I've been thinking about this thread and why the subject is so important to us; 18 pages.....who would have thunk it
I have a theory to apply from my college edumucation about personal space and Hope's story:
Men and women have an invisible boundary around them at all times which is what they hold as their personal space; basically the distance out from ones body which if infiltrated makes the person uncomfortable. This varies in size between people, genders, and cultures. Many cultures have a very small personal space where as North American's tend to have the largest.
Men typically have a larger personal space than women too. eg: when men sit on a park bench we tend to sit in the middle and spread out while women tend to sit at one end and cross their legs.
Their are several theory's why men's personal space is larger... dominance and patriarchy being the most likely.
To apply these theory's to Hope's story.... when Hope parked too close to the crotch rocket guys bike he took it as an invasion of personal space which offended him so much so that he had no problem in invading hers (note left on her tank). (the bike in this case was an extension of his body... objects close to the person can also be given the same personal space as their owner.)
All this happens on an unconscious level and most people are totally unaware that they are doing it.
My guess is this fellow has a rather large, rigidly held personal space which he actively defends since he holds it so dear. The helmet all the way to the desk is another example of "stay back, this is my space".
What does this say about the crotch rocket fellow.... just that he has a large personal space and what it says about us members.... to reach 18 pages we must all think personal space is a very important subject (although I believe most of us didn't realize that's what we were reading about
).
I'll leave it up to Hope to draw her own conclusions about this fellow
Matt.
