NetNews Usenet Archive 1993 #3/NN_1993_3.iso/spool/soc/women/22908

Text File | 1993-01-21 | 2.8 KB | 52 lines

Newsgroups: soc.women
Path: sparky!uunet!panther!mothost!lmpsbbs!areaplg2.corp.mot.com!bhv
From: [e-mail] (Bronis Vidugiris)
Subject: Re: Thoughts on Sexual Harassment
Organization: Motorola, CCR&D, CORP, Schaumburg, IL
Date: Wed, 20 Jan 1993 18:02:16 GMT
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In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Peter Nelson) writes:
)In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (ljf) writes:
)>In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Peter Nelson) writes:
)>>   When I was a kid, about that age, (~1963) there were also boys
)>>   who did these things.  Of course, on a bus there isn't much privacy
)>>   so they were exposing themselves at large, not just to the girls.
)>>   Some of them had recently learned how to "operate" their "equipment"
)>>   and would put on shows.   As I recall these guys were among the
)>>   more troubled (or troublesome) ones, but I recall the reaction
)>>   by the rest of us to be a mixture of amazement, disgust, and
)>>   curiosity.   It's not clear that it represented a form of harassment
)>>   or was in some way threatening.
)>
)>At what point does it become harassment in your mind?  If the boy were
)>to expose himself and then say to the nearest girl, "I'd like to fuck
)>you," is this alright?  Is it okay if only a few "troubled" boys do
)>it, but not nearly every boy?
)
)  I guess I think the line is crossed when there is a credible
)  threat to someone.  If there is a threat of actual physical
)  assault I would up the ante, authority-wise.

Interesting.  I'd say that there already were laws and practices against
exposing oneself in public to any one of any gender,  and that these have
been enforced in the past without labelling the practice 'sexual harassment'.

To go back to your earlier example, do you think that adults would have put
a stop to those boys who exposed themselves to other boys (or anybody else)
if they knew it was happening?   I do.  I think they still would.

I think that calling exposure like this 'sexual harssment' is very
misleading and ascribes implicitly motivation to the children that they don't
have (most likely).  I hope people wake up to this before it's too late.  If
they don't, it will in the longer term be self-correcting, IMO.  The 'magic'
in the words of 'sexual harassment' will tend to go away as people get a
more accurate impression of the range of behavior that it describes by
personal experience.  Which seems likely to me if it is taught to them
from school-age on.