone’s residence) when the justification is that this will make me oh noes, dishonest.

So one time my number just happened to match the fake that some Russian woman gave to a creep. So he kept calling and insisting that I was her and was lying to him about being a totally different Russian woman. I wouldn’t give him my name, which made him even more convinced that I was her. It took months to get rid of him. That made me realize that when I give out a fake, I’m probably pawning off a creep on some other unsuspecting woman. Just sayin’.

Sorry if the fake number loaded you up with a harasser, but the fault lies not in the woman forced to give a fake to the harasser, but the creep himself.

Months of calls? She had good reason.

I would have told him one more call and I’d report him to the phone company. And then reported him as a harasser to the phone company.

Sorry, Judybrowni, I work for a phone company, and there’s not a lot they can/will do about individual harassers. Which sucks - I always wish I could actually do something to stop them, but as it’s been explained to me at work, it’s one of those obnoxious cases where, for us to do anything, would be violating THEIR privacy rights, which we can’t do. Yes, I know, it’s ridiculous.

Ha! The ads on the bottom of this page are about “9 dangerous mistakes women make that men find totally unattractive” and the “secret” words you can use to make men totally adore you.

Well the creep was the one that did the harassing, so that was entirelly his fault. But, personally, I’m not a fan of throwing someone under the bus. So I stopped giving out fakes after that. As maladydee says, there’s nothing a phone company could do.

Just have the fake number begin with 555, tell them it’s because you’re subscribing to a new, Internet-based cell phone service.

I think I first saw the phrase “pretty girls make graves” in something out of Kerouac.

@29 BonAppetit: Further to your post, here’s an amazing study; these types of men understand your no, they simply refuse to heed it. (Article’s been linked here before, I think).

http://yesmeansyesblog.wordpress.com/2011/03/21/mythcommunication-its-not-that-they-dont-understand-they-just-dont-like-the-answer/

And Daisy is right, if you’re not interested in a guy, just look him in the eye and tell him “Sorry, I’m not interested.”

I often have guys argue with me on the “not interested” - “Why not? You have a boyfriend? He doesn’t need to know!” for example.

Yes, this. It’s what usually happened to me when I tried to say not interested. I’m just lucky that I mostly go out with big groups of friends, so eventually a male friend would notice and help me out. Once a guy tried to pick me up and he kept ignoring subtle clues, “I have to go find my friend”, progressively clearer hints, until I told him to leave, not interested. He started with “Why not, we’ve barely talked”, and kept insisting until I told him that he was dripping with sweat and stinking of stale bear and he was disgusting me, that’s why I wasn’t interested. Even then he kept insisting, telling me in smooth voice that I should give him a chance and not be such a bitch. He only left when 3 male friends arrived at the same time.

RanyIt @53: Here’s another one on “miscommunication”:
‘‘If a Girl Doesn’t Say ‘no’. . .’’: Young Men, Rape and Claims of ‘Insufficient Knowledge’

Colorlessblue, thanks for that. It’s now bookmarked.

I repeat, you have no obligation to tell some asshole what your number is.  But if you give someone else’s number to someone you think will make harrassing calls, you are an ass , and yes, you are in small part responsible should he then call and harrass them.  The major fault is the guy’s, but YOU gave him the number.
Amanda, I added the “(assuming a controlled public place)” for just the case that the guy might be dangerous and the situation unsafe otherwise.  Still a crappy thing to dump on someone else.