by dad2one

Updated Sep 09, 2005 at 01:19 PM by dad2one

Yesterday, I was in the break room with coverage of the hurricane clean-up on when a colleague of mine came in and began to discuss it. She proceeds to talk primarily about how Harry Connick Jr looked so good without his shirt on and that he could, "rescue her ANYTIME." She went on and on about it to me.

Now, if the tables had been turned and I had been commenting like she did about a female, that would be sexual harassment. This is by far not the first time this has happened. When I worked in the ER, women would go on about the firefighters and what they wanted to do to them (in graphic detail).

Has anyone else noticed this, or do I just have bad luck with coworkers?

This doesn't offend me (except that I think it's highly unprofessional for grown people - men or women - to act like this...) but I think that their should be a standard. I would never act like that, but if I did, it'd be sexual harassment and I'd be disciplined/sued.

I work with men who make MUCH more suggestive comments than that, so I don't think it's really a double standard. It may be unprofessional, but I really don't care. Most of the time it's said in a joking way and we all laugh about it. We do know there are some people who wouldn't find those jokes (or any jokes at work) funny and so no one makes jokes around them. If it bothers you, I suggest you say something.

The only person who might be able to complain about sexual harrassment would be Harry himself.

I would call it unprofessional though.

We have a beefcake calendar hanging up in our office - given to us by one of the male nurses. It's a joke . . . . .

steph

Originally Posted by fergus51

If it bothers you, I suggest you say something.

Well, it doesn't bother me. I could care less. However, I do know of people who have been fired for that kind of talk. I don't think that kind of talk belongs in the workplace, but I don't think that you should be fired for it. My point is that there are people out there who cry sexual harassment over anything they find the least bit offensive, but these incidences always seem to involved men saying things to women.

If you work with men who say worse than that, and you DIDN'T take it as a joke (even if it was intented that way) they could be fired. Like I said, that's going to far, but it DOES happen. I just think that there's a double-standard here.

Originally Posted by bryanboling5

Well, it doesn't bother me. I could care less. However, I do know of people who have been fired for that kind of talk. I don't think that kind of talk belongs in the workplace, but I don't think that you should be fired for it. My point is that there are people out there who cry sexual harassment over anything they find the least bit offensive, but these incidences always seem to involved men saying things to women.

If you work with men who say worse than that, and you DIDN'T take it as a joke (even if it was intented that way) they could be fired. Like I said, that's going to far, but it DOES happen. I just think that there's a double-standard here.

I just assumed it bothered you because you say you don't feel it belongs in the workplace. If you told them or your supervisor it was something that bothers you, I'm sure it would stop rather quickly without anyone needing to be fired (and I agree with you, that's how it should be). If not, I guess it doesn't matter.

It really isn't a double standard at my workplace because one male RT and two female nurses have been talked to about it before that I know of. The girls weren't cut more slack. The guy wasn't fired. Many hospitals like mine have formal policies for dealing with such things and "counselling" is usually the response to a first offense. I can't imagine anyone being fired for saying a movie star is sexy, unless it was something that happened over and over and was part of a bigger pattern of misconduct. If they did fire a man and simply counsel a woman for the same behavior they would be opening themselves up to a lawsuit from the man and they don't want to do that.

I actually don't know anyone who has filed sexual harassment suits and don't know anyone who has been fired or sued because of it (despite seeing some real harassment) so I may have a different perspective than you do. Maybe some workplaces are worse than others and I just haven't worked in one yet.

Originally Posted by fergus51

It really isn't a double standard at my workplace because one male RT and two female nurses have been talked to about it before that I know of. The girls weren't cut more slack. The guy wasn't fired. Many hospitals like mine have formal policies for dealing with such things and "counselling" is usually the response to a first offense. I can't imagine anyone being fired for saying a movie star is sexy, unless it was something that happened over and over and was part of a bigger pattern of misconduct.

I'm glad to hear that both are treated equally. As I said, I think it's unprofessional, but other than that, not a big deal. And this last incident was a little more than just someone calling a movie star sexy. I sorta glossed over the details for the sake of decorum....

We've had a couple of female nurses who talk in detail about their sex lives, with or without a partner. The two I speak of are night shift and so the talk goes on after report as they are leaving . . . .I just ignore it and go do my chart checks. Others are trying to be polite and just listen w/o saying much.

Funny, trying to be polite with a co-worker means you have to listen to, at times, kinda gross details.

steph

I believe too many women don't recognize their part in sexual harassment when it occurs. I am sensitive to this because a male friend of mine was dismissed from an agency position because he complained about sexual harassment by the females in his workplace. Nobody thought he had a right to be uncomfortable, except me...I could put myself in his shoes and sense his great discomfort.

I've posted about this before, but it involved him being the only male in a group of female breastfeeding nurses, who used the common break area to openly breastfeed their infants, change nursing pads, pump, etc. When he voiced his discomfort at this, HE was made the lascivious bad guy...and the girls complained to management, who fired him. When I said something to one of the girls about this (I knew the crew he was working with) they were outraged at him, and got mad at ME when I supported him.

So IMO women DO need to check that they aren't operating under a double standard.

"Can't we all just get along?"

I wish people would just be less uptight both men and women...especially in the high stress environment we all work in.

It just stinks that we even have to discuss this. While I realize "real" sexual harassment has and does happened and should be taken care of, I just don't think it is right to work and not be able to say what's on your mind in fear you might just affend someone in the room.

I am a Man, a fairly young man 29, who takes care of himself physically...I am VERY carefull not to "flirt" etc, but often I here comments from both Pt's and coworkers about my looks. Now would I file a complaint for sexual harassment, heck no! If it escalated to where it bothered me I would sure say something to that person but frankly I'm too dang busy doing my job thank you.

Originally Posted by bryanboling5

I'm glad to hear that both are treated equally. As I said, I think it's unprofessional, but other than that, not a big deal. And this last incident was a little more than just someone calling a movie star sexy. I sorta glossed over the details for the sake of decorum....

Gotcha... I wouldn't want to make anyone here blush with details either I meant to add before I think the fact that I work union jobs is probably one factor in the equal treatment of male and female employees.