Discussion: Flores: Biden Encounter Was A Personal Space Issue, Not Sexual Harassment

If she told Biden to back off and he didn’t, he’s got a problem. Other than that, I don’t see much there.

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And she believes it is responsible to try to derail Biden’s presidential run over a personal space issue? She’s triggered? The media covers this?

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The earlier Biden/Flores thred had a good point: has Joe listened and learned?

A reporter could actually, you know, REPORT a timeline. We have lots of pics of Joe touching, align with #metoo and with public comments made about Joe specifically. Any changes in his behavior at those inflection points?

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Ok, this is getting stupid. What next? “he was undressing me with his eyes”…

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Me too.

I am disturbed that we are putting serious stuff in with the sort of things that people really should tolerate if they expect to share the planet with other humans. It makes us look like delicate flowers who can not be far from the fainting couch.

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He’s a touch feely guy. I’m not a fan of those types, but when it bothers me I just ask them to stop. I don’t call the newspapers. This is ridiculous.

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I guess it’s cheaper than seeing a shrink.

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It never happened.

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Yo…watch that ‘personal space.’ Oh, it’s Bernie? Nevermind.

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This is kind of like being served leftovers.
I believe we spent most of yesterday exhausting this subject.
Nothing new to add. Ya know TPM, y’all could’ve posted Stephanie Carter’s response to everyone misinterpreting her Biden photo instead.
I want Biden to go away for other reasons, not this nothingburger. I believe we have some great female candidates this year. Anyone of them would be preferable over Biden,

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Of course they do so, gossip about Dems is a thing they can never pass up. It’s dog-bites-man with a Republican.

I am glad she ‘downgraded’ her remarks to space, but then she ramps up with ‘triggering’ which should only be used with trauma. So, I don’t like Joe’s behavior if he is still doing it, but I don’t think much of her either.

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Nevada is one of the early primary/caucus states and she obviously supports someone other than Joe Biden.

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Some of us need to actually have standards. You’d all be duly outraged, I have zero doubt, if a Republican was going around doing this. You can’t just slide up to women and kiss them and put your hands on them, for God’s sake, that goes without saying. I’m sorry but you’re giving him a huge pass on something he should damn well know he’s been lucky to have gotten away with for so long. And if you think he’s our only hope, take a longer look at the team we’ve got out on the field. He never did a damn thing in a presidential race without a running mate named Obama. And this isn’t the Republicans ambushing him, and it isn’t “eating our own.” He does this to himself and he seems to have a problem.

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Ooops! There it is.

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Biden seems to have a fetish for burying his nose in women or girl’s hair to smell their scalps.

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I hope Biden learns from it going forward. Calling it “Biden being Biden” will not suffice, and it never should have sufficed in the past either.

Intentions are not the only factor in determining whether someone has been violated and cannot be used to excuse inappropriate behavior. The way an event is experienced by the recipient of a gesture, touch, etc., is important. Invasion of personal space is not a sexual issue, per se, but it is often a dominance-power issue. Women experience these interactions on a regular basis, and it should not be our responsibility to discern what men’s intentions are. Men must take responsibility for recognizing that they don’t have the right to invade personal space, or make any other gesture, such as a kiss on the head, of a woman, without explicit permission to do so.

Would Biden have smelled a man’s hair and kissed him on the head in a similar situation? If not, why not? Because it would have been perceived as either sexual (even if vaguely), or demeaning of the other man, a means of emasculating or belittling him? If the latter, then it’s a dominance move. If Biden wants to survive the primaries, let alone be president, he just has to stop. Now.

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Mike Pence was lobbed a ton of grief and snark over his reveal he preferred not to be alone with a woman other than his wife. Yeah, he’s a prude, and Evangelical, and that’s a bit in the extreme. But on some level he has a point. Just as the only 100% safe way to avoid pregnancy is to abstain from sex, the sure fire method to avoid charges of sexual harrassment or “invading my personal space” is to have witnesses around, or forego the opposite sex altogether as to small or private meetings. A man could simply shake a peer’s hand, in view of others, and later on be accused of secretly tickling her palm in a sexually suggestives way during the shake. Women don’t make these accusation lightly, and I’m sure the false accusation rate is exceedingly low, but lies do get told, and it only takes one to destroy a political career, a business or teaching career, or a marriage. And it’s a very good thing women feel empowered enough to come out with these incidents and expose the creeps out there. But if I was a man with a lot on the line, and had the means to do so, I’d have an aide escort me everywhere, and maintain 3 feet between me and all other women at all times. Otherwise the simplest physical gesture may get turned into a harrassment charge.

“He touched my shoulder, and left his hand there waaaay too long, like for a few seconds!!! Ewww!!”

“He looked at me with his eyes a certain way, and I KNOW he was undressing me, I’ve seen that look before!!”

“He glanced away from my face as we spoke, looking downward briefly to my chest, and I know ***HE WAS OGLING MY BREASTS!!***”

Maybe there is no way to interact with the other sex safely. We’ve all heard that despite all the protections afforded a President if someone was really determined to kill him/her they could probably do it. I suppose if a person has it out for someone the same could be said of ruining them with accusations of sexual impropriety. If they want to do it they will, and you’re powerless to stop it, or even unable to plausibly deny it in the face of zero supporting evidence on the accuser’s part. Once it’s out there you’re screwed.

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There were witnesses. It didn’t happen.

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This is a big deal. If he did what she says–and I have no reason to think she would lie–then what he did was a form of power game. Intimidation. Men can feel uncomfortable when someone gets too close without a good reason. Think about, “He was in my face.” What does that mean? It means that your space was invaded. And when men do that to women it is, in general, more serious, because women are smaller on average than men, and face many instances of men attempting to intimidate them, and are still socialized to think of themselves as less powerful than men.

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