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From: laura@hoptoad.uucp (Laura Creighton)
Newsgroups: net.women,net.singles
Subject: Re: Beach harassment
Message-ID: <522@hoptoad.uucp>
Date: Fri, 14-Feb-86 04:08:46 EST
Article-I.D.: hoptoad.522
Posted: Fri Feb 14 04:08:46 1986
Date-Received: Sat, 15-Feb-86 04:50:11 EST
Reply-To: laura@hoptoad.UUCP (Laura Creighton)
Organization: Nebula Consultants in San Francisco
Lines: 27
Xref: watmath net.women:8987 net.singles:10273

> A public beach is not a singles bar.  One does not surrender
> one's right to privacy at a public beach, any more than at a public
> library, a public museum, or a public street.  Your statement is
> equivalent to
>  "If you don't want to be approached by strangers, stay off the streets.
> You should expect to be approached walking on a public street."
> 	A woman (or man) sitting alone at a singles bar or similar
> setting has indicated that he or she is interested in company.  That
> is NOT the case at public beaches.  Attitudes like that of Snoopy
> make me understand why some women get angry.
> -- 
> Bill Tanenbaum - AT&T Bell Labs - Naperville IL  ihnp4!ihlpg!tan

Nope, it is equivalent to, if you don't want to ever be approached by
anybody at any time, stay off the streets.  There is nothing wrong
with approaching people in libraries, museums or streets.  The place
that the problems enters in is when the approacher gets an ``I want
to be private'' out of the approachee.  The question is one of ``is
this serious, or do they just want me to work harder?'' I vote for
treating all such requests as serious, all the time, even when you
are *absolutely* *certain* that this is an unserious remark -- in
the hopes that the work-harder crowd will get so lonely that they
will give up this dishonest behaviour.
-- 
Laura Creighton		
ihnp4!hoptoad!laura 
laura@lll-crg.arpa