Tim Lineaweaver sincerely wants to know: What should he make of a situation where a woman gropes him in public?
—
Let me set the stage for you:
The house: Plus size, sitting on an emerald green private peninsula overlooking a stunning panoramic water view of Buzzards Bay on Cape Cod.
The party: An annual catered late August 5-7PM affair with an eclectic mix of people including artists, musicians, scientists, filmmakers, doctors, trades-people, and at least one therapist.
The victim (me): A 57-year-old white male therapist, happily married for 20 years, father of 3 grown children and proud grandfather of four.
The perpetrator: A fifty-something married white woman, mother and oncologist of some renown.
The crime: As I bent down to hug and air kiss one of the hosts, the perpetrator moved swiftly toward the target just cleverly out of the peripheral vision of the victim. The grab was not a light playful pat nor was it a flirty, saucy pinch. More, it was a full on digit-expanded assault resulting in a taut handful of the offended area.
The initial reaction: A quick backhanded slap as she retracted her hand with the stealth of a boxer pulling back his fully-extended jab. Fully in fight or flight mode, I legged it out of the area with a quick backward glance to try and read her face which was passive, betraying not much at all, perhaps best described as, “Whaddya want from me?”
The aftermath: What to make of this? Being a man I am well aware that all things are not equal in this instance. At this party, were I to have done the same to a woman though, the best I could hope for would be social condemnation: a short shocked collective gasp, conjuring words such as lech, pervert, groper, cad, freak etc. At worst, what? Asked to leave, disgraced, a huge diminishment of local reputation? Would arrest even be a possibility, attorneys! Egad! I know given gender differences in power, physical strength and force, maybe all these worst-case scenarios would be right and proper.
I can also say this is not the first time something like this has happened. Several years ago I was deep in the weeds at my last job as a manager of a busy behavioral health division in a frenetically paced community health center. Pumped full of anxiety and with jangled nerves at the end of a long week, I jumped in my car and drove hurriedly to my son’s hockey game a couple of hours away. Grinding through ungodly traffic, I screeched into the crowded parking lot and hurried through the doors of the rink pausing to score some soothing, stomach-warming hot chocolate at the concession stand and then happily took my place standing in the balcony overlooking the ice. No sooner had I sighed relief and took a warming draw of my hot chocolate I felt a sharp shooting pain-pinch on the butt. Startled, my hands reflexively shot up in the air and a big slop of the brown liquid doused my shirt and jacket. I spun around to nab the culprit and there was a local hockey mom of ill repute with a leering grin directed my way as she glanced over her shoulder and hastily sped away. As soon as I saw her face there was absolutely no surprise. Let’s face it, I have spent fifty-plus years in hockey rinks and I know well they are teeming cauldrons of dysfunction, with highly misguided notions of what it is to be a either man or a woman.
This particular cocktail party with this particular group of people was not a place I would ever have expected to be groped. I am left to wonder what to make of it? When you think of it, most human behavior is a form of communication. And this communicated something along the lines of I am crossing your physical space to a place most anyone would consider to be a bodily-no-trespassing zone. I am left to assume this was a physical fuck-you.
Polling friends about the ass-grab, women and men alike, has brought me a widely varied number of responses including the following: “You should have been flattered. You should have confronted her right away, saying with moral certitude that’s inappropriate! It was a sexual act. It was an aggressive hostile act. She likes you.” I asked one woman what she would do if this happened to her husband and she ran into the perpetrator at the supermarket and she was clear that she would make short work out of the perpetrator. My eighteen year old son, a very even-tempered guy, said if someone did such a thing to his girlfriend he would be forced to defend her honor and I can’t disagree with that sentiment.
Perhaps it’s just a simple as one friend put it: “Just be grateful she wasn’t a proctologist.”
Amen to Mike’s comments! I was a bit stunned when this happened because it was totally unexpected, the woman being a doctor that I was friendly with. I tried to make the piece lighthearted as what happened is certainly not the end of my world, so there is no need for me to “get on with my life” as assman suggests, but given past issues I do have a visceral reaction to being touched when it’s unwanted as many people do.
All: Some wonderful posts and thoughts here! It is fascinating to hear the different takes. Whenever I discuss the story I get widely varied responses and this is understandable as each person may have very different physical and emotional boundaries. I agree with Manvan, Nicholas and Selina that we all need to take personal responsibility for how we feel and that one person may feel very differently about the same act than another. In those terms I fell short as my impulse was to get the hell away from her; I can be a big chicken sometimes. After the party,… Read more »
These are the kind of instances where pulling out the equality card, whilst pretty great as a cornerstone for some good conversation, is actually a bit of a furphy. Sure, she displayed some questionable behaviour at best. But as to the original question – what should you have done? – the answer is entirely a personal one, and it is the point to be pushed. Be honest with yourself first, then with her. If you liked it, that’s fine, strike up a conversation, high-five a friend, whatever. If you didn’t, that’s fine too. Turn around and tell her how it… Read more »
You have every right to slap her hand away. Obviously the physical difference would make it difficult to deter her without beating her up but at the very least, slap her hand away and ask her what she was doing and that you didn’t appreciate it. You need to make clear that that behaviour is unacceptable from anyone if it is unwelcome
While the pernicious effects of patriarchy might mean that women generally suffer a greater outrage at being groped than men, it is entirely different on an individual level. A man is not obligated to feel flattered, or temper his outrage at being violated simply because he is a man.
But in any case, no one should tell you how you should feel about being groped. Society should condemn non-consensual actions, but you are alone responsible for deciding how you feel.
For my part, I strongly dislike most people touching me. I would have caused a scene.
How you should react I think depends on how it made you feel, and what you feel the intent was. I was groped repeatedly by girls in my year when I was at school, and it was quite clear that it was a bullying thing, it was about making me feel uncomfortable and flustered, it was a joke that I was the butt of (no pun intended) and not included in on – it was maliciously humiliating. And it wasn’t a cheeky pinch either, it would often involve a finger deliberately running between my butt cheeks. It didn’t stop there;… Read more »
Truth.
Well, I suppose if we’re trying to equal up the sexes in terms of potential offenses and offensiveness, this serves as an opportunity. But I really think it’s another opportunity for the discourse of universal victimization. You know, if an older woman sleeps with a male teen, she’s molesting him. I don’t buy it. I’m pretty generally against the total critique of everyday life. If we followed the proposed recipe here, life would have all the juice squeezed out of it. When I was a hippy college student in a collective farmhouse, I was making a wall-phone call with a… Read more »
I don’t think its a big deal. I would ignore it and get on with my life.
assman (not even going to start on your name), this attitude is why there is no language for men in this country to use when it comes to things that make them uncomfortable. If he felt affronted, and it appears he did, he should be able to say so, and even tell anyone, as a woman would have likely done if the situation was reversed. I feel pretty comfortable saying some women, especially married women (happily married, in any case,) would have said something and caused an uproar. Maybe if the action was just heavy flirting, she would have just… Read more »
I’m more inclined to make a scene and make it just as uncomfortable for them as I am. By asking, “Why did you touch me?” They generally deny it, or say something along the lines of you shouldn’t be offended it was a friendly gesture. I respond with a list of friendly gestures, that include, saying “hi”, offering a hand to shake. Being sneaky is not flattering. I hate the you should be flattered suggestion. If you want to flatter me, talk to me seriously. You have no chance after you have touched without my permission. I also find it… Read more »