Employers are obliged to sexually harrass female staff

[anitram]

So says a Russian judge.

The unnamed executive, a 22-year-old from St Petersburg, had been hoping to become only the third woman in Russia's history to bring a successful sexual harassment action against a male employer.

She alleged she had been locked out of her office after she refused to have intimate relations with her 47-year-old boss.

"He always demanded that female workers signalled to him with their eyes that they desperately wanted to be laid on the boardroom table as soon as he gave the word," she earlier told the court. "I didn't realise at first that he wasn't speaking metaphorically."

The judge said he threw out the case not through lack of evidence but because the employer had acted gallantly rather than criminally.

"If we had no sexual harassment we would have no children," the judge ruled.

Since Soviet times, sexual harassment in Russia has become an accepted part of life in the office, work place and university lecture room.

According to a recent survey, 100 per cent of female professionals said they had been subjected to sexual harassment by their bosses, 32 per cent said they had had intercourse with them at least once and another seven per cent claimed to have been raped.

Eighty per cent of those who participated in the survey said they did not believe it possible to win promotion without engaging in sexual relations with their male superiors.

Women also report that it is common to be browbeaten into sex during job interviews, while female students regularly complain that university professors trade high marks for sexual favours.

Only two women have won sexual harassment cases since the collapse of the Soviet Union, one in 1993 and the other in 1997.

Gals, we've come so far.

 

[yolland]

And we thought the Saudis were backwards...

 

[MrsSpringsteen]

That's so depressing

 

[BVS]

 

[Harry Vest]

And we thought the Saudis were backwards...

THEY ARE.

 

[Caroni]

Sexual harassment "accepted"

 

[Diemen]

THEY ARE.

Boy, I wasn't sure before, but since you used caps lock I'm now convinced.

 

[Pearl]

THEY ARE.

How does this relate to sexual harassment in Russia?

 

[MrsSpringsteen]

It doesn't

 

[Irvine511]

it almost reads like an Onion article.

 

[Zoots]

it almost reads like an Onion article.

Seriously! I cannot believe this is a serious article.

It's gotta be a joke, surely.

 

[A stor]

Joining a convent or doing my boss? I would gladly dedicate my life to God!

 

[BrownEyedBoy]

Yes, it's terrible, but I think it would be more important to discuss how something like this could possibly be fixed. Can you really change a whole culture of men and their alread formed mindsets? They are working within their rights and because usually employee's promotions are subjective then they can very easily explain it by saying that they don't believe the employee deserves a promotion.

I can't think of a way for this to be regulated.

 

[Irvine511]

I can't think of a way for this to be regulated.

activist judges?

 

[yolland]

from an American Bar Association report (.pdf) on women's rights in Russia and its compliance with the UN convention on women's rights:

...There is no law in Russia that specifically prohibits sexual harassment in the workplace, as either a violation of safety standards or as a form of discrimination. Forcing someone to perform sexual acts through the use of treats, blackmail or by taking advantage of the dependant status of the victim, however, is criminalized and, theoretically, applies to some forms of sexual harassment in the workplace. There are no legal requirements that employers take measures to prevent the occurrence of sexual harassment at work.

...a review of classified advertisements in one of Russia’s largest newspapers revealed such language as “Personal secretary to the Director. Young woman, attractive, slender...” and “Secretary, young woman from 19-35, attractive, good figure, with attractive features, pleasant voice...” Such advertisements appear to be unregulated and, as mentioned above, even Federal Employment Centers classify job openings in their databases by sex and age.

...Sexual harassment in the workplace is a widespread but little acknowledged problem in Russia. Because no official data on the problem exist, it is difficult to determine the extent to which women experience sexual harassment. NGOs which operate telephone hotlines and offer crisis services report that women call to talk about this issue, but often don’t recognize the problem as sexual harassment per se. However, an NGO which temporarily operated a hotline devoted to the problem received up to 100 calls a month from women about sexual harassment. Although sexual harassment seriously effects the workplace environment, it is not conceived of as an issue of employee safety. For example, the Labor Inspectorate does not include the issue of sexual harassment in its work although it does monitor such issues as maternity leave and benefits which primarily concern women. Respondents described incidents of sexual harassment, ranging from inappropriate comments, to proposals of sex and even sexual assault, but many noted that the problem itself is little understood, even by victims. A number of myths about sexual harassment prevail, for example, that women should enjoy such attention, that this is normal male behavior, that sexual services may be unofficially included among one’s job duties and that women use sex as a way to advance in their careers. The lack of a legal definition for sexual harassment, combined with a lack of media attention (or occasional press reports that are sensationalized or inaccurate), means that very few cases of sexual harassment are ever litigated. Victims themselves are often reluctant to pursue legal recourse, due to lack of awareness about their rights, the difficulty of proving a case and fear of losing their job. In fact, many women simply leave their place of employment if sexual harassment occurs.

Sounds like the law itself needs an overhaul before they're ready for activist judges.

 

[martha]

I can't think of a way for this to be regulated.

We've managed to do just that here in the states.

 

[kafrun]

"If we had no sexual harassment we would have no children," the judge ruled.

..um.. whut?

 

[MrsSpringsteen]

One small step for women, one giant leap for sexism

By Ellen Goodman | August 22, 2008

ONCE MORE we prepare to honor our foremothers by celebrating the anniversary of the passage of women's suffrage. Each year, in advance of Aug. 26, our one-woman committee gathers to hand out the Equal Rites Awards to those stalwarts who have done the most in the past year to set back the cause of women.

What to say of the last 12 months? This is the year girls finally caught up with boys in math achievement. And the year women finally achieved equality with men in job losses. This year we had the first serious female contender for the White House. And all she will end up with at the convention is a roll call vote.

But enough of all that. The envelopes please.

We begin with the highly competitive Blind Justice Award. This usually goes to some worthy American, but a Russian judge swept ahead of the pack when he ruled against a woman's charge of sexual harassment. "If we had no sexual harassment," he said, "we would have no children." We send this judge the blindfold to use as a gag.

Can he lend it to a French colleague? In Lille, a judge granted an annulment to a Muslim groom because his bride was not a virgin, "single and chaste." For this, he wins the Taliban Wannabe Prix, with a side order of freedom fries and our hope that he will not permit stoning on the Champs-Élysées.

Back on this side of the Atlantic, the Fashion Victim Award goes to Wrangler Jeans for ads that display women as half-dressed corpses. Ah, yes, homicide is so chic! Dead is the new black! Our prize is a sword thrust through their profit margin.

Sex and violence sell in the virtual world as well. The makers of "Grand Theft Auto IV" win the Raging Hormonal Imbalance Trophy for training men how to have interactive intimacy with prostitutes and then murder them. They call this a game.

Meanwhile, in the online girlworld, the Post-Feminist Booby Prize goes to those wondrous creators of "Miss Bimbo." This game encourages bimbos-in-training to buy their avatars everything from sexy lingerie to face lifts and breast implants, thereby producing "the hottest, coolest, most famous bimbo in the whole world." You go, bimbo!

Do I hear the sound of a backlash? The Backlash Award goes to Washington University, which gave an honorary degree to Phyllis Schlafly for leading the charge against women's rights. What's next, honoraries for segregationists?

Alas, we hoped to retire the Tammy Wynette Stand by Your Man Award. But there was Silda standing by Eliot Spitzer when New York's then-governor had his taste in prostitutes revealed. And what to say about the admired Elizabeth Edwards? She didn't do the perp's wife's walk, but didn't she enable John to think he could still be president? We send these wives our disappointment.

This leads us to the Dubious Equality Award for the person who wins the most suspect equal right. Our winner is Thomas Beatie, nee Tracy, who gave birth after a sex-change operation, thereby dubbing himself the first man to have a baby. This is not what we mean by shared parenting.

What's next on the baby front? Tarted-up tots? The Our Bodies, Our Daughters Citation goes to those fetishists selling stilettos for baby girls. Hey guys, they're babies, not babes. Get thee to the foot binder.

Or the football field. Our Superstars of Sexism Prize goes to those Jets fans - you know who you are - who spend halftime lined up, whistling and demanding that women display their breasts. For this brain malfunction you get a chauvinist pigskin.

Which reminds us of the Media Ms.-Adventure Award. With Hillary-misogyny all around, we picked our winners from opposite ends of the radio dial. The right-wing Rush Limbaugh insisted that Americans wouldn't want to watch a woman aging in the White House. The left-wing Randi Rhodes called the senator a "big [expletive] whore." Their prize is spending the rest of the election locked together in one studio.

Finally, dishonorable mention to all those with bumper stickers reading "Life's a Bitch, Don't Elect One." We cover them with the final words of Susan B. Anthony: "Failure Is Impossible."

 

[martha]

I Ellen Goodman.