I do feel a little weird about the "patting on the rear" thing. Not that George Bush should be doing it to anyone other than possibly Barbara!! But there are times and places where that sort of thing is culturally accepted without asking for and receiving consent (...granted, I'm mostly thinking of sports dudes patting each others' asses, and of gay men and I smacking each others' asses, and pretty much never "dude patting woman's rear who he doesn't know or has any power over"?)

It's entirely possible that I have smacked someone's ass who didn't want me to? But I have both smacked and been smacked as a greeting/gotcha/whatever this past weekend at my dance convention, and I can't think of any that bothered me on the receiving end. But again....gay men. Friends. Social activity that also involves a lot of touching. Clearly not the same as President Bush.

It really is one of those things that is hard to clearly define, except that you really should know when it is okay and when it is not! Just like sometimes a "Hey, baby" generates a smile and sometimes it makes your skin crawl.

But there are times and places where that sort of thing is culturally accepted without asking for and receiving consent

I know, I know. I'm just so tired of seeing yet another story. It depresses the fuck out of me how much women have to put up with on a daily basis.

Also, I'm insulted by his stupid joke.

"We all circled around him and Barbara for a photo, and I was right next to him," Grolnick told the website. "He reached his right hand around to my behind, and as we smiled for the photo he asked the group, 'Do you want to know who my favorite magician is?' As I felt his hand dig into my flesh, he said, 'David Cop-a-Feel!' "

That joke personally offends the concept of humor.

Gross! Old perv.

Guys--I did not figure out until JUST NOW that the conservative speechwriter Mark Halperin is not the same as the novelist (and author of one of my favorite books) Mark Helprin, who is also a conservative. I fail at politics.

I know, I know. I'm just so tired of seeing yet another story. It depresses the fuck out of me how much women have to put up with on a daily basis.

Oh, not directed at any of you. Just more "dang, this makes me uncomfortable and I need to process why and try to figure out if I'm a horrible person". I've known people who are suuuuuper serious about consent--even things that in our society are considered normal (i.e., tap on the shoulder to get someone's attention) they would be upset about. And I can see their point (especially if it's someone you don't want touching you at all, be that a coworker or a creepy stranger). On the other hand...there is so much that we do that is sort of...assumed to be consent? And maybe that means as an individual and as a society we should rethink that (instead of tapping on shoulder, saying "hey hey you"? waving a hand in their face?). I know that while I wouldn't, say, touch someone's hair, I have gotten rebuked once for complimenting a piece of clothing and reaching out to touch it! And she was right, I shouldn't have. So it's the whole 'acknowledging I"m part of the problem even as I recoil against feeling like some people are too picky about this, but wait that's what dudes who think groping a boob in an elevator is NBD so definitely I'm part of the problem and need to fix myself" etc etc etc.

I totally thought those two were the same guy!

Yeah, meara, that's hard.I'm a pretty touchy-feely person and with some people that's fine and with other's it isn't and I think I usually distinguish correctly, but maybe not?

I totally had a "do we hug or are we too manly" moment with the Senior Director of my old department on Tuesday - [spoiler alert, we hugged], that's always kind of hard to navigate with coworkers. She did not pat my behind, though, that would have been startling.

I'm sort of heartened by the idea that maybe as a culture we are moving away from thinking "dirty old man" is a cute thing?

Because I totally get the GHWB thing (he's in a wheelchair, other people are standing for a posed photo, that's where his hand goes), and would probably have laughed it off myself, and that is NOT RIGHT.

Wait, this was a recent thing? I assumed the accounts about Bush Sr. were coming from back when such things were more accepted. (I mean, he's been an adult since WWII era.)