"Nós não tocamos em mulheres."
Translation:We do not touch women.
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"Tocar em" means physically touch somebody or something. Without the "em" it could be understood either as be touched "emotionally":
- "aquela cena do filme me tocou" -> "that scene from the movie has touched me".
...or even as play an instrument (even a bell):
- "eu toco guitarra" -> "I play [the] guitar".
3278
It is a Brazilian expression that means "We don't beat women" in the domestic violence sense.
The sentence doesn't mean "we don't beat women". The sentence means "we don't touch women", and if there's a domestic violence background, then you would infer that "touch" means "beat" in this context.
But the sentence could also be said by a group of shy men that are afraid of physical content with people of the opposite sex. No domestic violence intended here.
You have a good question.
You might imagine a reason someone says, "We do not touch women." It could be for religious reasons, or it could have to do with sexual orientation. It could be a sarcastic statement made by someone who very much likes to touch women. In all of these cases, "Nós não tocamos nas mulheres" would not be be better.
I will say, though, tocar em is a pretty weird construction to me!
The usage is exactly the same in my native Spanish. It never actually means "duty". It's more like saying "it's my turn", or "it's up to me", or "it falls on me"; all of which are idiomatic phrases. As a visual aid, I imagine someone selecting from among a group of people and touching the chosen one.