I think they are referring to Facebook comments.
Could be, but I haven’t seen any Facebook posts saying that either.
Oh, there were some…and I think even a few on here. (but I’m not going back to verify).
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I’ve definitely seen some of it. It’s gross.
I work in finance and today we had our sexual harassment training. I live in Los Angeles, I am literally a couple miles from where the worst of Harvey Weinstein’s transgressions occurred.
The teacher brought up a real case where a female officer working for the CA Sheriff sued for harassment. She said the sheriff had hugged her over 100 times over the ten years she had been there. The teacher asked if that met the legal standard of harassment and one of the guys raised his hand and said come on, that’s like one hug a month and why didn’t she say something sooner.
In that moment, I realized how far we are going to have to come as a nation if this is being said, in a sexual harassment course, in “woke” southern California. People are just not getting it. And by people, I mostly mean men.
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It would have been great if the teacher had turned it around and asked that guy how many hugs it would have taken to make him uncomfortable, if the roles had been reversed? What would be his monthly quota for being hugged by a girl when it was unwelcome? Or being hugged by a guy, for that matter?
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In a business setting, best practices include the idea that you don’t go around gratuitously touching your subordinates. However, in my mind whether hugging once a month constitutes sexual harassment would depend on the context. Is the sheriff hugging lots of subordinates, male and female? Just females? Just her?
Is there verbal flirting and other forms of non-business related attention directed at her?
Yes, best practice is a no-touch policy. But not all hugs are sexual in nature.
And I have some sympathy with the thought that instead of gritting her teeth for ten years and then bringing a law suit, she could have said “Gee Sheriff, I know you don’t mean anything by it, but the hugging makes me uncomfortable.”
I hope you’re not suggesting that you think SafeSport would issue a permanent ban on a coach for occasionally hugging a student (when the rest of the context indicated it was just a hug).
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According to SafeSport Overhaul facebook page, an 18 year old trainer can no longer be friends with younger kids he has been friends with for years because of safe sport. And a trainer should think before they catch a kid who is slipping off of her pony because there can be no touching.
And there is no one in the hierarchy of that group making any effort to quell that sort of nonsense.
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My question is, how long was she his lawyer?
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The people who would be inclined to attempt to quell that nonsense would be people like me. But I have been blocked from that page (can’t post, can’t see it). I assume I’ve been blocked because early on I attempted to push back, politely and mildly, at some of the worst of the anti SafeSport hysteria (He didn’t even know her name! He was banned without a hearing!, etc.)
It looks to me that the people running the SafeSport Overhaul page are still trying to undermine SafeSport. However, they’ve pivoted from “SafeSport inappropriately sanctioned an innocent man” to “A trainer will be afraid to catch a child slipping from a pony” as their reason that SafeSport is ruining the sport.
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I’ve just seen her described as his lawyer, not sure how long.
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I tried… but probably failed since they refuse to use reason.
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So wait. Wait a second…
The Admins of that page have apparently blocked you for pushing back, yet have NOT banned known child molesters?
Lord. Have. Mercy.
@khobstetter as an admin of that page, is there a logical explanation?
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I think anyone who is reasonable in that group is only a member in order to keep an eye on the situation and to note who to avoid ever doing business with. Any reasonable comments are blocked anyway.
In all the posts, it’s still not clear what exactly they want to do about Safesport or what exactly needs to change. The majority of comments either make no sense with regard to the actual Safesport policies (like the 18 year old not being allowed to keep his friends) or say something like “what is the world coming to?!” in response to the completely unreasonable posts.
I feel bad for all the legislators they are trying to contact.
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While bolded is true it kind of misses the point- UNWANTED touching of ANY kind should not be tolerated. I am not a hugger, I am cactus prickly.
After a particularly frustrating month that included 2 falls off my new horse, I was crying (never do it) lamenting I was considering stopping riding all together- a full blown pity party. My dear friend even said “If you were a hugger- I’d give you one.”
A pattern of touching is not good. Yes- I know huggers. Eh- sometimes they hug me - of course it is innocent. I’m vocal enough to be like “don’t touch me” if I really didn’t want someone to- whether I liked them or not. Some people can’t, aren’t like that, are afraid to call out sick to work- can you imagine “don’t touch me” “I’m uncomfortable” if a boss is a jerk? Then we are talking possibly being teased or worse. No one needs that.
Over an extended period of time- yeah maybe that is just the hugger’s way. Sexual harassment training has been around a long time. There is no excuse for being touched unwanted by a coworker.
A child falling off a pony is an exigent circumstance and BN knows it. Saying a trainer would be afraid to do that is ludicrous.
2 articles I enjoyed. The second is one I have gone over with my daughter.
https://money.cnn.com/2017/10/31/pf/workplace-touch-harassment/index.html
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Interesting article written by a young lady. Freedom of Speech still exists in this country as of today. While some might not agree with her views she certainly has the right to be heard and express her opinions as much as any one else.
Kudos to her for saying and standing up for her views.
She is 17 and according to the article has an interest in how this new legislation has affected her life and other Junior Riders. I’m happy when young people of today take an interest in “ what’s going on in the real world”.
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UNWANTED touching or hugging should not be tolerated. But how does a person who is inclined to give hugs know whether the hug is welcome or not? My suggestion is that if it is the case that in the whole context of behavior, the hugging is innocent and non sexual, then the hugee should use words instead of a lawsuit to convey that they prefer not to be hugged. Once the no-hug preference is expressed, at that point any hugging is harassment.
Partly I was trying to point out that there is a space in between “best practice” behavior and behavior that is “clearly out of line and likely to get you a SafeSport sanction”. Innocent hugging (when the whole context indicates it is innocent) is in that space.
Some of the SafeSport bashers are saying that not only will a trainer hesitate before catching a child falling off a pony, but that they are prohibited from hugging a child after the child has fallen. If the trainer is paranoid; don’t hug and return child to parents or peers. But I think that people who say that a trainer will be sanctioned by SafeSport for publicly hugging a crying child after a fall from a pony are being ridiculous and are trying to make SafeSport look ridiculous.
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Well-written and thoughtful. She makes it clear that her objection is with MAAP, and not SS.
I’m glad that her experience in a HS engineering class did not dissuade her from majoring in a STEM field, as her bio says she is majoring in chemical engineering in college.
I’d love to hear a response from SS and/or USEF.
COTH also posted it on their FB page and it’s generating comments.
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Who on earth would hire a lawyer like BN? Her big mouth would keep me from ever wanting her as my attorney. She actually admitted that someone said she must not be a good lawyer because her client killed himself? She has no credibility at this point.
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I agree with you to a certain extent. But for me, in the workplace, a superior should not hug an inferior. Sorry, it just should not happen. Certainly without asking. And certainly not regularly. It just is not appropriate.
It’s great to say, she should have spoken up, but you know what, I too would struggle telling my boss something made me uncomfortable, particularly if I worked in a very hierarchical workplace, such as the police. I wouldn’t have sued, but I know I would have spent a lot of brain power trying to avoid situations where a hug might come. And that’s a problem. That’s not a comfortable work environment and that’s what we need to avoid.
The point of that example is that within the confines of CA law, the harassment either needs to be pervasive or severe. A hug from your boss when your mom dies is neither. A unwanted hug every month is pervasive and does meet that requirement.
I think it’s the same with SafeSport. Persistent hugging is out of place when you have an unequal power dynamic in place. Especially if it is not asked for. Asking a kid if they want a hug after falling off a pony is completely different. I applaud you for pushing back on folks trying to twist SafeSport into something that doesn’t allow a trainer to catch a kid falling off a pony. Because we all know that is baloney.
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