What do you do when a colleague tells you, “I will help you with your problem if you give me a hug”?
Of course, the colleague could have meant it as a joke. But surely it is the feelings of the recipient of the remark that counts, and not that of the perpetrator. So even if it was said in jest, if the person on the receiving end is offended, that should be sufficient to constitute sexual harassment.
But unfortunately we do not live in a utopian world. At the end of the day, it is her word against his. No matter how good a reputation the victim has, there will always be detractors. Especially if the perpetrator also appears to have a good reputation. There will be people who do not believe in the victim’s story outright. There will be people who believe. There will also be people who are convinced that it was a mere misunderstanding and nothing more.
So what do you do? Tell the perpetrator off? Lodge an official complaint? How do you prove that the remark was in fact said? How do you prove that you were offended by the remark? How do you avoid having the scandal publicized in the office? The last thing the victim would want is to have the whole office scrutinizing her behaviour, judging her, or misjudging her.
Sadly I do not have the answers. I believe many victims, even if they are offended, shrug the incident off as a joke and move on. I believe many victims suffer in silence. Sometimes they blame themselves.
When it actually happened to a friend, I had to tell her the bitter truth i.e. that there may be unpleasant consequences in her lodging an official complaint. I was not happy telling her that. The fighter in me wanted her to lodge an official complaint and bring the perpetrator to justice. But I guess the bigger picture was to get her out of the predicament with her reputation in tact, which is why I told her what I did.
In the end, her immediate boss had a word with the perpetrator, and even he was convinced that it was all a misunderstanding. Of course the perpetrator is not going to admit that he sexually harassed a colleague!
But there you go. If even her own boss thinks it was a misunderstanding, what more the other people in the office who do not know her.
I am learning that sometimes there are just no right answers. Sometimes it is not all black or white or gray, but a multiple shade of colours in between. Sometimes you just have to believe that the colour you chose was indeed the right colour.
Sheila, a relevant and thought-provoking topic to start the week. In some cultures, ‘nice tush’ is a compliment and ‘she is how god intended it to be’ is a rush for the ideal female.
ReplyDeleteIt’s apparent that the mental ‘vocabulary’ of the parties are not in sync. Vocabulary enables our thought process and thought enables our behavior. Given that differing cultures maintain separate thesauri when they banter in jest or even debate private matters, the question is were the parties aware if their vocabulary were in sync.
If they are from different cultures or religion then the initiator threw caution to the wind. He took a risk with someone who did not share his ‘vocubulary’. He ought to make no apologies for the content of his thesaurus but assure her that he will in future be mindful of hers.
Beers
Tom, sometimes a spade is a spade whatever the culture, race, religion, geography, orientation etc. Sometimes there are no excuses.
ReplyDeleteSheila I agree, but it is the aggrieved who must pronounce the ‘spade’ he is. Her announcement empowers her.
ReplyDeleteLet me digress. To curb harassment, Malaysian Railways proposed gender-specific coaches in their commuter trains. The proposal was generally welcome by women in Malaysia strident in the notion that a solution to ‘ their harassment’ has been found but a political party, who announced that it was in line with Islamic values, greeted the proposal with enthusiasm. Incidentally, the party runs a state with separate lines at supermarkets not unlike staple Islamic countries. The inverted logic in such countries is that women are actually banned from men-only areas in order to ‘protect’ them. Segregation in this instance clearly ‘disempowers’ their women.
Given that interpretation of such banter is subjective, the ‘ideal’ solution is to ban males from broaching topics with sexual connotations in the presence of females. The other is to encourage the aggrieved party to make a stand – to debate the issue with her opponent – and to win the debate - and perhaps with the help of her sisters, floor his pride.
The ‘ideal’ solution will clearly disempower her while the latter will empower her.
Beers.
Agreed. That is the ideal. Unfortunately not all women are strong enough to endure the possibly unpleasant social stigma and backlash that is usually cast, very unfairly, on victims rather than perpetrators. Equally unfortunately, not all men are strong enough to treat women with respect and to refrain from harassing women in whatever form.
ReplyDelete“…… not all women are strong enough to endure the possibly unpleasant social stigma and backlash that is usually cast, very unfairly, on victims rather than perpetrators. Equally unfortunately, not all men are strong enough to treat women with respect and to refrain from harassing women in whatever form”
ReplyDeleteIronically Sheila, this is the position of the Islamic party in question.