A powerful post today from Gander of Goose and Gander about men and touching.
Gripping a male bicep, tracing a finger around and down the lines and musculature of the male body, taking a male nipple between my fingers. Well, that’s gay obviously. You’ve crossed the Rubicon there. < /snark > The fact is men aren’t supposed to touch women, either. I don’t dare hug my female co-workers and brushing an arm is cause for worry. A social male-female hug is Kabuki-esque. And children…don’t even pedestrian down that alley. In most of the kink scene the male touch is marked and fraught with significance. “Don’t touch other people’s subs.” “Don’t touch Doms without permission.” “Better yet, stand over there.” This is one reason I enjoy our friends of the puppy-pile orientation. Generally though, women feel liberated to touch each other in the kink scene, but it’s still a bounded terrain for men. I know those protocols are important, especially in a zone where many other prohibitions have been let loose. But is there such thing as the innocent male touch?
Both Gander and I recognize the sources of inhibition and prohibition for men touching anybody. Awareness is so high and transgressions so prevalent that moments for genuinely innocent, non-selfconscious male touch are generally lost by the time they’re recognized.
Here’s the deal though. I had a perhaps classic male response when I read Gander’s words: First step, yes! I’m starved for touch. Next step, “No!” Not touching in others is so ingrained I don’t even miss it. I derailed in the classic next step, that women are so lucky because they can touch whenever they wish… because then I had a perhaps classic figleaf response: Is that really true?
In absolute terms it’s true that, outside of contact with sex partners, the arena in which women are allowed to make contact is a bit larger than the arena in which men may (hands, the arm from shoulder to elbow, and the back between the shoulderblades and down to about where the ribs end if you’re willing to push it a bit.) But also in absolute terms it’s true that the “scarcely any” permitted of women isn’t really an improvement on the “not as much of scarcely any” permitted of men.
What’s your take on it?
Submitted by 943 (not verified) on Fri, 2006-09-22 12:49.
It's a cultural thing. I'm North American but have lived in Latin America for 30 years. Men and women do not/not have the same inhibitions about touching that gringos do. Men give each other big, back slapping hugs down here, and women expect to be kissed when you say hello (which means constant trips to the dry cleaners because you end up with their lipstick and makeup on the lapels and shoulders of your suit jackets). It's interesting when you run into a strange (i.e., new) gringa down here; usually, upon meeting them for the first time, you (a gringo, or for that matter, a Latino) cautiously shake hands, because, well, they're gringas. In the States you could get hit with a sexual harrassment suit or something, and gringas down here are just seen as being more uptight about these things. Same goes for gringos: hugs are seen as having sexual connotation, so gotta be careful there, unless the gringo's been down here for a while, and then it's ok. Gringos/gringas are more into the "bubble" thing (as in, don't invade the invisible bubble that surrounds your body) whereas Latino/as tend to get much more up close and personal when they're talking to you - way, way inside the bubble for North Americans when it comes to casual social conversation...
In short, casual physical contact is treated very, very differently amongst cultures, and that doesn't even get to Asia, where you have non-gay men holding hands when they talk, as an example... T
[Yeah, I understand Americans, and to a lesser extent Canadians, are towards the far end when it comes to casual physical contact. I think we're so worried about making or receiving *unwanted* contact we just play it really, really safe. Thanks, Tambopaxi. --fl]
Submitted by 943 (not verified) on Fri, 2006-09-22 16:00.
It's amazing to me how deeply we internalize those cultural prohibitions, too. Even when we consciously want to challenge them it can be difficult to do so. I'm recalling a time when I was much more physically connected to my friends -- during college and graduate school. We touched each other affectionately, hugging, walking with arms around each other, sitting on the couch at opposite ends, facing each other and with legs intertwined, that kind of thing. A sort of casual-public-cuddling if you will. We were students. And most of us were women. (Position in the social structure does, unfortunately, matter to some degree in these things.)
But now that we are "professionals" we have, most of us, internalized the culture of conservative contact with co-workers and have directed our affectionate contact mostly toward life-partners and our own affectionate physicality has withered.
When I want to challenge that I find it difficult, and not only because of my fear of negative reaction, but also because of the way my very own habits have changed. So yes, it's cultural, and it's habitual, and it's hard to challenge. But challenge it, we should, I think. I know I should, simply because I'm happier when I'm more affectionate with the people I care about, and when I have casual contact with the people I'm friendly toward. In fact, I'm planning to spend a week, soon, with the one college friend who didn't lose her habit of being physically affectionate and I'm really looking forward to that! It'll be like friendly-contact-boot-camp and I hope I can keep some of those habits going upon my return.
[Nicely put, Elizabeth. I think there's also probably something in the not-as-woo-woo-as-it-sounds psychology of body space as one's social stature increases. But as Tambopaxi, above, reminds me, the space around us is defined differently in different cultures. Thanks! --fl]
Submitted by 943 (not verified) on Fri, 2006-09-22 18:34.
Thanks for shout-out, fig. I pretty much agree on all counts. Class, culture, region, all factor in. In professional settings the felt difference for men and women is probably marginal. And qualitatively different, because historically the male touch has been used, shall we say, rather indiscriminately in the workplace and certainly should be treated with sensitivity. In the circles I travel in, it does seem that the somewhat "transgressive" male touch - especially in a man-touching-man situation - sets off sexual alarm bells (for good or ill) more quickly than a more "transgressive" female-female touch might. But then...I live in Texas ;-)
[Actually I think it's that you live anywhere north of the Pecos River. "Girl-girl" touching isn't as frowned on, in part, because it's supposed to be "hott." Although we hear over and over, at least from women who read or write blogs, that "boy-boy" touching is also hot. (And since I maintain the only difference between bloggers and non-bloggers is that we're willing to talk about it...) Hmm. There's way more to say about this -- enough maybe for a whole post -- but I'm so behind in responding to comments I'm going to punt. (Darn it!) Thanks, Gander! --fl]
Submitted by 943 (not verified) on Fri, 2006-09-22 19:57.
That's because females can write it off as being friendly to each other. Guys have no such casualness other than the ocassional punch to the arm, or the rare fierce bear hug.
[I'm going to challenge that a little by pointing out that, sort of by definition, anything that's considered acceptable friendliness is going to be, well, accepted. In other words if it was ok for men to touch more, or women less, we'd probably still say we could write that off as just being friendly. (I hope that makes sense.) Thanks, Freakangel. --fl]
Submitted by 943 (not verified) on Sat, 2006-09-23 07:50.
I had a brief period in college where I was much more touchy-feely, because I saw the people around me doing it. I backed off, especially with men, when I found that I wasn't, after all, in the safe touchy-feely environment I thought I was in. My touches kept getting interpreted sexually. Given that I wanted to have sex with almost no one, and that only if an ongoing relationship could be established, having people interpret intended to be just friendly touches as signs of sexual interest wasn't a good thing.
[For some reason that reminds me of a passage in one of Horkheimer and Adorno's essays on the philosophy of self in society where repeated negative encounters tend to block organisms (including, of course, us) from trying again. I think the answer would be to actually *talk* about it in groups, but since that's generally harder than it seems I'm not about to start knocking people for not wanting to be the first to bring it up. Thank you, Lynn. --fl]
Submitted by 943 (not verified) on Sat, 2006-09-23 10:11.
I also found my touch was misinterpeted all the time so I don't do it nearly as much. My first instinct is still to touch though and it is less likely to be misinterpeted by women than men.
[And there's the chicken/egg factor where men go around starved for touch without even knowning it, and expecting to remain so, and just generally so unused to the idea of non-sexual touch that they make snap judgments about it. A shame, yes, but as with all chicken/egg situations in this case it's hard for anyone to initiate change without being misconstrued one way (for men) or the other (for women.) For the record I'd let you be more physically in contact without imagining you were trying to be sexual. (I'm evidently a total clot when it comes to noticing when people are being *more* than "just good friends" unless they're *totally* obvious about it.) Thanks, Cat. --fl]
Submitted by 943 (not verified) on Sat, 2006-09-23 10:34.
Figleaf,
I think it totally depends on your relationship with another human being and/or your interest level in them.
A stranger can do no more than briefly shake my hand. A man who I think is cute can have his gaze linger on my eyes while he shakes my hand. A friend can hug me with his hips away from mine. A man I am attracted to can hug me with his hips pressed to mine....
And so on and so forth...
As a woman, beyond brief hugs, I don't touch other women.
But with men, well, if you want them -- and they want you -- and it's before you've, er, done the deed, the "innocent" touches of hand on arm, and other little things, are erotic indeed...
Have a good weekend.
Sincerely,
Anne Elizabeth of MakeMyCopCome
[As I just mentioned, unless I'm in total flirt mode I evidently have a very strong tendency to assume "innocent" touches really are innocent. But yeah, once I figure it out it's *very* nice. Thanks. --fl]
Submitted by 943 (not verified) on Sat, 2006-09-23 11:51.
Watching golf's Ryder Cup today. Commentator suggested that the American team should get rid of the fist bump and do like the Europeans, like put there arms around the shoulders of their teams members. American team has lost too many matches and maybe more contact would improve team play.
[Heh. :-) Good point, Five. Team-sports contact can be awfully stylized. Thanks. --fl]
Submitted by 943 (not verified) on Sun, 2006-09-24 06:07.
I went to a very touch-positive college and we had an explicit ideology not to think of touches as being specifically sexual messages. This was wonderful and I miss it.
Nevertheless as a young man it produced a paradoxical effect, which was that it made me less sure what did count as an expression of sexual interest. So I'm not so quick to blame the young men for ruining the touch idyll. Speaking for my long-ago young self, young men need to know when it's safe to make a move, and if we knew better when that was, we'd lay off the overinterpretation of the other touches -- and that would be more relaxing for us too.
[Boy that rings a bell. My high-school church youth group (Unitarian) was extraordinarily touch-centered. (For instance we had a year-long "sensitivity training" class that introduced extraordinary degrees of nonsexual touch. But yeah, when I moved away from my little liberal Southern Appalachian haven it took me another year or two to figure out "mainstream" boundaries about touch, even in the alternative mainstream. Thanks, Humbition. --fl]
Submitted by 943 (not verified) on Sun, 2006-09-24 14:57.
My take is that you and Gander are both completely correct. Men in our society are absolutely starved for male contact, and I think that's part of why male homophobia is so egregious in this culture. My husband comes from a culture in which men routinely hug and kiss each other, and where they frequently walk arm in arm down the street. Interestingly, from my observation though, this is not really considered 'touching', per se, but rather the same as shaking hands is here (re: the hug and cheek kiss upon greeting). In any case, dh is much more healthy about male touching than most American men, and I really love that about him. I've found it makes him a much more physically demonstrative person in general, more open; and also it seems to have completely eliminated any homophobic jackassery on his part, lol. His best friend is Puerto Rican, and is a very touchy guy, in fact the only straight guy that 'I' can love on and kiss (appropriately) without raising any red flags. This guy hugs my husband as exuberantly and intimately (meaning full frontal contact) as he hugs me. I love it. American men are all kinds of fucked up, in a nutshell.
[Unless we're drunk. :-) I remember an allegedly Irish poem an old Irish-American friend used to quote. I can't remember the whole thing but it ended along the lines of "there's no kind of love / like the love of one dead-drunk for another." Not that this helps me since I don't drink but it does indicate where we can get, while remaining absolutely platonic, when we lower our inhibitions. Thanks, Lydia. --fl]
Submitted by 943 (not verified) on Sun, 2006-09-24 17:05.
your first commenter really hit it on the head. after living in the caribbeanfor a while and having to come back to the USA i thought i'd die of touch starvation. in trinidad, men and women touch each other so often and so casually and naturally. fior me it was an easy adjustment to make living htere. i felt as if i'd finally come home to where my soul belonged and part of that was the freedom to touch men or women and their freedom to touch me. when i returned to the USa i foudn a friendship with a kenyan woman who was dying to be touched and i was much more comfortable with the kind of touch she needed (and i needed too!) than the other women around. we often walked arm in arm, or sat with arms aroun deach other, or other ways that made people think we were romantically involved but we were not. we just were two dear friends willing to do what made us comfortable even if it sort of freaked others out.
[And sometimes you just need to find one person. I ought to add that, at least for me, it's usually been *nonsexual* contact that's missing -- sexual contact isn't the same thing. It might just be one person you can be comfortable with. For me I get to have that contact with my children -- when they have an "owie", or they're sleepy, or even just wanting someone to sit close to when there isn't any other shade around on a hot day on the soccer field. Good to know you've found someone in your Kenyan friend. Thanks, Lime. --fl]
Submitted by 943 (not verified) on Sun, 2006-09-24 20:19.
I'm not very touchy myself, but I make a point of touching my kids. My son is almost 8 and he still loves hugs and kisses and sitting on my lap. He tells me he misses me sleeping with him... I can almost always distract him out of an angry mood just by kissing his forehead or gently touching his face.
[Yeah, kids really need it. My son's almost 10 and it's surprising how, when he gets particularly ornery and "daddy I'm bored" my partner or I can grab him and snuggle him for a little bit and then ta-da, he bounces back... to his *usual* ornery self. Which illustrates several principles including: we often don't recognize when we need attention; love might be able to pull you out of a bad mood but it can't always work miracles. :-) Thanks, Swan. --fl]
Submitted by 943 (not verified) on Mon, 2006-09-25 00:05.
The threat of sexual harassment charges has made the workplace the ideal setting for a paranoia worthy of the Salem witch trials. I remember giving one of my staff members a pat on the back (not backside) for a job well done, and immediately thinking, "Oh, I probably shouldn't have done that. What will he think?"
Unfortunately, this caution and vigilance is usually exercised by the innocent. If a predatory superior or coworker feels he or she can get away with it, the sexual touching and groping will continue unabated. In our respective workplaces, both my husband and I had the same unnerving experience of a male supervisor running his hand down the length of one's back (defintely not a "Good job!" gesture). In those situations, the predator is usually counting on the victim's silence, caused by embarassment and/or fear of losing his or her job. In the meantime, everyone else is nervous as hell about standing too close to one another in the elevator.
Excellent topic, Gander and Figleaf.
[Good point about the innocents suffering more than the guilty. (It's like my phobia about being falsely accused. If I'd *really* done it I'd have my alabi straight. If I'm innocent chances are I'll have *no flipping idea* what I was doing on "the night of the 11th!" Gives me the total jimmies.) Oh wait, now that I have a blog chances are I was home posting to it on the night of the 11th and have records to prove it! Ah-ha! Another good reason to blog! Thank you, Kochanie. --fl]
Submitted by 943 (not verified) on Mon, 2006-09-25 12:10.
I grew up in a very tactile family. I don't know why this is so; I don't think my father or mother grew up in such households. But the four of us, we were. I still cuddle up on the couch with mom or dad and kiss my parents on the lips. I still link arms with my dad when we're walking down the street.
I'm very huggy with my friends and am a big fan of cuddling -- in private, of course.
That said, I'm uncomfortable with stranger touches. I've been groped too many times on trains or in clubs.
[Yeah, uninvited touching doesn't fit in the picture at all, at all. Thanks, Camogirl. --fl]
Submitted by 943 (not verified) on Mon, 2006-09-25 16:14.
After I left home for college I faced a rather devastating touchless wasteland. I would get home for a weekend and spend the entire time like a cat trying to be in constant contact with my mum.
I know the non-sexual touch that I'm constantly getting from my boyfriend keeps me happier/more sane in every day life. I think maybe a lot of women are just looking for touch and end up in relationships because it's more socially acceptable here (to be in a sexual relationship with a man than to intentionally seek out friends who are likely to touch the people around them? (i think that's what I was getting at there)). I know my best(girl)friend and I get odd looks on the street if we link arms while we walk, but that people just get all gooey eyed if it's myself and my boyfriend.
Also, I get a little jealous of the boy because he's very close with a bunch of childhood friends and there's a noticably more than average amount of (pleasant) physical contact between them as a group (hugs, sitting close, linking arms... "pleasant" because mock-fighting doesn't really count in my book). Are people who stay in the places that they grew up/near childhood friends/family/etc more likely to touch the people around them (regardless of gender or relationship)?
[First of all I'm glad that your partner can be physical with his friends, though I'm sorry you don't have more people to be physical with as well. Interesting question whether people who grew up together can be more comfortable with it. My intuition says yes although I couldn't back it up. Thanks, Colette. --fl]