allegations by dozens of women claiming sexual harassment and assault in the workplace has served as a bitter reminder that unlike the virginia slims cigarette ad of the late one nine hundred sixty s we have not really come a long way baby so what do we do about it why is it as pervasive as it seems and how do we deal with it in the work environment and what are the legal remedies i mar joining me today is labor attorney latoya barrett who is a partner at dwyer and barrett bello say in newark new jersey in the area of women's rights latoya has helped the victims of sexual harassment and pregnancy discrimination pursue claims with the state division of human rights and the equal employment opportunity commission also joining the discussion is elaine sundial research director for the center for women and work at the rucker school of management and labor relations in new brunswick new jersey her work in gender equality includes developing programs that promote an inclusive climate for women in science technology engineering and mathematics better known as stem welcome thank you so i feel like we could talk for about five hours but we only have about twenty minutes it appears from the rash of allegations that have certainly come about the last few months that sexual harassment and assault in the workplace is rather commonplace is it as pervasive as it seems the reality is that for many women this is a daily occurrence it's under reported but even among reported cases at the see we have seen a slight uptick over the past several years so i think there is a growing awareness about this issue that it's that it's women are more feel more empowered to come forward and report these allegations but it is unfortunately as commonplace as a thing because we get these claims we knew that it was still happening in the workplace we knew that some of the things that were going on where outrage even in today's environment still i'm glad now that the information is coming out because it helps with jury selection it helps with you know people's understanding of these claims they can understand now that this has been happening it's terrible it's as terrible as you thought it was or you know that you could possibly think it was and i just think i'm just happy that people are feeling empowered now they discuss these claims and you know bring it to management's attention or whoever's attention just so that it could stop happening hopefully we can stop this from happening so before we get into some of the  legal aspects of this and and also how to handle it in terms of being within the corporation or within a company in the workplace and using those channels i actually want to ask a much broader question is this about sex or is it about power or is it about both i think it's both and would you say away i think it's about it's about inequality so please tell us more you know i think we have this image in our mind that sexual harassment is about you know mostly about come ons or pressure for sexual fave your favors but a lot of the sexual harassment that women encounter mostly revolves around subtle comments degrading or demeaning one's gender and it  points out that sexual harassment is often perpetrated by people who are responding to a fear that their status in the workplace is is being taken away so an easy way to regain one's status is to pick on someone else and degrade their sex their sexual orientation their gender identity and i think that when we as long as we see a lot of struck occupational stratification where women do certain jobs than men do others we're going to find that this behavior is going to be as prevalent as it used to be you know it's not as public i think as it used to be and but it's really the environment in the company that maintains that these behaviors are are ok and that that relies on a sense of you know men are here and women are here right well i would say that it's there's the inequality aspect of it but there's also the power dynamic because it's not just an issue between men and women you can be sexually harassed by a woman you can be harassed you they could be  same sex situations where the harasser and the victim are both of the same sex so i would say it's a power dynamic you have the ability to wield this power over someone and you're going to use it and i think that's more about i think that's more of what it is as opposed to just bullying someone if you have control over this person's life over this person's  looted by their incomes and things like that then you know that there are no vulnerable position and you're able to capitalize on that because you have the ability to do that so i think it's a power issue more so than an inequality issue but i think that these things can work together you know change of plea right actually i want to get to another piece of that of what you just spoke about but first i want to ask elaine in terms of what the center for women in work is doing in this area what what are you doing to kind of prevent prevent change the landscape well we do offer training for   and sort of a holistic understanding of behaviors and climate that can that can make it uncomfortable for women in under a percentage peoples in the workplace so we we approach it from that dimension comments made of a sexual nature of requests for sexual favors things things of that nature and like i said before it could be comments not even made to you directly but it could just be in the workplace and weigh on this so in terms of the professional relationship between the two people for instance you know how to how does that factor into what is considered sexual harassment for instance if it's  a male boss asks someone who a female who reports to him out on a date and she refuses as opposed to a call male colleague asking her out on a date and sort of what and she refuses that date as well and sort of the how she's treated afterward does it make a difference whether it's technically a boss or not well i think it's going to depend right ok so if your boss asked you out on a date that would depend on what the policy is in the work environment that you're and because the some places have a zero tolerance where they don't allow relationships between it's just prohibited in management finds out about it you could be disciplined or fired and then you know people recognize that in the workplace we spend most of our time there so bright people get married after meeting on the job right so i don't think that the asking of the date is the issue i think if if your boss asked you out and you say no and they repeatedly ask you out then we could be moving into the zone of harassment  and the same for a coworker so if it's a supervisor doing it there is liability in that sense because this person has control right or work environment the colleague maybe not so much again that would depend on what the work situation is but if it's just your coworker i think the company's liability comes when that situation is reported by and how they handled the the report the claim of harassment so that's where the difference would come into play but it's not just all can you would you go out on a date with me and that sexual harassment it's just kind of depends on what is happening now if it's that if the are and how much and how or that person has over that person's employment right right makes it much worse it does but i would think if you're sitting next to a coworker and every day that coworker is asking you out on a date then you know that might be a little on well and then you would report that like listen i told this to stop that i don't want to go out with him and he keeps asking me out and you do something about this and then that's where the liability would come in because it depends on how the company reacts to and i think a lot of companies take a defensive position on dating because it reduces their liability and also because you know it creates an awkward environment in the workplace where women really rely on men in higher positions for mentoring for sponsorship you know to be considered for promotions and you know i think dating puts a strain on that relationship and can cause a lot of a lot of awkward interactions if one is male or female for that matter is feeling you know threatened feeling like they're the they're being harassed what do what should they do what is the course of action well i think what you should do is if it's in the work environment of course you should see what your company's policy is on that if they have one somewhere and some handbook buried far far deep into the back of your desk drawer there is a handbook there and you can see what the company says for you to do if you're experiencing some type of discrimination or harassment but tell you and then follow those steps that would be the first thing to do and you know of course you could reach out to a lawyer but you know for the most part you still should let the company know what's going on because there's there's nothing the legal system can do for you if the company is not aware of it this is happening to you right which i was also going to ask should you start documenting keep emails keep records to tell coworkers tell family members i mean how much should you document to well i know that everyone is different in that aspect because some people feel comfortable talking about these situations they feel comfortable telling you no family or friend a family member or friend listen this person that work did x y and z to me and other people are a little bit more closed up about it so they might not tell anyone because sometimes they feel we've been seeing this now some people feel so ashamed and embarrassed that happening to them right so whether or not they tell someone a family member or a friend is a different story but if you are feeling that uncomfortable at work and it's becoming unbearable then you definitely have to go to the h r person or whoever is the person that you're supposed to talk to about it and i would say to document as much as possible  it just it becomes helpful when you're trying to remember exactly what was happening when it happened and it just makes it easier for you to explain to someone else that this happened to me on this day and you can also show that this is repeated harassment and i had to start documenting it because it was going on and i wanted to keep a record just so that i had something to show you and it's a lot harder to dispute when someone has taken  to look at it from the the context of your company i mean for many of the women who are reporting harassment i mean about one fourth of them live are in low wage industries  that the h r department is not you know accessible to them maybe it's a hotline that they have to call and it's strange and it's people they don't know so it's very in the whole process is very intimidating and a lot of women have been reporting that the claim goes nowhere and then that's retaliation against them because information about their case has been shared with the harasser so i think everyone has to kind of assess the climate where they work and decide what it's best for them right i think one of the reasons people don't complain especially in a low wage income situation is that they're scared to lose their jobs and retaliation is it is a real thing it's something that we were just afraid of and it doesn't happen it absolutely does happen so i think that's why maybe one of the top reasons why people don't report these they don't support these issues but if you have decided that you're going to complain you have to it's said you have to reach out to your company you have to tell someone in the company because even if you contact a lawyer you contact the e e o c they can't help you  because the company is going to say listen we had no idea what allowed the company to remedy a right and then and then the remedy is then becomes the issue because often times like elaine said there is no a result of complaining so you don't have to tell us who but you have to mention the company but our you know have you have you experienced some companies that that have dealt with it in a positive way like just simply gotten you know transferred the person out of the department or or something like that but without it coming to a lawsuit yes actually on a so it's a strange thing gentleman wanted to pursue a claim against a company and when i looked into what a little further we understood that he was the harasser but yes really he would he was the harasser he didn't believe it was the h him so that he wanted it he he was the one who was making a claim that initially so yes he was the one who was making a claim because he did not believe that he should be fired oh i say that he was he should be fired for his behavior so he was upset about that and he wanted to so in his mind he was just being romantic and i'm going to i'll say he was being nice he secretly recorded her all kinds of all kinds of things oh my goodness but as soon as the company found out about it they fired him so and that was cause that was a good thing other is before colleagues to get involved to her by stand anyone who is really witnessing it to not just be sort of the silent witness but really take action do you want to talk about that a little bit so i think you're talking about bystander training and if that's actually comes from university campuses it was developed in order to stop sexual assaults if they empowered people around you or people at a party to step in that you know we a lot of the incidences could be avoided and this also applies to creating a non sexual environment at work  if everyone feels responsible for creating a positive environment the impetus is no longer on the victim or the harasser to change their behavior it's about everyone being able to identify bad behaviors and step in and do the right thing and this also reduces the feelings of the victim the target of harassment they often feel very isolated that this was what i was saying and so having support from others around you to step in and identify the behavior that's that's causing the problem it creates a sense of relief of the target they're no longer alone right and even when you're making the complaint to r you know one of the first things that you are going to be asked did anybody witness this and you would say a bunch of names because these people are around and they hear the comments all the time because everyone for the most part is afraid of and sexual harassment is not something you can do in ten minutes it should be a video that you watch on your lunch hour and then you check the box and those were developed really to protect firms and you know it's a protected division exactly and so you know talking about what actually cut real life examples of sexual harassment what actually constitutes these behaviors you know we find that when we survey people they have very different ideas of what sexual harassment i thinking about the individual you were talking about was stalking yeah right right and so all of you know there actually is some misunderstanding about what behaviors are harassment so really getting deep talking about it deeply having your supervisor talk about it with you but not you know just the stereotypes of women of men asking women for sexual favors favors over and over again this is not helping us understand w really a sexual harassment really is in the workplace and it's not just for the harassers sometimes you could be a victim of sexual harassment and not even know it there was a survey done and i think maybe two years twenty fifteen and they were explicit comments or you know it things like that so yes you have been involved in a sexual charged environment but you don't see yourself as being a victim of harassment so you know  harasser needs to understand their behavior and the harassed see should understand they're only the victim i should say should understand what's happening to them and i think one of the other problems that you have is that you know some people think about coming forward with claims or it's saying that they're victim of sexual harassment they don't want to feel like a victim right it's like oh well he just makes those comments all the time i don't pay him any mind but you shouldn't have to worry about that in the workplace so even though you don't feel the those comments are offensive someone else may feel like those comments are offensive so we should say something together so we can stop these offensive comments from being made in the workplace even if he's just joking right you know do you think the fact that so hard to accept you know it's like wow how long has this been going on i mean we we knew it was going on but just not to this level right but i do wonder now that this is become so public and so many men have lost their jobs or had to resign or whatever do you think women will feel actually women and men will feel more empowered to address it sort of head on like when it's happening you know i mean even because you know it takes a certain amount of courage to do that and i would imagine and i don't know i'm just sort of theorizing here i would imagine that women always feel like it's their fault right so even even going to h r say the first step you know you might feel like oh my god are they going to say something about the way i'm or something i said on facebook or whatever right so i would imagine that most people just like rape victims are afraid the they're the one who's going to be interrogated a so do you think that because it's become so public now it is is this going to give women more courage to come out right away you know to address it i think it already has i think it already has i think that me movement is a way of showing that people are not afraid anymore to say yes i am a victim and this happened to me and this happened to me ten years ago but it's still happening to me so i think people feel more empowered now to come forward i just feel like we have to be careful about the response to the claims because we don't want to have a situation where just a simple allegation well we're not someone to be fired  someone to have to resign and it there should be a process but at the same time understand again like the lady said training that this is a real thing sexual harassment is a real thing so we need to look into it if there's any way to prevent it let's prevent it but if you feel like you're a victim you should be able to come forward and talk about it so i think professional women are going to feel more empowered to come forward but i'm really still very concerned about women in the low wage workforce waitresses other temp the workers because for them you know it's a matter of it it's a matter of losing their job not being losing their home hours so imbalanced yeah we're going to quality is just so tremendous that reporting it is just sort of not possible in many ways in their minds so i think the bystander training would be helpful in that situation if you have more people in that environment who says yes this is what's happening in the company will have to respond to many people and then they witnessed it or maybe we have to become like the police and just wear body cammies all the time things that we have sometimes it's the one who they know will never complain yeah right and who actually does complain really shocked by it ok but i think oftentimes by the time they get to that point where they have to make a i've i was talking to prior to this taping and you know the question that nobody that's a really unpopular question but what is there something that women are doing we're not being taken seriously enough because there's still income inequality obviously there's still harassment so is there something we can do how can we you know what can we look to ourselves and say ok i can do this differently and then i'm going to be treated differently we run for office and we get elected and we make a change i think that's what we can do because it's going to be too difficult to try to change some what we have to do but if we're you know for madge in a better future right exactly but let's blue sky right let's break the ceiling well as i said i could probably talk to you for about five hours we could probably do a ten part series but we have on the show please visit us on the website pro se nation dot org i'm mary lynn she often see you in the future