Hugging Gone Amuck: Patch Editor's Notebook

Heads up to anyone who might be missing those friendly embraces previously given by accused serial hugger Fred Civis, who was fired from his job as a grocery store cashier in a small Michigan town after customer complaints that the embraces were “creepy”:

Amma, a Hindu guru and spiritual leader who has hugged millions of people around the world and is revered as India’s hugging saint, begins a world tour in November that will bring her to Detroit.

Amma, whose name means “mother,” hugs and gives love. People stand in line for hours to be swallowed in her embrace. She’s hugged something like 34 million people. I know a couple of them, and said the experience lifted their burdens, lightened their hearts and flooded them with a sense of relief they couldn’t quite explain.Who am I to judge?

Tell Us:

• How should women – and men – handle unwanted hugs? Should they acquiesce to a “side hug” and suffer silently?

Amma’s “job” to hug people. Fred Civis may have regarded it as part of his, too. And, like those who feel blessed after hugging Amma, a hug from Civis may have left them feeling loved and special. Good for them. Good for Civis.

The difference – or one difference – is that no one ever accused Amma of invading their space.

Some of you women – and many of you men, too – know what I mean.

The hug lasts a little too long. The hand wanders from the “friendly” area of the shoulder to “unfriendly” territory, lingering in places that shouldn’t have been grazed in the first place.

As one woman on the receiving end of an unwanted hug put it, “I know the difference between a friendly hug and a grope.”

How many women said, “I hear you, Sister” when they read that?

Many, I’m betting. I did.

It’s hard to know without having been embraced by Civis if that who-me-little-boy-innocence claim was authentic. Let’s leave that to people who were actually hugged by him to decide.

For the record, I think tactility is an admirable human quality. It indicates openness, trust and warmth.

I’m a hugger myself in the right circumstances. I hug my friends, my family and their children if they want it. Often they don’t, and forcing a hug on them probably makes those little kids whose parents are prodding “oh, give her a hug” feel a bit like the women in the grocery store did after Civis gathered them in an unwanted embrace.

Related:

• Hugging Cashier ‘Creeps Out’ Customers, Loses Job
• Hugging Cashier Told to Enroll in Behavioral Program

But the idea of randomly hugging strangers or people with whom I have only a passing acquaintance – say the people I do business with – is awkward at best.

Consider this:

Working at a small newspaper right after college, one of my first assignments was to cover a ribbon cutting. Everyone was lined up and I was ready to snap a photo when one of the businessmen jumped out of line, trapped me in an embrace and planted a sloppy kiss. “Welcome to town,” he said.

I was looking through the viewfinder and didn’t see him coming. I was so taken aback that I almost fell back. There was no time to turn it into a “side hug” or give the man – er, let’s name the drama, lech – the benefit of my cheek.

When I rebuffed him, he gave me a too innocent oh-you-misunderstood look.

Uhm, no I didn’t.

I told my boss about it. Perhaps wondering why he’d hired me at that moment, he told me that I had over-reacted, that Roy meant no harm, and that I should just lighten up and – are you ready for this? – take the compliment and shrug it off.

It made me feel worse than I did at the original affront – diminished, when I needed validation. So do those women who didn’t like the way Fred Civis was touching them. One woman even reported death threats.

It’s their truth, and they deserve to be believed.

Photo via Shutterstock

______________

Have a news tip? Email beth.dalbey@patch.com. Our platform has changed, so click here to learn how to post news, events and announcements; comment using Disqus; or add photos to the Instagram feed along the top of the home page.