Sue Lani Madsen: Bring back the slap

The conversation on sexual harassment has been stifled since 1998, when the leader of the National Organization for Women defended a man in executive position who took advantage of women under his authority. Gloria Steinem’s loyal response to then-President Bill Clinton’s predatory behavior set a precedent for the next two decades.

Now more reports are coming out. And while partisan snipers trade predictable shots over who did it first, who did it worst, and who should resign, we do have a consensus.

Groping, grabbing or otherwise touching someone who does not want to be touched is wrong. This should be something we all learned in kindergarten. Apparently not everyone did.

A generation ago, there was a widespread and obviously unofficial elementary school event called “flip up Friday.” Boys would run around and flip up the hems of girls’ dresses. Some mothers advised their daughters, “just don’t wear a dress on Friday.” It avoids the problem but inadvertently teaches girls the boys’ bad behavior is their fault.

Paula Gardner, now living in Grand Coulee, told the principal she had instructed her kindergarten daughter “to turn around and smack any little boy who flipped up the hem of her dress. The principal just said little boys will be boys, so I asked him if his intent was to teach girls to let boys do whatever the heck they wanted and girls should just take it.”

Gardner said the school never did get serious about putting an end to “flip up Friday.”

So what happens these days if a boy is being grabby at school and a girl smacks him upside the head? Who gets in trouble?

Everyone in the state of Washington has a right to use force in self defense. Not just self defense in response to a violent physical assault, but also in preventing “an offense against his or her person … or other malicious interference with real or personal property” as long as “the force is not more than is necessary.”

Respecting personal space and safety at school are the focus of typical school district anti-harassment and anti-bullying policies.

“We try to give students the tools they need to communicate effectively with appropriate responses, and we start in kindergarten,” said Kevin Morrison, Director of Communications and Community Relations for Spokane Public Schools.

Presented with a couple of hypothetical cases, Morrison was reluctant to make a ruling on who would get in the most trouble.

“It’s complicated and it’s not getting simpler. Everything is built on context.”

He agreed the principal in the case of Gardner’s daughter abdicated his leadership role by not interceding. Boys will be boys as long as men are not men.

According to John O’Brien of the Spokane Police Department, the standard for self-defense is determining whether “the use of force was reasonable given the totality of the circumstances.”

Morrison agreed teachers and administrators in each specific situation absolutely must exercise judgment regarding the reasonableness of the force used by a victim versus a perpetrator.

But let’s not call these girls victims. Call them defenders, strong and admirable girls exercising their right of self-defense.

Many school districts duck like the abdicating principal and treat disputes between attacker and defender as neutral, disciplining the defender. It may keep the physical peace but it rewards victimhood without teaching the full range of self-defense responses and what reasonableness means. The lesson is somebody else has to defend you. It’s the opposite of empowering.

On the political playground in Olympia, grown men have been caught acting like kindergartners. Women don’t have to take it. It’s time to bring back the open-handed slap as a socially acceptable reaction to unwanted physical touch.

A political insider who lost his leadership position over a sexual indiscretion with a colleague says he wishes he’d been slapped.

“Not taking no for an answer is wrong, no excuses for that. But there has to be a no. If someone is doing something the other person doesn’t like, stop them. Mark them. Use the slap. It will be enough of a shock to stop bad things from happening.”

Women who are empowered to defend themselves are not victims. A slap may not be reasonable in context, but physical self-confidence reinforces the confidence it takes to speak up. No more stifled conversation.