Thread by @margosteines

today at brunch an older man put his hands on my daughter. we were having eggs at an outdoor cafe and he approached our table and started making weird faces at her from a few feet away.

I didn’t like the vibe, but it was a public space, and I get that ppl love to make faces at little kids and up to a point, okay. She wasn’t comfortable, and I didn’t know what to say, and then he leaned in and touched her neck/shoulder/chest.

I said DONT TOUCH MY KID and he didn’t pull away or stop and then I YELLED. I yelled TAKE YOUR HANDS OFF MY CHILD and everyone turned to stare and only then did he step back. Then he lingered around our table for a while.

My daughter was okay—I explained to her that sometimes people won’t respect our body boundaries and that’s when we use our strong voice, and that I will always use my strong voice for her, and it’s okay for her to use hers too.

I was MORTIFIED tbh. I felt so shook up but also hugely ashamed, like I had done something wrong or misread or overreacted. I wanted to leave but I made myself stay and we finished our food and when I got my daughter packed up to leave and was rolling the stroller out,

the younger woman sitting closest to us said to me, “You handled that really well.”

I was SO grateful to be seen like that, and to know that it is the 40 yrs of cultural conditioning that my body is community property that I have received that makes it feel anything short of correct to tell someone to get their hands off me, off my daughter, off all of us.

I was raised to be polite and accept an uncomfortable hug and to never make a man feel bad about himself. It took a long time to see and reject all of that, and bodily autonomy still feels hard won. I will NEVER show my daughter that someone can touch her without asking,

that we have to accommodate every boundaryless old man who has never stopped to think about why he feels entitled to put his hands on people.

I feel proud of myself but also so weighed down by the project of it all, by how many years I didn’t have a strong voice, and by how hard my kid will have to fight to keep herself whole in this world.