Space Invaders

I really didn’t want to write about this topic AGAIN, but here we go. Now it’s former vice president Joe Biden accused of inappropriately touching females. In this case, most seem to feel there was no sexual intent, but at least one complained that her “personal space” was violated.

I know what that means, and I’m not dismissing it. But there’s still something wrong with this picture, and it’s not my own gender defensiveness. Under modern standards, as I have said before, I couldn’t be elected dogcatcher. But don’t worry. “Ah shall not seek, and ah will not accept...”


We’ve heard a lot about courageous women coming forward through #metoo over the past couple of years to report sexual abuse by men. But it’s unfortunate that shame has been weaponized. We certainly need to discuss appropriate behavior and what the new standard should be. But the first behavior that needs adoption is that men and women must learn to have this discussion between each other, preferably  at the time of the offense, instead of turning it into a Twitter bomb later. Men have to stop this behavior, and if they don’t, women need to look them in the eye and say, “Please don’t do that,” or find another way to communicate it directly, whether it’s to a date, a celebrity, a superior, a clergyman, or even a family member. That requires even more courage than taking it to the media.


As for Mr. Biden, I don’t think it’s this behavior that is disqualifying. He would certainly make a good President. That said, I do think the combination of his gender, age, and even race may be. Democrats seem to be looking for younger candidates who appear to better reflect them and who have a good working knowledge of the new challenges of the future. It’s not about space invasion.


In the meantime, maybe there’s a tech solution to this. Give us a phone app that creates a force field around us, that we could set at will. The field could be as little as a few inches or up to a few feet, or we could turn it off entirely for cocktail parties. But when it’s on, anyone who enters our personal space would get a mild shock or hear a buzzer. Now THERE's a billion-dollar idea.


I don’t know whether it’s related, but I heard a statistic the other day to the effect that young people in the US are having 23 percent less sex these days. But hey, that’s great news for the environment, no? Fewer little carbon footprints to worry about. Why isn’t THAT in the Green New Deal?