aag

I personally think you did the right thing. It is ok to have some class, especially when others don’t.

Its a very fine line we walk between politeness and protecting our space. I don’t think you lack for balls, because you were quite clear about the limits, but you did it in a classy way. seeing as it was a social setting. To have it escalate into something more, would have ruined everyone’s evening.

I would like to see a picture of these balls…

It’s such a shame that we all have those experiences where afterwards we wished we had handled it differently…

For example, a guy friend of mine once had his ass groped in a public place by a deranged man who immediately confessed that he enjoyed licking guys asses. Instead of having the response that he would have wanted to have in this situation (and that most guys upon hearing this story would vow they would do), which is punch the guy in the face, my friend just stood there, frozen in shock. My friend is not a small man, it was just beyond his immediate ealm of comprehension that such a thing could happen to him, and so he was completely INactive about it.

Unfortunately, this happens all the time to some of us. A coworker makes a snide, rude comment at your expense and you don’t say anything because you’re shocked and wondering if you heard it straight.. only to agonize over what nasty comment you could have fired back when you’re trying to fall asleep that night.

Sorry for the long post, this just happens to me all the time!

It sounds to me like you handled it with aplomb. You got our message across without breaking your bliss, or embarrassing anyone unduly. If you got all heavy about it you could have broken the vibe of the party and everyone would have gone home irritated by you, rather than him.

He got the message, eventually. And he probably went home and thought long and hard about why the evening hadn’t worked out well for him - and ultimately realised that it’s because he was too pushy.

Freakin’ perv!

Just remember this, from You’ve Got Mail:

Joe Fox: Wouldn’t it be great if I could pass all my zingers to you, then I could always be nice and you could be nasty whenever you wanted to be. Although I must warn you… when you eventually have the pleasure of saying the thing you want to say at the moment you’re wanting to say it… remorse eventually follows.

I’m always torn on this issue. I’m a very non-confrontational person, and probably would have handled the situation the same way, or at most (unless he just outright grabbed for the breast) made an excuse to get out of the situation - oops, have to go to the restroom, etc.

At the same time - I get it. It’s more than just ‘wanting this person to stop touching me’, more than just anger; it’s that your *set and announced and clear* boundaries are being crossed, and as a woman, you feel like the urge to keep it quiet and demure is sort of a…a betrayal of feminism, I guess. At least, that’s how I feel about those behaviours in myself.

Dunno. But I certainly don’t think you lack balls. Had the situation progressed, I’m sure you would have brought them out in all their brassy glory and he would have scurried away in terror. :)

I’ve been in these situation too, as I think all women have at one point or another. I was on an airplane and mostly asleep against the window when the dude next to me started touching me up underneath my skirt. all I did at the time was take his hand and put it back in his lap rather firmly. didn’t look at him and didn’t say anything. he tried it again, and I did the same thing.

Upon telling my boyfriend of what happened he kinda got pissed at me. He asked me why I didn’t alert one of the airline ladies and I told him I just didn’t want to make a scene. I wish I’d called him out now, of course, embarrassed him a bunch, but I didn’t. It was a full plane, so for me to move someone else would have to move to my seat. Didn’t want to deal with it.

A betrayal to feminism is exactly how I feel about it. I wish I had done more aswell.

I think you handled yourself well- but what a jerk he was, to need the message repeated so many times!

Why on earth he didn’t simply smile after the *first* time, and focus on your hand and not need the repeats?

Sometimes, people can be so stupid about things like that.

Growing balls?! No let’s not be hasty.

You did fine. Stop kicking yourself in the imaginary balls over it.

I have to say I disagree with most people that have responded. You informed him very clearly after the first time his hand wondered, so he should have stopped. As you stated this was an adult party, so it is to be assumed adults attended. I’m sure as you know that it’s usually children that need multiple warnings and not adults. If you would have sat up and looked at him sternly then sent him away, the people at the people around you may have paused for a moment and then continued their evening. Your comfort in a situation like that comes before possible social missteps.

P.S. Love your blog.

AAG,
years of being taught NOT to speak up, to be “nice”, to be afraid to tell someone off will do that to you - or to me - or to anyone.
I have a feeling that with your new freedom and growth apres divorce, your pair of balls will be growing nicely :)

He overstepped. You were polite. Next time you will be firm as well.
A sharp tongue is a learned skill :)

I agree with Annie. As we grow in our independence and confidence our girly-balls will grow in kind.

The sad thing is that he probably didn’t think anything of it because of the nature of the party. What a jerk!

oh man i totally understand this. and i’ve done the same thing in situations where it was dangerous to. i was living alone this past summer, after my roommate moved out, and i came into my house from downtown, passing a park. one of my old roommate’s friends, so not a stranger but a man i’ve met only once, saw me go into my house and followed me in. i was far too polite to kick him out even though i was very uncomfortable, and he refused to take my (very obvious, i thought) hints. eventually, he actually got into my bed and tried to get me to come with him, and instead of telling him to fuck off as i should have, or even calling the police, i told him i had to go to work and herded him out, but that meant that i had to leave my house to. later i was far more angry at myself than i was at him, and tried to convince myself that the reason i hadn’t done anything was because he hadn’t done anything wrong…..

I wanted to respond to Sarah’s experience on the airplane.
I’ve experience something similar on a bus, and being on a plane is so much harder, especially a full plane. If you make a fuss, and ask to change your seat, you are being the difficult one, you are the fussy one. Even the stewardesses, who are female, will give you the “look” for making trouble.
Women have been conditioned all their lives to not rock the boat…. but I am noticing younger women not putting up with it as much.

Hi AAG,

The other women in the party can take care of themselves. That’s THEIR deal. Who made you in charge of everyone’s safety?

It’s one thing to get a grope on the bus– quite another when you’re at an adult party where people are going at it with vibrators.

Sounds like you handled the situation just fine.

XOXO

Chuck

A woman I know was on a crowded, rush hour subway. People pressed all up against her, and whatnot. Par for the course, here. Suddenly, she feels a hand rubbing her bottom and moving down in between her thighs. She abruptly turned around and, looking the man in the eye, said very loudly, “Do you mind!” The man literally shrank in front of her and everyone else and got off at the next stop.

I love this story. And I admire her for doing it. Could I do it? I honestly don’t know. I like to think I could. I’m not afraid of confrontation. But, conditioning is deep and it’s very difficult to go against that inner “polite” girl.

I totally know that feeling of regret at not having said more, but I have to say I think you did very well, really. You were firm and consistent and didn’t just let it go along.

Eve

I get caught in the same situation in “adult” situations of that nature, as do girl friends of mine. We find it somehow impossible to tell them to f’k off, to tell them to leave us the hell alone, or even just to tell them we are not interested. Instead we get stuck in situations where they’re touching us or kissing on us or sucking on us and we feel sickened, like whores (and there is a difference between a slut and a whore, I wholeheartedly believe). I have no problem with a backbone in other situations but in the “adult party” environment for some reason I do. I don’t like making people feel rejected and I do not like conflict…. Ideas on how to change this, anyone?

aag,
if this particular party is a regular event and you plan on attending again, perhaps you could alert the host of the situation. especially if other women had similar experiences with this particular man. if it were my party i would want to know.

Your response was typically female, I think. I probably would have done the same thing, at least at first.

As women, we are conditioned to “be nice,” to be people pleasers. We want everyone to like us.

It’s hard to buck years of that kind of training. But it all begins with the desire. You’ll get there. Maybe I will too!

AAG,
I’m with Chuck. There’s no reason why you should be the guardian of every woman there. However having said that, if you want to take that role on, do it with gusto.

Round up all the other ladies who’ve been touched, circle round him, grab him by the balls (a nice swift twisting motion can work wonders here), and lead the craven bastard outside nude and lock his ass out. And if he shows up again, don’t wait for more unwanted touching. Just get the vigilantettes together and do it again.

Even the slow ones take a hint after awhile.

Your experience is very much a minor version CofCC’s post about her being assaulted..http://collegecallgirl.blogspot.com/2007/10/number-is-eight.html

(BTW that may be where some of your 700 hits per day to your old blog come from, might send her a note?)

People regularly let their own greedy myopia, give a meter’s license whether a thimbleful was granted.

I am sure I have done it, In boy mode I had it done to me by a girl that was a fair amount larger than I.

No shouldn’t have to be elaborated on.

But at the end of it, you , like rape and lesser assault victims are blaming yourself for not being clear.

P.S. bookmarked, added for the first time to mine for the edification of my paltry stable of accoaisional and usually accidental readers..

It’s shameful that I enjoy reading about people’s bad experiences with gropers. I guess I enjoy the shock value of something so far removed from decent social etiquette.

With that in mind, I say to anyone caught in such a situation to be immediately bold and forceful in your response. Tell the groper to ‘f*k off’ loudly, slap him hard in the face, knee him in the balls or mace him, depending on how indecent and improper you consider his action/words to have been. And if you worry about the bystanders who may be appalled by your ‘outrageous’ behaviour, just know that their inaction to support you simply shows that they were enjoying the shock value of the situation. F*k ‘em.

I’ve actually had things like this happen. At one of the parties I regularly go to, there was a guest who was there for the first time. He got way to drunk way to early.

He managed to piss off every girl there. I was fucking my friend Ruby with a strap on, when this douche came up behind me, and with out warning pulled my hair so hard that my first instinct (which I ought to have followed) was to elbow him in the solar plexus. Instead, I looked up at my male friend sitting by Ruby’s head, and was mouthing ‘get him away, i don’t like this!’.

He also kept getting Ruby to try to blow him, after repeated no’s, tried to lure my friend Lily into a tryst in the bathroom, and basically molested another friend who at first was too tired (she was sleeping in a non-play room) to put him off.

And we all did not react by yelling him. Go figure.

But, at another party, when I was sucking a dick with my friend Miss Jo, and some other noob tried to jut his dick into her face, she got up, put her hand in his face, and said “THAT IS NOT OK!”

I never saw a guy go limp quicker.

And thats why I have extra love for Miss Jo

the sad thing is it’s always the “gropee” who’s considered to be making the scene. as though reaching up a woman’s skirt on a bus or touching them beyond their boundaries isn’t a scene enough. aag, i’m sure your other masseuses knew something was up, and likely felt as uncomfortable as well. in both these situations, the “groper” is most definitely being impolite, to both the person being groped and to everyone around. i guess it’s in most peoples’ nature to ignore it. if you had chosen to be more firm about it, i’m sure you would have had the support of others.

Hi AAG,

It would be one thing if someone was poking you with a strap-on– quite another if someone tries to steal a grope. When you don’t distinguish between the two, then it makes all acts of bad behavior past a certain, poorly defined threshold at the same level– and that’s wrong.

The guy’s a jerk. Odds are he won’t get invited back. Orgies certainly aren’t for everyone. But your reaction at the time was reasonably calibrated for the level of the transgression. Quite frankly, I see this as an excavation from your past that triggered the need to have a strong reaction. For you, those previous types of behavior give you a little touch of PTSD.

And hey– it’s who you are. No apologies necessary. We all have our marks– as you said in a previous column. But I’m coming down on the side of a little more self-analysis on your part on why you felt so strongly.

What happened to you is NOT the same as being groped on a bus. There, the situation was decidedly non-sexual. Not quite the same as what you were experiencing.

XOXO

Chuck

It is very much different. She needs no self-analysis beyond the introspection she did here. You might want to consider some introspection yourself.

If it was “A” grope, sure, hey he tried, was denied…the fact that he persisted showed he did not respect her boundaries. For you to say AAG is over-reacting to this ‘minor offense” suggests that despite what you say you feel there are no boundaries once adult situations begin. Or that if they are there at all they only apply to those “transgressions” that you feel rise to the level of..etc etc..

I always beat myself up for not saying or doing anything about inappropriate touching. Each time I resolve that next time I will say something. But I don’t.
I think you have more balls than me.

Your response was *NOT* typically female. Your response was typically suburban/white. I’m a guy, and if, say, that guy was gay and he were coming on to me like he was to you, I would have been just as diplomatic and non-confrontational as you were. Please don’t turn this into a feminism thing, it isn’t.

If you had grown up in New York City, or Latin America, or Italy, you would have jumped bolt upright and got in his face like a baseball manager screaming at an umpire, and called him every kind of asshole you could think of. Or you’d have slapped the guy in his face. If the *party* was in New York City, you could have expected every guy there to have been just like that guy, because every woman there would have been bitchy and confrontational too, the guys would test the limits and get slapped down, and that’s how the game is played there.

I’d be curious to find out where that guy was from. I’d guess, a big city, or a Latin country.

I don’t like that kind of confrontational, harsh approach. I’d prefer that more people behaved like you. I think you did it right.

Our children (and this guy sounds immature) understand that if they cannot respect the boundaries and rules we have set, they lose privileges we allow them.

It might have been best once he displayed a lack of respect for you a second time to immediately and loudly dismiss his services by calling for someone else to take over his duties. This could have been done with a laugh as well, but would have perhaps made your message more pointed.

Besides, he needs to learn that there is a lot more eroticism to be found in controlling oneself than in letting baser urges go unrestrained.

sex - it isn’t a locational thing! I grew up in the city, and I’m still entirely too diplomatic. And the parties I go to are in NYC.

Yet, every guy there, many of them grew up in NYC too, and THEY learned manners. They don’t grope randomly.