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Sexual harassment is an important issue in every business; if left unattended it could cost companies millions in damages. In 1980 the Supreme Court ruled that sexual harassment was a violation of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. From 1978 to 1980, sexual harassment cases brought against companies cost them $189 million. This number rose to $267 million from 1985-1987. Damages are just measured only by numbers. Sexual harassment can cause harm to a company's image, reputation, customers, as well as their revenue.
In earlier years, women use to think in order to get along in the workplace they must "go with the flow" of whatever may happen in the office. Co-workers often looked negatively upon people who stuck up for themselves. Men's behaviors at work had always been accepted without question. When women were sexually harassed they had no where to turn.
Today, the EEOC receives more than 16,000 sexual harassment complaints in a year. This is hardly the amount of situations that happen. 95% of sexual harassment incidents are left unreported! We cannot follow in our government?s footsteps down this road. Our so-called Congress is the worse place to work in dealing with sexual harassment. Until 1994, they were not under compliance with any laws for the protection of workers in the workplace. Even the regulations of 1994 did not provide strict enforcement so the problem remains. Statistics have shown that in the Supreme Court one-third of the people has been a victim of some form of sexual harassment. A member of Congress harassed one in nine of these persons! 42% of women and 15% of men in the federal government have reported sexual harassment. Do you think our government does a great job of covering up things?
It is estimated that nine out of ten women will be victims of sexual advances at work. The courts are making it easier to hold a company liable for any sexual harassment behavior that occurs within the workplace. The employer does not even need to know that the sexual harassment is taking place for an employee to file a suit and win. It is almost impossible to find a ?solution? or ?magic key? that will end the problem. There is no guarantee that anything will prevent sexual harassment from happening. There are only suggestions that might help in depleting the problem.
Developing an effective policy against sexual haras...
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Mcafee, R. Bruce. ?Workplace Harassment: employees vs. customers.? (Mar.-Apr. 1999): n.pag. Online. Internet. 5 Dec 2000. Available WWW: http://www.findarticles.com/cf_o/m1038/2_42/54370819/print.jhtml.
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?Same Sex Harassment.? n.pag. On-line. Internet. 5 Dec 2000. Available WWW: http://www.employer-employee.com/sexhar1.html.
?Same Sex Harassment.? n.pag. On-line. Internet. 5 Dec 2000. Available WWW: http://www.employer-employee.com/sexhar4.html.
?Sexual Harassment in the Workplace.? n.pag. On-line. Internet. 5 Dec 2000. Available WWW: http//www.de.psu.edu/harass/analysis/work.html.
Sexual Harassment in the Workplace?: n.pag. On-line. Internet. 5 Dec 2000. Avaliable WWW:http//www.flabar.org/newflabar/consumerservices/General/Consumer.Pam/37PAMPH.html.
In Chapter 11 of William Shaw’s The Organization and the People in It goes over issue of sexual harassment in the workplace and its effects. Sexual harassment is defined as the “unwelcome sexual advances, requests for sexual favors, and other verbal or physical conduct of a sexual nature”, most reports of sexual harassment are from women accusing men however men accusing women is becoming more prevalent in todays society (Shaw, p.444). Sexual harassment is a moral issues because a person becomes a victim by means of verbal comments, gestures, or physical contact of a sexual nature and not being able to refuse them without fear that something worse will happen.
According to legal dictionary (2013), sexual harassment refers to any form of unwelcome sexual behavior or advances, appeals for sexual errands, and other form of physical or verbal conduct or behavior that portrays sex nature and tends to make the working environment offensive or hostile. Any behavior or remarks that take such forms constitute sexual harassment when: Compliance to such conduct happens either implicitly or explicitly based on employment of an individual, rejection or compliance to such conduct is used to make decisions during employment and when such conduct interferes or affects performance of a person at the workplace. Sexual harassment ta...
Sexual harassment can take place between any two individuals: any gender to any gender, any business, school, place of social, religious, and political organization, authority to subordinate, subordinate to authority.The DeVito text separates this definiti...
...rom occurring in their workplace location. The only way that we can stop these types of behaviors from occurring is by becoming knowledgeable about the topic and making sure everyone is also aware of the topic and the preventative measures that are available. Sexual harassment in the workplace may always be a problem but by working together with those who work around you, we can lower the chances of it happening in your particular workplace.
Basson, in Sexual Harassment in the Workplace: An Overview of Developments, makes the claim that ‘unwelcome conduct of a sexual nature’ is not necessarily sexual harassment until a certain level or degree of unacceptability is attained (Basson, 2007: 426). This according to the author is the first step towards a threshold in which one should ask the question as to whether the conducts was welcomed or unwelcomed (Basson, 2007: 427). As far as the types of conduct that may be constituted as sexual harassment is concerned, a distinction is usually made, “within the broad spectrum of the sexual nature of the conduct, between physical, verbal and non-verbal conduct” (Basson, 2007: 427). Sexual harassment can also be defined as sexual innuendo, comments
Women do not have control of what to do and that causes them to be quiet about sexual harassment. All in all, women quietness of sexual harassment in the workforce relates back to what Frye says that women are oppressed. These women serve in the military because of their own free will, but they are still caged in a barrier of being in an all-male environment and the double-bind of them having to either tell or not tell that they are being sexually
Most companies in the United States require employers with over 15 employees to undergo sexual harassment trainings. Avoiding sexual harassment is not an easy task. If an employee, whether it is male or female, is a victim of sexual harassment, they should immediately take the matter to their immediate supervisor. The victim should “communicate either verbally, in writing, or by their own actions to the harasser that the conduct make them uncomfortable and it should be stopped” (Know Your Rights, 2012). Employers should provide their employees with training on the subject, where direct guidelines are provided, along with steps to filing a complaint for potential
According to the United States Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, Sexual Harassment is a type of sex discrimination that violates Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Indeed, Title VII applies to employers with fifteen or more employees, including State and local governments. Moreover, it also applies to employment agencies and trade union organizations, as well as to the federal government. As said by Rick Bellows and Brian Kleiner, Unwanted sexual advances, requests for sexual favors, and other verbal or physical conduct of a sexual nature creates sexual harassment when this behavior explicitly or implicitly affects the employment of a personal, unreasonably interferes with an individual's work performance, or creates intimidation
According to a recent study, the causes of sexual harassment in the workforce can be exceedingly difficult due to the fact that employee’s are dependent on each other for team work and support, and are reliant on their supervisor’s approval for time off and career advancement. Supervisors and employers take advantage of their supremacy they have over their employees. Such closeness and intensity can distort the professional boundaries which lead people to cross over the line. The report also reported that Politics can be a catalyst, and problems caused by poor management, workplace bullying, frustration, and job/financial insecurity which creates a hostile environments. Furthermore, personal problems can also play a factor, and sexual harassment can be a symptom of the effects of life traumas, such as divorce, or death of a spouse or child (Sexual Harassment in the Workplace).
Klein, Donald F. (1997). Sexual Harassment. What to do., Retrieved December 16, 2000 from the World Wide Web:
This coincides with our basic human desire to conform to a certain extent to the laws that govern our society. In order to progress through gender equality society must weaken male- advantaged gender beliefs but not to the point that it becomes a male disadvantaged gender belief. The fact that sexual harassment policy education is becoming commonplace, through the threat to companies to comply with federal statute, forces each worker to bear in the forefront of their mind these gender beliefs and the repercussions of continuing sexual discrimination. However, this practice can also backfire and make female workers be perceived as inferior because they need legal protection through such policies. This can lead to frivolous cases of sexual harassment in almost any
THESIS STATEMENT: In today’s society 40 percent of the nation’s 55 million working women have experienced sexual harassment in the workplace.
Glazer, S. (1996, July 19). Crackdown on sexual harassment. CQ Researcher, 6, 625-648. Retrieved from http://library.cqpress.com/cqresearcher/
Sexual harassment in the workplace has been a huge problem in recent history. It can happen to anyone, and it can happen everywhere. It can affect all types of races, genders and ages. Statistics today show that more and more sexual harassment has become an issue due to the large number of cases presented. Mainstream media becomes consumed covering sexual harassment because of the high-profile cases.
In today’s workplace, sexual harassment is a growing problem. The legal definition of sexual harassment is any unwelcome sexual advance or conduct on the job that creates an intimidating, hostile or offensive working environment. Another definition is the making of unwanted and offensive sexual advances or of sexually offensive remarks or acts, especially by one in a superior or supervisory position. Women and men of all ages, backgrounds, races and experience are harassed on the job. Sexual harassment encountered in workplaces is a hazard across the world that reduces the quality of working life, jeopardizes the well-being of women and men, undermines gender equality and imposes costs on firms and organizations.