With all the discussions of “Me Too” experiences, I wanted to commemorate a Black man who came to my defense when I was being sexually assaulted on the NYC subway in 1974.
I make a point to mention his race because, in the context of the era, I believe it’s important.
Long considered a “liberal” city, New York has always had an undercurrent of racial tension that erupts during acts of police brutality and murder committed against the Black community which then casts a spotlight on the racial divide.
This was especially true in the 1960s and 1970s. In fact, just a year before my subway assault, a Black child, 10-year-old Clifford Glover, was shot and killed by a white undercover policeman in the spring of 1973.
Given this context, here’s what happened.
Just out of college, I was riding the E-Train from Queens to Midtown Manhattan to work my first “real” career job.
Like many a morning rush hour, we were literally packed in like sardines on this day – body against body.
I could feel the breath of the man behind me – a white man, in a business suit – against my neck.
With the rocking of the train as it sped forward, I couldn’t be sure if he was intentionally rubbing his body against me.
And then the train stopped at a station and there was no doubt – he was grinding his crotch against my butt. And he boldly continued the assault as people got off and on the train.
Born and raised in NYC, I thought of myself as streetwise and tough but in this moment I simply froze.
Then I heard the booming voice of a Black man who had just stepped into the car, “Get off that woman!”
He got into my assailant’s face and shouted a few select words. With the doors of the subway car still open, the pervert ran off the train.
A few women applauded but the men looked away.
Then my hero turned to me – stern, fatherly, his eyes locked on mine – “Don’t you ever stay silent when a man does that to you. Shout, scream, but don’t stay silent.”
I thanked him and he nodded in reply then he stood beside me the rest of the ride without saying a word.
Even then I thought to myself he didn’t have to step in to help a white woman on her way to work.
He could have easily thought it wasn’t his problem. He could have shrugged it off and ignored it like the other men who saw what was going on had done.
He was a better man. A man who stepped onto a train, saw a woman being sexually assaulted, and did something about it.
I took his words to heart. From that day forward whenever a man attempted to grope me, or worse, on the subway I shouted, I pushed, I got in his face.
Not long after this incident, again during morning rush hour, a man slipped his hand into my coat attempting to grab my breast. I shouted and hit him on the head with my folded-up Totes umbrella – a handy club — he ran away, too.
When I saw men groping other women on the train, I shouted at them and paid forward the advice: “Don’t stay silent.”
Over the decades, when the subject of sexual assault comes up, I think of the man who stopped my subway assailant on that day in 1974.
In fact, the only other man who ever came close to doing the same was my younger brother when he was only 17.
We were shopping in Macy’s together for a Mother’s Day gift and my brother was walking a few steps behind me. Suddenly, he shouted, “Stop looking at my sister like she’s a piece of meat, asshole.” And that man ran off, too.
I have to wonder why other men, good men, look away. Men with wives, sisters and daughters, look away.
As a society we are at our best when we help each other – in looking away we condone sexual assaults and worse.
With this in mind, I want to send out a loving thought of thanks to the amazing man who did the right thing in 1974.
If only there were more men like him.