Sexual harassment -- WOO!

I had the much-anticipated sexual harassment training today. I'm totally kidding, of course; any sort of military-generated training is bound to make your eyes roll up into the back of your head and your tongue to loll out as you pass out from lack of signals to your brain. The Powers That Be claim that the conference room must be kept at near-glacial temps because of the computers nearby, and their preferred operating temperature. I believe the true reason lies in the fact that it's darn hard to fall asleep when you're cold. Unless you're REALLY cold, and then I hear you actually shouldn't do it.

I love the name of the seminar: Sexual harassment training. As if we're being trained HOW to do it. Hee.

So I had two hours to daydream today. Actually, the training wasn't bad at all. Aside from pulling the same tired joke over and over (Sample Question: "Will we have an opportunity to provide feedback at the end of this session?" Answer: "Of course not! HAR! I mean, yeah, of course."), the leaders did a good job.

The lady (anti?)harassment instructor said something toward the beginning that made me think for awhile, and wonder what y'all thought. She was talking about how we all perceive the same situation differently. And we all (or most, and especially us Americans) like to maintain a bubble of personal space around us. Then she talked about the differences of preferred eye contact, how some like to look someone directly in the eye the whole time they speak -- she said she was one -- and some people consider that really rude. How do you feel?

I kind of prefer not so much eye contact. It feels really super personal. And yet, when someone does it, it's kind of like when someone uses your name a lot. You get this little rush of pleasure. It's more intimate, and makes it feel like the person cares.
So, if it creates positive feelings in me if people do it to me, why do I avoid doing it to others? I've been with friends before, having a conversation, when they've actually commented that I seem distracted. I guess I just listen without looking directly at them?
I'm trying to make sense of my differing attitudes on the subject. Perhaps it's a holdover from when I first got to D.C. (or Europe) and learned that if you looked someone in the eye, they thought you a) were interested in some sort of romantic encounter, or b) were spying on them or otherwise planning some harm. To judge from their reaction, anyway.

I love to watch people (strangers), but feel that I shouldn't really look directly at them. It's weird.

Can anyone relate, or have I gone insane from too much harassment training? (I promise not to report you to my supervisor if you reply.)