Tag Archives: sexual harassment
How to minimise sexual harassment: a quick-start guide
Greetings! Are you a rambling misogynist cunt? Have you been informed that a particular aspect of your behaviour is creepy or in some cases downright illegal? Would you like to dismiss those killjoys who have decided that your totally normal and fine behaviour (a hand on someone’s knee in a meeting, comments about how ‘buxom’ they look today, or aggressive staring on the tube) is somehow inappropriate? You’ve come to the right place. Welcome to GOTN’s quick-start guide on how to minimise sexual harassment.
You can’t say anything these days!
Today I’m going to tell you an old, old story. Guy meets girl in a workplace. Guy tries to chat girl up. She finds his comments overbearing and creepy. Guy continues, despite her discomfort. When the inevitable HR investigation happens, he explains to the boss that it was ‘only banter’. Starts jumping in any time other colleagues make jokes of any kind: “you wanna watch out, mate! You’ll get reported for that! You can’t say anything these days!”
Sometimes I forget that women are meant to be vulnerable
I don’t ever want to be vulnerable purely because I’m a woman. I understand life has its moments, and leaning in to vulnerability – when you’re with friends and loved ones – can be a valuable thing to do. Let people in, get closer, see their vulnerabilities too and nurture them through hard times. But broadly, I don’t want to be vulnerable. I go through life doing powerful things, and rejecting vulnerability because I don’t want to feel weak. Unfortunately, the world is peppered with men who want to remind women just how vulnerable we are.
Intervention: what if you see someone being harassed?
My ex once offered to buy a stranger’s shoes, to stop him from hassling me outside a restaurant. It was the weirdest method of stopping someone being harassed that I’d ever come across, and alongside being genuinely funny to me at the time, it also worked.
Sexual harassment: There’s one way this conversation ends
The last few weeks have been a barrage of news about sexual assault and harassment. Guys in powerful positions in a number of industries are getting called out for doing things that are wholly inappropriate, to people they hold power over. Is anybody else completely exhausted? I know I am. Not exhausted by the call-outs, but exhausted by the response.