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Sexual Harassment 101....

By Lafe Tolliver, Esq
Guest Column

      The hottest talk show topic today is sexual harassment and who may be the next big name to fall under the public glare of being a harasser, male or female.

      While the current focus of the political world is spotlighting the accused pedophile senatorial candidate Roy Moore of Alabama, the Democrats have also been hit with their own sexual harassment scandal with the acknowledgement that Senator Al Franken is now contrite over his sexual hijinks with a female actress which groping happened before he became a US senator.
 


Lafe Tolliver, Esq

      Sexual harassment is the new taboo of today and people in media, politics, business and religious circles are being ousted by victims of a crime that the harasser thought would never see the light of day.

      But...victims are now finding their voices and are standing up and calling out names and events even if the scandalous harassment took place decades ago. The shame and angst of being a victim of a sexual predator or harasser is life long and the emotional scarring and mental degradation can stay around until they put the grave marker over your tomb.

     Of course, you will notice that President Trump is strangely silent on tweeting about the current crop of harassers since over 16 women have accused him of sexual

harassment; and for him to state anything against a fellow harasser would be a boomerang ready to knock him upside his head.

      Yet, somehow his 16-plus accusers got no traction in having him to step down from running for the White House. His class of voters put on their blinders and covered their ears in cement earplugs and rallied for him in spite of his own sordid confession that he was a P***y Grabber of the first degree.

     Why, even white evangelicals voted in huge numbers for Trump in spite of his moral depravity because they too went ' a whoring after gods' in order to get Trump elected simply due to his promise to appoint justices to the US Supreme Court who would rule against abortion.

     The good ol' days (according to affluent white males) were the past decades wherein women and minorities were treated as mere appendages to the powers that be and their lives and aspirations were deemed marginal at best.

     Back in the day, if you wanted to get along, you had to play along and sometimes that "play along" meant sexual harassment or worse; and for people of color it meant outright denial of meaningful job opportunities.

     And if such chances were allowed, it could mean cruel and despicable treatment on the job by management and racist commentary from spiteful co-workers.

      But for the enactment of several pieces of civil rights legislation, which was formed in the grinding crucible of marches, demonstrations and outright murder of activists, the tragic truth is that not a lot would have changed if one had to wait on the largesse of white society (meaning the rule of white males) embracing the inherent value of people of color and the dignity of the woman in the work place.

      Sexual harassment is not hard to spot, smell, taste or hear. It is both creepy, as in Roy Moore's fetish to date nubile teenage girls and also sublime as when the employer tells an attractive single woman that a plum job promo depends upon her willingness to stay late at night working alone with the boss.

     Sexual harassment is about power...male power to subjugate a woman or a man into a subordinate position for the pleasure or ego of the offending male or female subjugator.

     A sexual predator is keenly able to gauge the steps he or she needs to take in order to bend the will of his or her intended prey to do their vile bidding...even the asking of an "innocent' kiss can be the lead off act to other offensive sexual intrusions.

     A sexual predator will keep on asking and pushing and coercing and pleading and threatening until he gets his way with his intended victim or the victim wises up and leaves the offensive environment.

     Sexual predators are able to "morph" their deviant personalities so that when they are caught or accused, they howl their innocence to the wind and employ all kind of mental and emotional tactics to act as if they are the real victim.

     They will lie, lie and then lie some more and always deny and deflect their aberrant conduct to the other party so as to indicate that the victim is to blame for what they did!

    So, with that in mind, indicate whether the following scenarios are incidents of sexual harassment:

(1) Male supervisor tells the new female interns that he needs to meet with each one, one on one, to determine their fitness for the job and to see whether they can take the stresses of the job. The interviews are at a local hotel at 8 PM sharp.

Yes....No.

(2)  At the job site, male co workers harass a female worker by drawing obscene pictures on her lunch box and locker and when caught, they claim it is just locker room "fun"...no one got hurt; and it was to initiate the new worker into the job.

Yes...No.

(3)  Your boss gives you work to do but somehow he always winds up being very close to you while you work and you find his eyes always looking at your blouse for long period of times.

Yes...No.

(4)  You are a new hiree as a truck driver for a express delivery service. In the service bay area, the shop has dozens of photos of nearly nude women hanging in plain sight.

You protest to the manager but he says, "you are too thin skinned...lighten up!"

Yes...No.

(5)  You work at a desk that has no front panel to it. Your male co workers have a bad habit of walking in front of your desk and for some odd reason, they drop their pencil and they have to bend down and look under your desk to retrieve the pen. When they rise up, they are always smirking.

Yes..No.

(6)  An older employee, around 80 years old,  has his desk near the water cooler and when you come by and bend over to get a paper cup for a drink, he always blurts out, "Oh... to be 30 again!"

Yes...No.

(7)  When you come into work and hang up your coat, your boss always compliments you on your wardrobe and hairstyle. You nervously smile and ask her to stop because it makes you feel uncomfortable but she continues. You need this job and you decide to tune her out and do your job.

Yes...No.

    If you are the victim of unwanted comments or physical touching and your company is tone deaf as to what is happening in the work place, you need to make some noise about it or regrettably be quiet and take it. You have value and worth...take a stand!

 

Contact Lafe Tolliver at tolliver@juno.com

    

 
   
   


Copyright © 2017 by [The Sojourner's Truth]. All rights reserved.
Revised: 08/16/18 14:12:36 -0700.


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