You Don’t Know Me Like That
I am an American living in Costa Rica and my Spanish skills are best described as “emerging”. One day in the supermarket, I had my usual lively exchange with the butcher, in Spanglish-centered charades, and then moved on to another aisle of the supermarket.
Then a man came up behind me and said:
“I like girls with big tits who don’t wear a bra.”
Now, for those of you who don’t know me, I happen to be a girl with big tits who almost never wears a bra (honestly, the only exception is yoga and that is only because down dog without a bra could very well suffocate me). So, this sentence, delivered in English, was clearly directed at me.
This was not OK for me.
Luckily, my natural defense mechanisms include incredible volume and giving zero fucks, so I turned and looked him in the eye, asking: “Who the fuck do you think you are, you disgusting pig?” (Deep apologies to actual pigs, who are noble creatures, as well as being delicious, and do not deserve to be dragged into this mess). He quickly left the store and I followed him to the front door, berating him the whole time. I went back to my cart and my day with only a modicum of staring from locals who did not know quite what to make of the exchange.
At dinner that night, I told the story to my family. My 15-year-old daughter gave the appropriate response of “Oh hell no!” after hearing what this stranger said to me, but my husband/editor was confused (Full disclosure: My husband/editor is also someone who likes girls with big tits who do not wear bras.) and my husband/editor said “He was just saying what is true for him.”
Before we go full #metoo on my husband/editor, a little background. My husband/editor is on the autistic spectrum and to him, telling the truth is never the wrong thing to do. He did not understand why I would object to something that was so clearly a simple statement of fact.
Bless his heart, but the man is clueless.
My spectrum husband/editor sometimes just needs a quick tutorial on how humans act, and to his credit he is a pretty quick study. But that did not stop my daughter and I from rolling our eyes wide and slow at each other when he came to the defense of the pig in the supermarket (again, apologies to all yummy pigs). I had to explain why this was not ok and it is not as easy as it sounds when you need to start from zero.
So, I did the best I could.
“It was not ok with me because he is a stranger to me and he was taking liberties that are normally reserved for our most intimate relationships. When he places his need to express his views about my body above my privacy and dignity, he is implying that he has more power than I do. He is making me his domain. He is peeing on me in the middle of a supermarket when I am not asking for any exchange with him at all. If you say that to me, it has a completely different context and power dynamic, but when he says it to me it feels like an aggressive act of dominance and I did not invite it.”
“Ahhhhhhhhh……” said my husband/editor. He was starting to clue in.
“Yes!” my daughter added.
“Do you get it?” I asked.
“Yes, and now I feel somewhat like a giant ass. You’re right – it wasn’t right for him to say that. I am so glad you handled it in a way that declared your boundaries and felt powerful for you.”
So, yes. Sometimes even the most well-intentioned among us need a little help slipping on the shoes of another person. Sometimes we don’t understand why another person is offended, because if we were in their position, we would not be. But, Autism aside, how would my husband have perspective on this before I shared with him mine? He is a 6’4” white, cisgendered, straight man – he has no experience with people trying to show dominance over him. I could have gone off on his ignorance and equated it to malicious intent or stupidity – but why would I do that? It took me less than a minute to share how it felt for me and broaden his perspective. And in doing so, he totally understood the problem.
Just like it was not OK for supermarket pig to engage intimately with me and presume compliance because he is a stranger who simply does not know me like that, it is equally ill-advised to presume another person’s uninformed view is designed to be offensive.
Ignorant, perhaps, but offensive seems a judgement best reserved for those with ill intent.
Maybe we should all give each other the benefit of the doubt because unless you have clearly shared your perspectives, you simply don’t know another person like that.
