Newsgroups: soc.women
Subject: Re: getting fired after making sexual harrassment complaint - illegal?
From: rivero@mdcbbs.com (Michael Rivero)
Date: 11 Nov 92 09:29:17 PDT
Distribution: na
Organization: M&E (Division of EDS), Cypress CA

In article <1992Nov09.043545.16727@ux1.cts.eiu.edu>, cfaks@ux1.cts.eiu.edu (Alice Sanders) writes:
|> I'm looking for information for a woman I know who was put on probation at
|> work the day after she made a sexual harrassment complaint against a male
|> coworker.  Her supervisor was a woman with whom she got along very well
|> until the day after she made the complaint.  She had worked at the company
|> for three years and had an excellent work record.  Other women in the
|> company also wanted to complain about this harrasser but were afraid.
|> This woman took it upon herself to come forward because she was confident
|> of her position in the company and so was not afraid.  After being put on
|> probation and being under severe stress, she became ill and missed 10 days
|> of work out of 60 days, all with sick pay.  She was fired 90 days to the
|> day that she had made the complaint, supposedly for missing too much work.
|> Later she was told that she did not fit the image of the company.
|> 

  Seems like the problem might not be the harasser but the supervisor
who, after all, appears to have made the decision about probation, and later
termination.

  My first question is, since the supervisor was a woman, was there
a relationship between this supervisor and the harasser that was
outside the professional one, to the point where the supervisor would be
biased towards him? That would generate a lot of problems for the complainent,
no less than if (for example) a male employee tried to date a woman that 
the boss was also interested in.  One of the networking studies in the 80's
showed that women in the workplace tended to be more ruthless towards 
other women than their male counterparts; partly because of a lack of
early "team building" exposure (little league and so forth), and partly because
other women were considered more of a "threat" in the newly emergant
feminine arena. Certainly in areas where sexual politics are in play, women
do NOT welcome other women into what is essentially a "seller's market".

  The cold reality is that if you make an enemy of a suprvisor, that person
will usually find a way to terminate you, and due to the large number
of recent lawsuits, will make sure that there is demonstrable cause
for your leaving. You refer to your friend's having an excellent work record,
but is this what's in her employee file? 

  Was the complaint internal, or civil? If your friend has enough
hard evidence (and mind you, accusation alone does not carry the weight
it did just 6 months ago) then press the case in civil court, and after
winning a judgement there, then you have a case for wrongfull termination
from the company. Otherwise, "accidentally" dropping a hot cup of coffee 
in the guys lap while he was harassing her might have been a better approach 
(from the pragmatic point of view). 

  It appears that there might be a hidden connection between the harasser 
and the supervisor; one that cannot be used in court. Your friend may 
have hoisted with her own petard.

  Also, as bad as stress is, if it knocked your friend out for 10 days out
of 60, then I suspect there is another medical problem; stress alone won't
do that. She should see a doctor.


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|  Michael Rivero rivero@mdcbbs.com  "Middle-aged Mutant Ninja Animator" |
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
|     This is my last week at EDS (mdcbbs.com) and since I am planning   |
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|    colorful time!                                                      |
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