GRAND Magazine - January/February 2018 - 26

grand legacy

Did your granddaughter post #MeToo, too?
BY JERRY WITKOVSKY

I

love my weekly calls with my grandson Ethan, a Rabbi
at the Park Synagogue in Manhattan. During one call
last fall, I opened the topic by asking for advice for
an upcoming meeting I had planned with a local high
school. "How can I ask the high school what they are
doing about sexual harassment at school?" I asked my
grandson. He shared that this topic was on his mind as
well. In fact, he said he was working on a sermon triggered by the revelations and accusations in the news
about sexual harassment by a growing number of wellknown, public figures.
I was very interested. My fellow grandpas in my
weekly "men's group meet-up" had been asking me,
"how do we talk to our grandkids about this?" Indeed.
Especially when we ourselves are finding this to be
new territory. Especially when we came from a generation that propagated this behavior, even if we didn't in
our own personal and professional lives.

How to get started with difficult
conversations.

Ethan shared that he began thinking about the subject
by discussing it with women close to him. I thought to
do the same. I talked to my granddaughter Katie and her
boyfriend. "Why do women dress provocatively if they
don't want attention?" I asked her. She answered sternly.
"Women have a right to dress any way they want to."
I asked what, if anything, they had been taught about
relationships in high school. Lance shared that it was
mostly about abstinence, which he didn't think was a
worthwhile approach.
26 GRAND

JANUARY FEBRUARY 2018

I also spoke to my daughter, who is the COO at a Los
Angeles based social-service agency. She often feels the
impulse to hug people when congratulating them on a job
well done, to convey her deep gratitude and appreciation. "I
always ask permission," she says, before hugging anyone.

"

It just wasn't something you
talked about. But if you can't talk
about something, if you can't
name it, then you can never fix it.

"

And before anyone thinks this is not happening in their
grandchild's school, ask. A conversation with my 18-yearold granddaughter, a senior in high school, revealed that
a football player at her school had been accused of raping
another student. She was sickened and angry after overhearing two fellow teammates talking about the alleged
incident, saying it was her fault, she was "asking for it."
How do we change the dialogue so that students are
sticking up for, watching out for, each other?

How do we teach about healthy
relationships?

The question about respect when related to sexual
harassment seemed to be caught in the "sex" part. But
maybe that's where it starts (how do you have conversations that have the word sex in them without it being
sexual harassment?). And for us older folks, there are
big generational differences. My parents never told me
anything. It just wasn't something you talked about.
Continued on next page


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GRAND Magazine - January/February 2018

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