Letter: A story far too familiar

Thanks so much to Andrea Doray for her frank opinion piece “Unpresidential audio stirs memories” on men assaulting women. It has happened to nearly all of us, and it must stop right now. Fortunately it’s out in the open now and can be addressed.

I was an innocent 16, on a bus to a Quaker work camp, and a man sat next to me and to my shock soon I felt a touch on my upper thigh. I couldn’t move away and didn’t know what to do. Finally I said “I’m ashamed a human being could act like you!” and he moved away and I cried the rest of the way. Another time I was in “standing room” at the NY Metropolitan Opera – I finally realized it wasn’t “that” crowded when the man behind me started moving up and down against me – unfortunately I’d taken off my sharp high heels.

Our mothers didn’t prepare us; they said, “Just ignore it” – Bad advice because these creeps take that as assent. A pervert accosted a group of 12-year-old girls in Laramie near our home – “Wanna see my ‘baby’?” – my daughter ran home, and the police were arresting him while I was still on the phone. In the 1900s my grandmother had to carry a hat pin on the subway. Parents: Prepare your daughters, teach your sons. “We are mad as hell and we aren’t going to take it any more.” Time for women and girls to be nasty, not nice.

Judy Denison,

Golden

 

 

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