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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... ... middle of paper ... ... McGraw-Hill, 1998. 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. McShane, Steven L., and Mary Ann Von Glinow. Organizational Behavior. Boston: Irwin McGraw-Hill, 2000. Miramontes, David J. How To Deal With Sexual Harassment. San Diego: Network Communications, 1983. Roberts, Barry S. and Richard A. Mann. ?Sexual Harassment in the Workplace: A Primer.? n.pag. On-line. Internet. 5 Dec 2000. Available WWW: http://www.uakron.edu/lawrev/robert1.html. ?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.
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
Acts of sexual harassment against another individual have sadly become a common incidence in the workplace. It can be either physical or verbal. In 2008 the Association of Women for Action and Research conducted a survey addressing the issue of sexual harassment in the workplace. The study, which included 500 respondents and 92 companies, showed that 79% of the victims are women and 21% were men; 54% had experienced some form of workplace sexual harassment, 27% experienced harassment by their colleague, while, 17% were harassed by their superior. The study also showed that 12% had received threats of termination if they did no comply with the requests of the sexual harassers ("Statistics | AWARE | Workplace Sexual Harassment", n.d.).
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...
THESIS STATEMENT: In today’s society 40 percent of the nation’s 55 million working women have experienced sexual harassment in the workplace.
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
Each year many people first become aware of sexual harassment when they are harassed in the workplace. Today in the United States there still seems to be a need for general information about sexual harassment. Many people are unaware of exactly what sexual harassment is, how it affects its victims, where it happens, and what to do if it happens to them. There are many laws that protect people from sexual harassment and provide them with information about what to do if you should ever be in this situation (Wyatt, 2000).
KANE-URRABAZO, C. (2007). Sexual harassment in the workplace: it is your problem. Journal Of Nursing Management, 15(6), 608-613. doi:10.1111/j.1365-2834.2007.00725.x
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
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
Moreover, since it is not tied to the promise or menace of certain employment actions, this type of sexual harassment is found at all levels of employees. (Miller) Furthermore, another important distinction here is that inappropriate behavior among employees can also create a hostile work environment for other employees, who were not really the objective of the behavior. In fact, the employer must be responsible for workplace hostility that happens between two employees, it should normally be demonstrated that the employer knew or should know about the situation and took no action. In addition, If the employer took immediate action to stop the situation once it was brought to light, and especially if the employer had also taken steps to prevent it, the employer may have a defense.
In conclusion, sexual harassment in a workplace is a major problem in the modern working environment with significant impacts on organizational productivity, employee morale, and employee satisfaction. This form of discrimination occurs in various ways include requests for sexual favors, unwanted sexual advances or behaviors, threats, derogatory comments, and rape. The prevention of sexual harassment incidents requires the establishment of effective workplace policies and practices as well as concerted efforts by employers and employees.
Sexual Harassment is a growing problem in today's workplace. The signs and causes of harassment are not always easy to detect. There are a growing number of cases through statistics and actual cases that’s been headlined in news rep...
Sexual harassment in the workplace is a huge problem in recent history. It can happen to anyone and it can happen everywhere. It can affect all types of races, gender and age. Statistics today shows that more and more sexual harassment has become an issue due to the large number of cases presented. Mainstream media becomes consume covering sexual harassment because of the high profile cases. Sexual harassment becomes a topic on various TV shows, and on some major morning radio talk shows mostly everyday. Sexual harassment laws must be strengthened in order to fix what has become a serious problem today in the workplace.