Italian Court Rules Bottom Slapping Is OK

Jan. 25 -- The work of Italian feminists isn't getting any easier. The Italian Supreme Court has ruled that an unexpected pat on the bottom at work could not be labeled sexual harassment — as long as men didn't make a habit of it.

The ruling came Wednesday in a case where the male manager of a public health agency was accused by a female employee of sexual harassment after he slapped her posterior.

He was found not guilty of harassment because the court said the act was 'isolated' and 'impulsive.'

A lower court had earlier found the man guilty, sentenced him to 18 months in prison and fined him $3,800 for his behavior.

On Wednesday, the lower court's ruling was overturned. The new ruling stated that a pacca sul sedere or a smack on the rear did not amount to harassment since it was not intended as an "act of libido."

The reaction to the ruling has been deliberate and strong.

The Ansa Italian wire service reported that Alessandra Mussolini, a far right politician and granddaughter of Italian strongman Benito Mussolini, called the ruling a "new cause of humiliation and shame," in parliament today.

"It's a question of respect for women," she said. "We have to continue to react to change this way of thinking. A smack — even if it is isolated and impulsive — is harassment if that is how it is seen by the person who receives it. We have to put an end to this: You can't quantify sexual harassment."

'Like a Farmer With His Cattle'

Mussolini seemed to disapprove of bottom-slapping across-the-board. "I saw [President] Bush give his wife a smack on the bottom," Ansa Italian quoted her as saying, "and I didn't like it one bit. He looked like a farmer with his cattle."

Some columnists snickered at the very definition of a smack on the bottom as "impulsive." In an editorial on the front page of the leading national daily Corriere della Sera, writer Luca Goldoni poked fun at the Supreme Court justices.

"Objection my lord," he wrote. "That the smack was isolated and impulsive seems vaguely obvious: if the employee had not denounced her superior's sexual harassment, it would have meant that she didn't mind the smack and the smack would have then become repeated and prolonged. Poor supreme judges," he said.