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The connection to politics in your scenario isn’t clear to me. Are people having charged discussions on Slack about whether men should be allowed to harass wome

The connection to politics in your scenario isn’t clear to me. Are people having charged discussions on Slack about whether men should be allowed to harass women? I would think the scenario would be an open and shut case of going to associate relations to complain about the harassment. No real political discussion to be had.

deleted 5y ago
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kaitai 5y ago
That's really optimistic. Turns out it doesn't work and usually ends the woman's career at that company -- or maybe she gets some justice and then is destroyed by the folks on the internet who thinks she's just a feminazi b*(&. (I'm showing my age here I guess; I don't know the terminology of kids these days.) Look up Jennifer Blakely, or Kara Woo, or see the 2018 report analyzing 46,210 harassment claims filed with the EEOC or Fair Employment Practices Agencies between 2012 and 2016 that found 65% of women who make complaints lose their jobs soon after. I'm sure someone will helpfully tell me that they probably all sucked at their jobs and so they just complained of sexual harassment before being fired because they're vindictive and/or trying to game the system. It does sort of prove my point but most people who tell me that feel they've discovered something original. Women just want to go to work and not deal with politics also. That means not being cut out of the stock tips discussed after lunch, not having to deal with egregiously gendered jokes in discussions with the other (all male) managers, not having to do extra office social stuff because "you know women they're good at that", not having their technical work denigrated while supposed soft skills are played up. I can't magically not look female to go to work. So I'm stuck. Either I put up & shut up or say something, which is then automatically political.
- mplanchard 5y ago
  Yeah, all of this, and the idea that any of it is going to change without people actively fighting against it is asinine, honestly. Reporting something through the HR chain is almost never effective (if you’re even in a big enough company to have HR, and you’re not being harassed by the very managers to whom you might otherwise report), and it’s often detrimental. Have we all forgotten that HR exists to protect the company, not the employees? I don’t know what the best way to solve problems like this is, but the solution is probably not “trust the same authority that engendered the culture to fix it.”
mplanchard 5y ago
Talking about the differential experiences of women vs men in the workplace and pushing for policies or support to improve the situation seem like pretty political activities to me. Just as an example of how these situations become political also, I was once at a company where an employee raised an issue that was pretty unambiguous and had multiple witnesses. The same employee was then demoted and sidelined until they eventually quit. They were well liked in the company, so a number of people quit along with them in protest. There’s no way for something like that to not be political, in my opinion. I guess it’s just not always as simple as going to management and hoping for the best. Edit: also it’s great that we view women’s right to not be harassed in the workplace as a given, but how did it get there? Decades of tireless political activism. Sure, some things people are political about seem less important, and will probably fizzle out, but IMO it’s not worth quashing the potential for real, good change for the sake of not having to deal with the things we think are unimportant.

deleted 5y ago

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kaitai 5y ago

That's really optimistic. Turns out it doesn't work and usually ends the woman's career at that company -- or maybe she gets some justice and then is destroyed by the folks on the internet who thinks she's just a feminazi b*(&. (I'm showing my age here I guess; I don't know the terminology of kids these days.) Look up Jennifer Blakely, or Kara Woo, or see the 2018 report analyzing 46,210 harassment claims filed with the EEOC or Fair Employment Practices Agencies between 2012 and 2016 that found 65% of women who make complaints lose their jobs soon after. I'm sure someone will helpfully tell me that they probably all sucked at their jobs and so they just complained of sexual harassment before being fired because they're vindictive and/or trying to game the system. It does sort of prove my point but most people who tell me that feel they've discovered something original. Women just want to go to work and not deal with politics also. That means not being cut out of the stock tips discussed after lunch, not having to deal with egregiously gendered jokes in discussions with the other (all male) managers, not having to do extra office social stuff because "you know women they're good at that", not having their technical work denigrated while supposed soft skills are played up. I can't magically not look female to go to work. So I'm stuck. Either I put up & shut up or say something, which is then automatically political.

mplanchard 5y ago
Yeah, all of this, and the idea that any of it is going to change without people actively fighting against it is asinine, honestly. Reporting something through the HR chain is almost never effective (if you’re even in a big enough company to have HR, and you’re not being harassed by the very managers to whom you might otherwise report), and it’s often detrimental. Have we all forgotten that HR exists to protect the company, not the employees? I don’t know what the best way to solve problems like this is, but the solution is probably not “trust the same authority that engendered the culture to fix it.”

mplanchard 5y ago

Talking about the differential experiences of women vs men in the workplace and pushing for policies or support to improve the situation seem like pretty political activities to me. Just as an example of how these situations become political also, I was once at a company where an employee raised an issue that was pretty unambiguous and had multiple witnesses. The same employee was then demoted and sidelined until they eventually quit. They were well liked in the company, so a number of people quit along with them in protest. There’s no way for something like that to not be political, in my opinion. I guess it’s just not always as simple as going to management and hoping for the best. Edit: also it’s great that we view women’s right to not be harassed in the workplace as a given, but how did it get there? Decades of tireless political activism. Sure, some things people are political about seem less important, and will probably fizzle out, but IMO it’s not worth quashing the potential for real, good change for the sake of not having to deal with the things we think are unimportant.