Is putting a hand on a knee sexual harassment?

THE real problem about older men groping young women is not the fact they have done it, but the people who should act on this disgraceful behaviour choose not to. If it’s the Forces, politics, the NHS, Hollywood, teaching or the boardroom, your career is finished if you dare to complain. Evil reigns supreme when good men do nothing.

ANN CHEESEMAN, Brigg, Lincs.

WHAT is seen as sexual harassment is getting more bizarre by the day. If politicians want to resolve this matter, perhaps they should make it legally binding that within Parliament there should be no physical contact whatsoever between men and women. Or maybe we could use common sense.

STEPHEN ORMEROD, Aldershot, Hants.

POWERFUL men who use their power to persuade young women to indulge their sexual craving should rightly face public humiliation and the legal consequences. However, we have to accept we live in the real world. Presumably Adam put his hand on Eve’s knee.

BILL HODGES, Eynesbury, cambs.

IF TOUCHING another person’s knee should be a cause for resignation, then no one in Britain would turn up for work. We live in hysterical and ridiculous times.

JONATHAN WILSON, Presteigne, Powys.

ARRIVING for cancer treatment, the nurse greeted me with a hug. Should I feel traumatised and sue the NHS or sit on the incident and try to grab 15 minutes of fame in 15 years’ time? Or should I just act like a grown-up? PAUL CODRINGTON, Minster-on-Sea, Kent.

IS THERE no difference between a compliment and inappropriate behaviour? I do not condone intrusive remarks, groping, bottom pinching, leering, suggestive remarks, rape, stalking or paedophilia. However, an appreciative, reassuring pat on an arm or knee is not sexual harassment.

D. HUTCHINSON, cookham Dean, Berks.