The Collegian

Issue date: 3/21/06 Section: Opinion

Media Credit: Ken Fung

While cooking dinner last week I listened to three women talk about a man who slapped a waitress. They stood in my kitchen and spoke about it with a numbing familiarity, as though this was something closer to normalcy than irregularity. They were visibly saddened by the story and equally confused by the reaction, or lack thereof, by a single man or woman who witnessed the event.

The story goes as follows…

A man drinking with his friends in a bar was approached by a waitress who asked to be paid for the drinks she had brought them. When she confronted the man, who was already a bit drunk, he misinterpreted her request as a pass at him and he grew angry. He placed his hand in the middle of her chest and shoved the waitress away. In response, she immediately dumped a drink in his lap. The man stood up and slapped her across the face. Not a person in the room moved. The waitress stumbled away.

I listened to this story and the uneasy reactions of the women who discussed it. It was brought up that the waitress provoked the drunk man by pouring a drink in his lap. That was countered with the classical retort, "you never touch a woman in violence." And then, it was quiet in the kitchen. What else was there to discuss? A woman had been hit by a man and no one had come to her defense. No one had leveled this man.

When I was in third grade I saw my older sister slapped by a playground bully. We had been playing basketball on the playground of our grade-school, waiting for our mother to get off work. A couple older guys approached us and in stereotypical fashion, took our basketball and told us to piss off.

As a third-grader who was quickly developing a questionable vocabulary, I exchanged a few choice words with the bullies. When one of the boys grabbed me from behind, my sister came to my defense and began screaming epithets similar to my own. Then a boy slapped her. I remember seeing her cheek immediately turn red and a slight grin spread across her face. She was so terrified and so caught off guard she simultaneously smiled as tears filled her eyes. She was embarrassed.

At home that evening, I remember my dad's face sharing a similar hue to my sister's cheek. No one needed to slap him.

I didn't see the waitress get slapped in the bar. But I know she was embarrassed. So am I. I was embarrassed to stand in my own kitchen and listen to my friends speak about a human who was not protected from the physical threat of another human.

I was embarrassed for the waitress' father who would undoubtedly have a similar reaction to my own father. And I was embarrassed for the men and women who witnessed this event and did nothing.

I remember the color on my sister's cheek. Maybe no one in that bar had a sister, a brother, or anyone they loved - though I doubt it. I should not have to say what should have been done.

I should not have to say it.

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