A few years ago, I was taking the train with some friends after work to go to a speed dating event. We went straight from work, so the train was crowded with rush hour commuters. I had worn a skirt that day - not extraordinarily sexy, but a skirt nonetheless. It was a small, almost-houndstooth-but-not-quite pattern in gray and black, knee length, pencil skirt, not overly form-fitting. I think I was wearing it with tall boots and a black top. My thought in putting the outfit together was that it was something appropriate for work in an office that with the addition of some lipstick would also be appropriate for a speed dating event. In retrospect, I was probably underdressed for the speed dating event (read: not sexy enough).
So my friends and I were on this very crowded train, smushed in among dozens of other commuters, standing near the doors because that was as far into the train car as we could get. And suddenly, from behind me, I felt a hand lifting up my skirt to gain access to my inner thigh. I smacked the hand away, turned, and gave a very stern look to the guy standing behind me. I could only guess which guy it had been. At the next stop, we got off the train. I would like to think we would have done so even if it hadn't been our stop. I told my friends, they agreed that the guy was a creep and out of line, and we went to our event.
Like I said, the story I just shared here is not as egregious as some. I was groped by a stranger on a train. Nobody was physically hurt and the psychological trauma for me was minimal. But seriously, who sticks their hand up a strange woman's skirt on a train? Who thinks that is okay? Who thinks that it's really not that big of a deal?
In retrospect, I wish I had done something louder and more obvious than give the guy a stern look. I wish I had shouted at him, "What makes you think you have the right to touch me without my permission?" so I could have embarrassed him in front of everyone on that train. Because that is what he did to me by touching me inappropriately, he embarrassed me. He made me self-conscious about my perfectly acceptable office attire. I think you would be hard pressed to find even a mysoginistic jury that would say I was "asking for it" in that outfit. The groper made me uncomfortable, he invaded my personal space in a public forum. And really, who does that on a crowded rush hour train? Was he counting on the fact that I wouldn't want to make a scene? If he was, I am even more annoyed that I didn't.
I have ridden the train hundreds of times since then. I've been stepped on and whacked in the head with oversized purses, but I have never been groped by another man like that. Meaning, I know that not all men grope strange women on trains. Not all men are rapists. Not all men are mysoginistic asshats. Not all men think they are owed sex. Not all men think women exist purely for male gratification. I know these things, you know these things, we all know these things. That's not the point. The point is that there are enough of them out there who do, and they are bold enough in their life choices, loud enough with their hoots and hollers, strong enough in their physical demands, that every single woman has had to deal with them on some level at some point in her life. Every. Single. Woman.
So I would ask, those men defending mankind against the "online onslaught" of female empowerment, even if you, personally, are not the aggressor, how would you feel if your mom told you she was groped on the train by a stranger? How would you feel if your girlfriend was attacked walking to her car one night? How would you feel if your sister was shot and killed at school because some guy was pissed that she didn't want to date him?
Not all men are aggressive and violent toward women. All women have been targets of violence and aggression. Something needs to be done about that second statement.