bum pinching in night clubs!

She turned down a house party tonight as she said there will be boys and men there and she doesn't want to be around them.
Ignoring the well-covered SA conversation, the above statement is really, really strange. Something other than a bit of bum pinching or knee touching must have happened. I may have missed it, but has she had any therapy or similar? Men really aren't that scary.

I went out clubbing in the nineties, I had my boobs grabbed, hands shoved between my legs. Men grinding against me and so did my friends. This was from age 14 onwards. Looking back I have no clue why we accepted but it was normalised at the time.

I'm glad women are calling men out on this behaviour, women should be able to go to a nightclub and dance without being sexually assaulted.

Whoever said this was normal and acceptable when they were young is talking utter rubbish. Or is a bloke wishful thinking. I'm almost retirement age, and I assure you we never rewarded being touch up with a "snog and a dance". Blokes who did that were sleazy twats, and any of the few women who liked it were of the non thinking variety.

When did you grow up, OP? Your attitudes seem very 70s.

I was a pretty young woman in the 80s and 90s and constantly received unwanted attention, including bum pinching. It was bloody awful then and it’s bloody awful now. Worse, in fact, because young men should know better now.

Your OP reads like you think your daughter is somehow lacking. She isn’t. You probably are.

Unbelievably this has happened to me 3 times quite recently as a middle aged married woman by middle aged men I know really well. One a step cousin at a wake, one an ex fling at a uni reunion and he also pussy grabbed me and my friends husband at a party when I hugged them both. Each time I was so shocked I didn’t say anything and still haven’t apart from to some friends who didn’t really say anything, I kind of felt like I was making it up.

Because they could get smacked twice as hard back. Men are scarily violent now, incel and Andrew Tate culture is telling men that punching women is “equality”, annd that they’re entitled to what they want with whatever woman they want and if they don’t get it she’s a bitch. there’s a new wave of misogyny that is terrifying.

Why wouldn't you advise them doing what you did?

Yes it’s assault. Used to happen to me all the time as a student. I got to the point where I’d smack their face if they pinched my bum. The amount who unironically shouted “You’ve assaulted me” was staggering. I wouldn’t advise this these days BTW, the world is more dangerous. But I certainly wouldn’t have let it stop me doing something I enjoyed. That’s how they win

I think it’s brilliant that they refuse to tolerate it. When I started going out clubbing it happened all the time and even though we shrugged it off it was still uncomfortable. Makes me angry now that those men thought they had the right to do that. But that’s because we allowed it. I hope attitudes like your daughter’s are the turning point for this behaviour.

I think it's good that they are calling men out on this. It is assault .
When I was young it was awful in some clubs. I recall getting my bum pinched and once or twice men putting there hands round to try to reach further 😳 it's frightening to think it was more accepted 20 or 30 years ago.

Same with my DD19 experience. Puts her off going to clubs etc which is so unfair on her and her friends. Who wants to be mauled by some bloke who thinks he's entitled to grope women just because he wants to?

Sounds like she’s copped on early that a lot of men are utterly shit and grim.

She doesn’t have to have a boyfriend, and wanting a female only dorm at uni is perfectly valid.

All uni hall rooms have locks and security at night, please reassure her. You need to see things in a different light and be happy she's being so picky and standing for her rights, so many young girls and women end up in abusive relationships. I was one of them, I'm glad there is so much more education on consent and control.

I’m guessing the police response and clubs will be then she shouldn’t of gone 🤷‍♀️

Im guessing there will be cctv, but surely a police investigation into a bum pinch is a complete waste of police resources. There will be absolutely no conviction. Rapists, groomers and abusers get let of so a bum pinch….

No, because a 19-year-old is an adult and any decision to involve the police would be made by her, not by her parents. You don't seem to have much sense of your daughter as a person in her own right.

In my opinion I wouldn't call it sexual assault and neither do most people i have spoken to in IRL

Would you still feel that it wasn’t sexual assault if someone groped your daughter in a train station or in Tesco?

Oh fgs. Where did she say she was ok with it?

DD = dear daughter

Very sorry. Could someone tell me what DD means?

How is an OP being okay with her daughter being SAed/SHed? That's disgusting.

Have to admit, when DS told his uni friends about the girl who slapped his bum, they all laughed and said he should have enjoyed it

Where the fuck did you get that I think we are male property to be groped? You daft muppet.

Rather than worrying about giving her a "balanced perspective" perhaps support your daughter in calling out inappropriate behaviour and stop normalising what is sexual harrassment/assault. Spend your time worrying why young men think this behaviour is acceptable. It is not.

Just because it was once club culture or whatever doesn't make it right. At least your daughter and her friends sound clued up on what is acceptable, huge respect to them. Sounds like they won't fall for the type of men who see women as sexual objects to use as they wish. Good for them!

When I used to go to underage club nights it was definitely a game, for teenage boys to pinch girls bums and to 'get off' with as many boys as possible . We saw it as fun then.
I think attitudes have changed and I think it's wildly inappropriate in todays world.
If it's not fun for your daughter and her friends then it's not fun, they shouldn't have to lighten up. Unwanted physical contact isn't ok, especially not sexualised touching.

So this is sexual assault - there are degrees of SA, and this is on the more 'minor' end (the most serious being rape), but that doesn't mean it's still not horrible and something that will linger in her mind.

Legally, SA is defined as unwanted touching of a body part in a deliberate and sexualised way. We can see that pinching someone's bum in a club fulfils all these categories.

• unwanted - the perpetrators never ask, so how would they know if it's wanted or not? The victim can't say 'no', because the perpetrator never gives them a chance to say, 'yes'.
• Deliberate - if someone just brushed past your daughter and accidentally brushed her bum with their hand, this would be 'unwanted' but not assault, as it wouldn't have been a deliberate act. In contrast, someone pinching/grabbing her bum WOULD be assault, because there is the deliberate intention to grab her sexually.

I totally understand how bum grabbing can feel like a minor thing, and how her reaction can feel like an overreaction. Bum grabbing/slapping can be totally ok and cool in some contexts - for example, one of my friends regularly slaps my butt as a joke, which I find funny. In this context, it can be hard to understand how an act which feels fine when done by one person could feel so sickening and violating when done by another. I find it helpful therefore not just to think of sexual assault as an action, but as a DYNAMIC. The people pinching girl's bottoms in nightclubs are generally unknown to the women. Their intention isn't benevolent - it's at best a lack of understanding about the rules of consent, and at worst a deliberate enjoyment of female sexual humiliation, and of overriding someone's boundaries. It's dark in the club, so it's hard to see the perpetrator, so it feels confusing and stressful. Loud music is playing, there are lots of people: it feels like you are being hunted.