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And I'm pretty much sick of this whole thing, but there are some thoughts it's brought up in my mind...
That Open Source Boob Project thing* was a very poorly designed social experiment and I'm amazed at the amount of kerfluffle that it's produced. I mean, yeah, it's odd that touching someone's breasts or butt is different than touching their elbow, or that touching a man's chest should be different than touching a woman's breast, but this taboo is so tricky that it's really going to be impossible to design an experiment that won't offend someone by it's very existence, or scar someone emotionally.
It's something we have to deal with at work all the time - we use the back of the hand for touching certain areas and there's varying opinions as to whether the slide or the pat is less offensive. The instructions we get keep going back and forth on that, because as soon as you institute slide or pat someone complains and it gets changed to the other. And we don't get choices around which areas we think are 'sensitive' - in cleavage and jollop areas we have to use the palm of the hand.
Perhaps the thing I find most odd is numerous women's insistence that their female friends NEVER HAVE and NEVER WOULD grab their breasts unexpectedly, unasked, etc, etc. I'm starting to feel like a pervert, a fiend and a evil, horrible person, because I have at least once grabbed a female friend's breasts unexpectedly and in semi-public. It didn't seem like such a big deal the moment before I did it, because I touch women's breasts every day at work, and she did the same job for years, and we've had to practice on each other numerous times. But then I used the front of my fingers. The moment after it was done I worried a little about the look she gave me. And now I haven't had the opportunity to interact with her for months, and have begun to worry more and more that it was a bad idea, and now after this whole thing I really feel quite convinced she'll never talk to me again, and probably nobody else will, either, after I post this. I won't do that ever again.
On the other hand, I'm weirded out by guys grabbing the crotch of their own pants. They do it all the time (the husband of the woman who's breast I grabbed does it in an ironic, goofy way when he's dancing) and these guys very often seem to not even think there's any problem with it, just like very small girls who's parents dress them in short skirts don't realize there's any problem with them sitting splay-legged on the floor. The other day a fourteen year old boy came walking through the metal detector toward me holding his way too baggy pants up by the crotch and his mother, standing behind him, had this faint, vague look of "I can't do a thing with him." I suspected she was actually so very embarrassed that she couldn't even think of how to say anything to him about it. I wondered if I should, but I let it pass on the grounds that she might consider it sexual harassment of her boy if I said, "Don't walk around in public like that - people will think you have to wee and they'll direct you to the nearest bathroom."
Speaking of bathrooms, though, I once felt I had to tell one of my co-workers that people in Maine find it distressing to see him walking down the hall still doing up his pants and belt after coming out of the bathroom, because having grown up in California he was just used to people dressing in public, coming off the beach. But the fact that most people in Maine find dressing/undressing to be distressing if not confined to certain areas was something I had to learn by noticing their expressions, because my parents never worried about states of undress and then in high school I worked in a theater with a communal dressing room. I had the advantage of him because he's not good with reading people's expressions, so I figured someone had to say something directly or he'd never notice. But, he's a geek, I'm a bit of a geek. I'm slightly better at noticing expression than he is, so I assumed I had a duty to let him know. (ETA: Not meaning to say I'm naturally better at it, but I have 20 years more experience.)
And when we're talking about the people who came up with this ill-conceived breast experiment at the con, they're probably geeks pretty much by definition. I'm sure they had no clue this would be a problem for people. I'm just really surprised to see the kerfluffle considering most people online are some variety of geek. I'd think most would realized it was mainly a case of confusions over taboos. Especially since they're so different in different countries and even with different people and ages. (Really old people are pretty much one in the attitude of "It's all fine - I've been touched and prodded in hospitals so much that I really don't care.")
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*Because I believe in going back as close to original sources as I can, I'm pleased that I've finally found a post by A Woman Who Was There
and
a conversational thread off that post between her and another person who was there who is a friend of The Woman Who Made The Buttons.
*'jollop' was the term the Gillian Anderson Estrogen Brigade came up with years ago for the side of the breast, which is often displayed in tank tops and bathing suits.
That Open Source Boob Project thing* was a very poorly designed social experiment and I'm amazed at the amount of kerfluffle that it's produced. I mean, yeah, it's odd that touching someone's breasts or butt is different than touching their elbow, or that touching a man's chest should be different than touching a woman's breast, but this taboo is so tricky that it's really going to be impossible to design an experiment that won't offend someone by it's very existence, or scar someone emotionally.
It's something we have to deal with at work all the time - we use the back of the hand for touching certain areas and there's varying opinions as to whether the slide or the pat is less offensive. The instructions we get keep going back and forth on that, because as soon as you institute slide or pat someone complains and it gets changed to the other. And we don't get choices around which areas we think are 'sensitive' - in cleavage and jollop areas we have to use the palm of the hand.
Perhaps the thing I find most odd is numerous women's insistence that their female friends NEVER HAVE and NEVER WOULD grab their breasts unexpectedly, unasked, etc, etc. I'm starting to feel like a pervert, a fiend and a evil, horrible person, because I have at least once grabbed a female friend's breasts unexpectedly and in semi-public. It didn't seem like such a big deal the moment before I did it, because I touch women's breasts every day at work, and she did the same job for years, and we've had to practice on each other numerous times. But then I used the front of my fingers. The moment after it was done I worried a little about the look she gave me. And now I haven't had the opportunity to interact with her for months, and have begun to worry more and more that it was a bad idea, and now after this whole thing I really feel quite convinced she'll never talk to me again, and probably nobody else will, either, after I post this. I won't do that ever again.
On the other hand, I'm weirded out by guys grabbing the crotch of their own pants. They do it all the time (the husband of the woman who's breast I grabbed does it in an ironic, goofy way when he's dancing) and these guys very often seem to not even think there's any problem with it, just like very small girls who's parents dress them in short skirts don't realize there's any problem with them sitting splay-legged on the floor. The other day a fourteen year old boy came walking through the metal detector toward me holding his way too baggy pants up by the crotch and his mother, standing behind him, had this faint, vague look of "I can't do a thing with him." I suspected she was actually so very embarrassed that she couldn't even think of how to say anything to him about it. I wondered if I should, but I let it pass on the grounds that she might consider it sexual harassment of her boy if I said, "Don't walk around in public like that - people will think you have to wee and they'll direct you to the nearest bathroom."
Speaking of bathrooms, though, I once felt I had to tell one of my co-workers that people in Maine find it distressing to see him walking down the hall still doing up his pants and belt after coming out of the bathroom, because having grown up in California he was just used to people dressing in public, coming off the beach. But the fact that most people in Maine find dressing/undressing to be distressing if not confined to certain areas was something I had to learn by noticing their expressions, because my parents never worried about states of undress and then in high school I worked in a theater with a communal dressing room. I had the advantage of him because he's not good with reading people's expressions, so I figured someone had to say something directly or he'd never notice. But, he's a geek, I'm a bit of a geek. I'm slightly better at noticing expression than he is, so I assumed I had a duty to let him know. (ETA: Not meaning to say I'm naturally better at it, but I have 20 years more experience.)
And when we're talking about the people who came up with this ill-conceived breast experiment at the con, they're probably geeks pretty much by definition. I'm sure they had no clue this would be a problem for people. I'm just really surprised to see the kerfluffle considering most people online are some variety of geek. I'd think most would realized it was mainly a case of confusions over taboos. Especially since they're so different in different countries and even with different people and ages. (Really old people are pretty much one in the attitude of "It's all fine - I've been touched and prodded in hospitals so much that I really don't care.")
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
*Because I believe in going back as close to original sources as I can, I'm pleased that I've finally found a post by A Woman Who Was There
and
a conversational thread off that post between her and another person who was there who is a friend of The Woman Who Made The Buttons.
*'jollop' was the term the Gillian Anderson Estrogen Brigade came up with years ago for the side of the breast, which is often displayed in tank tops and bathing suits.
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As for grabbing frineds boobs, I wouldn't really do it. I've had it done to me though and wasn't offended. By a girl obviously.
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Bah, now I sound like some sort of frigid victorian.
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jollop' was the term the Gillian Anderson Estrogen Brigade came up with years ago for the side of the breast, which is often displayed in tank tops and bathing suits.
*impressed* Useful word! The OED says it means "the wattle of a cock, turkey, or other fowl" (last recorded use circa 1890) or slang for medicine/strong liquor (most recent use 1966), but use of the word in those senses seems uncommon enough that I expect we could get this sense of it included in the next edition of the OED fairly quickly if we wanted. :)
(Splendid sentence: "The Turky Cock Jollopeth." 1688!)
his mother, standing behind him, had this faint, vague look of "I can't do a thing with him." I suspected she was actually so very embarrassed that she couldn't even think of how to say anything to him about it.
This made me laugh, but oh dear, that poor woman!
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I don't doubt that in the beginning, it was a bunch of friends fooling around. I don't give a shit about that.
It's the fact that they took it into the hallway to ask random strangers, and the fact that they made it a MOVEMENT that bothers me. It bothers me in a really personal way, since I go to conventions.
I read
Yes, the cosplayer he approached said yes...but I've had the exact same situation happen to me and my friends at a convention (approached by a group of people asking us for permission to grope) and while nothing happened, it was absolutely terrifying.
The fact that they didn't consider that is pretty offensive from my standpoint. Even more offensive because he decided that she was 'obviously' dressing that way because she wanted a group of strangers to come up and ask to grab her breasts without even bothering to compliment her costume first. He goes on later to say that they only asked people who were similarly 'obviously' displaying themselves.
Now, I go to conventions to play games, talk about scifi, shop, and geek out -- I don't want to have to be asked whether or not I want a breast-groping button. That's basically saying "Enough about Star Wars, let's focus on what's really important here: your boobs!" I shouldn't have to opt out of boob grabbing -- it should be the DEFAULT. I shouldn't have to worry about whether or not my outfit is sufficiently provocative to make it OK for someone to ask to grope me -- someone I have never met before, and therefore have no idea if he/she will respect it when I say no, or if I say yes will stick with a quick grope and not take it further.
TL;DR, take it from a female con-goer: the last thing we need is a new way to legitimize propositioning women. It's not the friendly boob-grabbing that people dislike, it's the fact that they started bringing strangers into it -- especially when the face of the project justified it by pointing to how they were dressed.
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Also,
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And, ugh, I agree with you about the 'worthy of being touched' bit too. That sounds like an excerpt from Sci-Fi Conventions of Gor or something.
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I also wouldn't be bothered by a female friend grabbing my breast unexpectedly in a nonpainful manner, although I don't really encourage it, either, and I'd prefer she asked first. But if it's bothering you, you should try to talk to your friend--I doubt she'd cut you off entirely over it, but apologizing isn't a bad idea if she might have been bothered.
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I wrote her and apologized, but have heard nothing back, and was starting to worry, but then I realized she's in Florida at the moment and probably not checking her email.
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Not to insult you or anything...I don't really remember you grabbing me or offending me or any such thing. Or maybe I was so traumatized by you that I now have a split personality and am unable to remember the incident. :)
You are very sweet to apologize though. Thank you.
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