Each night, I relay some of the best lines from work. My boyfriend is stunned. [...] I tell my boyfriend that his very hot, 27-year-old, large-breasted boss gets hit on as much as I do. He says I am wrong. He says he sees her at work all the time and that never happens. Then we have a fight. I tell my boyfriend that of course men don't harass women in front of other men. After all, it's illegal. Men are not stupid.
Well, clearly some of us are. What yutz thinks he can get away with saying stuff like that, in this day and age? (And her boyfriend is dumb; whether or not they say it in front of him, nobody is likely to say it TO him; that doesn't happen that often, so it may be happening and he's conditioned simply not to see it.)
Although I am not sure about the laws, I have a feeling that you can't complain about sexual harassment unless you've warned the person that you don't appreciate the comments. So that afternoon when he said, "I want to hug you, but it would be illegal," I said, "You're right."
Ma'am, that's NOT a warning. That's simply agreement. It says nothing about whether or not you like or dislike his comments. If the law requires a warning, I would think that the warning MUST be explicit: "I don't appreciate your making comments like that to me. Please stop." If comments persist, go to your supervisor or that individual's supervisor. No matter what, you need to say something more than "you're right".
All that said, I think her plan is completely wrongheaded. After all, if it works out the way she thinks it will, nobody else in the company will know why she was allowed to switch departments; all they'll see is a sign of privilege that they can't understand. (And what makes her think another department will be better? It will be another supervisor, maybe work she prefers, but it's still the same company, the same corporate culture that lets men think it's proper to say "Big testicles" and grab their crotch at her.) The other advantage, if that's the right word, to a lawsuit or legal or FORMAL complaint is that it will force the company to deal with these people in some way. If she just somehow switches departments in a very low-key way, she leaves the problem behind for someone else to deal with. Since people are, in fact, saying the things they are, it's clear that management either will not deal with them, or doesn't know it has to, and either way, just fleeing the situation won't make it stop for others.
THAT said ... she doesn't actually have many options, does she?
Copyright © 2001, Iain Jackson, after-words.org
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12/19/2001: vive la france
12/19/2001: princess, redux
12/19/2001: yemen and rumsfeld
12/18/2001: you're NOT in the army now
12/18/2001: interesting donation
12/18/2001: shame on winn dixie, indeed
12/18/2001: saudi princess
12/17/2001: new resolve
12/17/2001: a victim of the attack ... yeah, right
12/17/2001: polluters ho!