What is teasing?

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When I was young I understood teasing. It was a way children bullied each other covertly while pretending to be innocently playing. The goal was to upset the one being teased without being blamed for it.

As I got older there appeared new and unrelated meanings of teasing.
A man told me he would tickle me and do certain other intimate physical things to tease me. This is clearly considered sexually stimulating and not meant to be bullying, which makes it a totally separate meaning of teasing.

Another man engaged in confusing word-play that had sexual double entendres, and then told me it was teasing. He clearly did not mean to either bully me or to sexually arouse me, but to engage in risque verbal witticisms which constituted flirting. That's another unrelated meaning of teasing.

Another person pretended to misunderstand everything I said to him. When I began to appear frustrated after correcting his mistaken statements, he explained he had been teasing. This is obviously not bullying, not sexually stimulating, and not flirting. It seems like some type of humor. Another form of teasing.

Just how are all these unrelated scenarios all called "teasing" and how can we possibly know what is teasing and what is not when it appears to have so many different forms?

Isn't the second one flirting? The intimate physical things I mean. Flirting isn't teasing to me but what you do to show you have sexual feelings for someone. It does involve a bit of teasing however.

Teasing to me is mocking someone without ill intent. It's a way people that are close or want to be, bond together.

from what you said , i think i see the pattern: teasing would be a way to provoque an emotional reaction in someone, and the risque talk , for a man, could amount to flirting without doing it in an obvious way so that if you reject him, he can say he was just teasing"which has no meaning in itself, it doesn't mean joking, it means...tickling your mind.
sort of....as far as i can tell, but i can't say i'm totally certain of my definition....

Hrm... um... I looked it up in the dictionary and it says teasing is provoking -- it can be to provoke someone sexually, or humorously, or to provoke them into anger or humiliation... to provoke some kind of emotional response, but I think teasing always involves some kind of humour. The bad kind of teasing, like making fun of someone, is only humorous for the person doing the teasing but it still involves someone laughing. So... teasing is... attempting to provoke someone into an emotional response with the intent of one or both sides finding humour in it?

I dunno... I can see variations on the dictionary definition of teasing in a couple of those but more than that I see three guys being jerks.

Your explanation for each type of teasing were good. And as Chama said, teasing means provoking a reaction, and it can be of humorous or sexual nature, but the intentions behind it can be good or bad, depending on the person who is teasing.

In some of your examples you mention a man who told you he would tickle you etc, personally I wouldn't describe it as "teasing" I would use the word "arousing", eventho I guess it could be used in that context too. Whoever that man was I would stay away from him, unless he is your boyfriend and you know him well, and he made his intentions clear.


Also 2 different persons can tease you using the exact same trait of your personality but may have very different intentions, one may tease you in a kind and affectionate way, while another may intend to hurt your feelings, it is for you to judge if the person is someone who likes you or someone who is mean to you usually.


I must say that sometimes it can be hard to tell the intentions behind it, especially if it is from a person you don't know well.


Shadi

Of your four scenarios, I would call the first one bullying (as you suggested) -- and not teasing. To call playground bullying, "teasing," improperly discounts its maliciousness and doesn't account for its complete lack of mutual enjoyment. People can call it what they want to call it, but it is what it is.

Your other three scenarios actually appear pretty closely related. I agree with the flavor of most of the earlier posts. All of the actions you describe were designed by someone (with seemingly different levels of selfishness) to provoke some reaction in you -- arousal, hope, curiosity, confusion, etc. The key ingredient that I don't think anyone's hit on is that teasing causes frustration or tension, which is supposed to be alleviated by the teaser. Otherwise the "tease" is not complete -- and ought to be called something else. Teasing has to come full circle; it demands a release. If the person getting teased isn't let in on the joke at some point, then I wouldn't call it teasing. I think we'd be back at bullying.

In your first scenario, teasing is meant to cause temporary frustration and to delay sexual satisfaction -- and obviously that can be very pleasurable, so long as it's only delayed. For someone to tease you that way, and then put on his coat and leave, isn't teasing. It's just weird.

In your second scenario, teasing is meant to cause temporary frustration by delaying "full disclosure." It's supposed to arouse interest and curiosity of the "does he like me?" variety. That tension is released when you find out explicitly that he's really crazy about you. If he's saying what he's saying just to play games with you, then, again, it isn't teasing. It's emotional cruelty.

In your third scenario, teasing is meant to cause the frustration of being misunderstood, just as you describe. I don't understand this one as well, because it's much more subtle and situation-specific. But, I would hope that, by his pretending to misunderstand you for a while, that it was somehow really funny when it finally came to light that he understood you all along.

Overall, I think that what passes for teasing on the playground is really just simple bullying. Teasing seems to me to be a much more sophisticated and subtle way of interacting that, like I said before, involves the situation coming full circle. It starts by causing a buildup of tension or frustration in the form of arousal, expectation, hope, or confusion and that concludes by alleviating that tension in the form of sexual release, the disclosure of true intentions, or the humorous clarification of confusion.