Back to the OP I find more and more reasons to love Target. Monday NPR ran a story about how Target caught some bad P.R. becuse they chose not to allow solicitors including Salvation Army in front of their stores. The store with the blue vest greeters took advantage of that and made a big deal of their contributions. What many people don’t know is that Target funds many things no one hears about. In their home city they fully fund the salary and budget for two police detectives to investigate unsolved murders. Not glamourous front page stuff but they’re being good corporate citizens IMO.
Today the local Target donated $4000 worth of blankets…to the Salvation Army.
Target has caught a lot of heat for not letting the SA ring the bells. Now I support the SA, their work is marvelous.
But dang, the bells drive me nuts when I havee to listen to them. I can’t put something in everytime I pass them, but I end up feeling guilty about it. I once worked as a grocery clerk, and right outside the door was the bell ringer. Listening to the ting ting ting for six hours is enough to make you lose your mind
My all time favorite response to this sort of predator is to grab his hand, hold it over my head and yell “does any one know who this belongs to? I just found it on my butt.”
There is a word for a person who hit-and-run fondles others in public, but I cannot remember what that word is!
All you people calling out for arrests, pepper-spray, and general ass-kicking scare the hell out of me. God forbid somebody brush past you in the electronics section of Target at christmas.
–EJ, protective father of a 12-year-old daughter.
from the OP…
I’d hardly call this ‘brushing past’, and I don’t see why the girl would lie.
My replies have been motivated by the belief that this wasn’t an innocenc ‘brush past’.
If most people are like me they will find or wait for a way past that avoids intimate physical contact with people, especially young girls.
As was my quoted bit. From the OP that is. The part where ivylass said (paraphrasing here) “y’know, it could have been accidental.” Followed by 20ish posts of how some random dude needs to be pepper sprayed, arrested, murdered, etc etc.
Let’s look at that again:
Where is anyone accusing her of lying??
And sometimes you turn around and some is where you didn’t expect them to be. Especially if the store is crowded, as stores tend to be this time of year. The string-him-up mentality scares me.
Look, I’ve got a freshly turned 13 year old daughter. She and I are very physically affectionate- fine and good, she needs to always know there are men who will be caring and gentle and physical with her. When her girlfriends are around, I don’t touch her at all. Not all girls live that closeness at home, and I’d rather they feel at least moderately comfortable in my home, and around myself, than not.
Now, as to public contact? I gotta tell ya, touching a shoulder is totally unacceptable. Unless I saw a young woman, or woman of any age at all in physical danger and unaware, I would never ever touch them. Not shoulder, arm, nothing. It is out of line now, to me it has always been out of line. If I hold a door for a woman, ( and, please…don’t start with the flaming. I hold doors. Open another thread if that’s not okay by you ) , sometimes she’ll touch my arm as she walks by and says " Thank you ". That’s fine. But I would never touch a stranger. I’d be hard pressed to touch a guy who was a stranger, and I’m an incredibly physical person with men and women I know. Hugs, smooches on the cheek ( for guys and gals !).
It is just beyond acceptable to me to touch a stranger like that unless called upon to do so. As an E.M.T., I had my hands almost all over quite a few patients. One does so professionally and with detached and clinincal care and utmost respect. And even so, when handling a female over the age of about 5 I was incredibly aware of their sense of privacy, moreso than most patients. That may be unfair to male patients, but that’s also another thread.
In a store? As a civillian? No way.
Cartooniverse
Maybe it was a simple ‘brush against’ situation, but the girl’s own words suggest that is not what happened. Her words suggest this was a very deliberate act of perversion. I did not imply she was lying, nor that anyone is accusing her of lying. I actually suggested she was probably predicting the truth accurately.
I advocate peper spray, tazer, laser eye ‘treatment’ only in situations where the intent to harm is obvious.
You know what? To tell you the truth, people at my former place of work were starting stupid rumors that I was the type of person that was likely to come in and torch the place. Which isn’t frustrating due to having a grain of truth to it, it doesn’t but frustrating cause it makes me .
Where am I going with this? Well, I’m not a big guy, but if I were confronted with this and a young acquaintance of mine were to actually find the guy who she thought did this, my facial expression would be :eek: ---- :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: . If I scare the people at work :rolleyes: , imagine what I could do if I were actually enraged. Might not even need to get physical to have an effect.
For further clarification, I did speak at length with my daughter.
She was looking at the Gameboy SP games, when this guy came up next to her. He was whistling. While he was whistling, he reached out and patted her on the bottom. He then switched to singing and moved on down the aisle.
So, it was deliberate.
I’m pretty sure it’s called “frotism”, but I’m at work and I don’t dare Google it. Shudders*
Found it. I was close.
frotteurism
As someone who totally hates the bell-ringing, nobody was happier than me when Target announced this. And nobody is more proud of all the charitable contributions they make. There is no reason to feel obligated to allow some annoying bell ringers in front of the store when there are a thousand other ways to help the needy at this time of year and throughout the rest of the year. MHO: The Salvation Army needs to look at its methodology. Many times I’ve been tempted to pay the bellringer $20 just to stop ringing while I’m walking to and from the store.
So, put me down in the “This guy needs to be arrested & generally have his ass kicked” column.
Thanks for the clarification.
This sort of thing worries me no end. My own daughter is almost 15, and she is quietly lovely (not into makeup or flashy clothes) and rather, er, well-developed. I’ve noticed adult men noticing her - never caught anyone actually leering, but she’s starting to attract rather a lot of male attention. Because she IS so young, and because she looks womanly, I worry about both child molesters AND plain ol’ ordinary guys who won’t realize she’s just a kid. It’s terribly hard to be protective enough without going completely overboard, so I just worry constantly. I have no idea what I’d do in your situation, ivylass, although I suspect I would over-react horribly. I think you’re handling this very reasonably.
Well, I don’t want to scare her unneccesarily. I mean, what happened was disconcerting, but I don’t think it’s going to scar her for life. At this point, all we can do is wait and see if Target security finds anything on the tapes.
**Absolutely right. **
Happened to me when I was 11 (early 80s). Pinched on the butt at a toy store. I remember it but it didn’t scar me. My mother’s reaction - yup, there are perverts out there, let me tell you about the guy came up to me in his car and flashed me. She didn’t terrify me, she didn’t tell me to stay in the “yellow zone.” Just the facts.
Because the facts are that this will happen again, but that doesn’t mean the world is crawling with pedophile predators who are about to abduct rape and kill her at any time. Seriously when I went to Paris 3 years later this was like a continual barrage. Whistles, pats, comments. (What the hell is wrong with that city?) It’s an annoyance. Sometimes an extremely creepy annoyance. But it’s not the end of the world.
My nephew was in Wal-mart and some guy attempted to fondle him. He found his mother and told her and they found the guy in the toy aisle approaching an even younger child. The guy was mentally challenged. He was an adult, and when confronted started crying and saying “please don’t tell my mama, please don’t tell my mama”. He may’ve been mentally handicapped, but he knew what he was doing was wrong. Wal-mart called the cops and he was apprehended, but the cops just gave him a warning and let him go. My sister was understandably furious.
You have to be careful with your children. Not everyone is a predator, but there are enough of them out there that you can’t let your guard down.
StG
What?! How do you get someone’s attention when you want to tell them that their glove has fallen out of their pocket, and “Excuse me, ma’am” has failed?