I don’t know how many female readers I have out there, but I feel the need to address a topic that I am hoping some of the women out there can help me out with.

After suffering a brutal personal attack at the hands of a very righteous and holier-than-thou individual regarding my take on boy/girl physical contact (as posted earlier here), I got to thinking… Am I the righteous one who’s thinking is off, or am I right to think that women (girls) aren’t quite as fragile as this guy claims?

The truth of the matter is that my thinking isn’t black and white when it comes to things like this. When it comes to this topic, I have been accused by several parties as advocating that violence against women is acceptable, that rape is acceptable and that I apparently  feel that women are just pieces of meat for me to use sexually. That is black and white thinking, and interestingly enough the only people who have attacked me are men. Of course, none of those accusations are in the least bit true.

When I say black and white thinking, I am referring to the fact that people like this don’t believe in a spectrum of behavior. To them, there is no difference between playful childhood banter between boys and girls and sexual violence against women at the hands of men. To them, any physical contact is a violation of a woman’s physical, emotional and spiritual being. In fact, one of these guys actually inferred that it is violating a girl’s future husband and sanctity of marriage. An interesting albeit arcane take on the whole thing if you ask me.

On the other hand, my opinion is slightly less black and white. When it comes to behavior, I look at motive and intent. Is playful physical contact between a boy and a girl malicious in intent?  Was it intended to intimidate, coerce, humiliate or otherwise degrade the girl? Of course not. However, if the intent were there it would be a completely different story. But that’s what makes behavior a spectrum instead of an all-or-none issue. Allowing kids to be kids and have their fun does not teach them that it is acceptable to grow up and beat their wives or rape women. Again though, that’s the problem with the black and white mentality. It allows for an all too easy connection to be made between childhood play and rape. It oversimplifies something that is far more complicated than that.

But I guess that brings me around to my point though. Is my politically incorrect view actually wrong? Are people like me quickly becoming dinosaurs that are being left behind by a world obsessed with polarizing views and opinions? Is physical contact of any kind between the sexes bad unless it’s done behind the sanctity of marriage?

I don’t know, it just doesn’t make sense to me. Before now playful physical banter between boys and girls was commonplace and acceptable. It is something that has been going on for a very long time, and despite our apparent “victimization” almost all of us grew up to lead normal and healthy lives,  build loving and healthy relationships with members of the opposite sex and lead pretty normal lives. To take the actions of a few bad seeds out there and blanket-apply them to the human race as a whole seems a bit absurd. After all, I would like to think that we are better than that. We are, for most intents and purposes, decent people capable of dealing with physical contact without breaking down into sexual predators.

What I have been inundated with is that physical contact degrades women and turns them into sexual objects. I have been called an animal and have been accused of some pretty horrible things as the result of my dissenting opinion regarding the “no touching” mentality. So now I turn to everybody else out there. Is it wrong and degrading for kids to engage in playful physical banter so long as they’re not doing it against the desires of the other person? Does a playful butt swat violate a girl to the extent of harming the sanctity of her future marriage and husband?

You know my take on it… But maybe I’m just a dinosaur - a dying breed of people who once thought it was ok to have fun and enjoy the company of the opposite sex. Somebody who still believes that there is a line that differentiates fun and play from maliciousness. Anything is possible I guess, I just hope I’m wrong.