"Please Read: Member Advisory" Topic

Thanks Murphy, I needed that!

Actually, if TMP utilized Cafe Press for T-Shirts, Mugs, etc., I'd buy. Might be a way to increase 'sales' and awareness and help get us to 4.0.

Can we get over the fact that so many people think the editors are "pretty"? They're here to work, and they have a right to be introduced to the community. There seems to be a double standard, since I doubt anyone would object to a picture of a guy in a T-shirt.

Never "objected", just asking "why bother"?

Cute, Pictors, but you're missing the point. Those joints have all established up front what their "dress codes" are, and people have an idea what they're going to see when they go there. There is no place so "laid-back" that there is no line you can cross that would get you thrown out. Every single bar, dive, pub, or club on earth has got SOMETHING that the owner and patrons will hate, whether it's failing to wear a tie, not wearing pants, harassing the bartender, crapping on the pool tables, knifing the staff, or holding a prayer circle on the dance floor. That's called having standards, and no matter how "high" or "low" they're set, everyone's got them.

This whole flap had been because something new and unexpected (for here) came along, and the community is trying to establish or clarify what the standards are.

Excellent Point.

Joes Shop – I am not wading back through various threads of complete garbage and nonsense to find specific comments unless you are that desperate I do so. Look how many people jumped in without thinking and immediately attacking Raglan. As it is, I stated I thought he was wrong, whilst I may disagree with Bill at times, I'd never accuse him of grooming under age women, or men, sheep, goats etc, I just pointed out I think the whole thing could have been handled better, as have many. However, any time someone on here does criticise TMP or Bill, even if with a justified point that Bill acknowledges and discusses, the usual suspects are straight there chest thumping, promising to buy a membership/extend it or saying Bill's house, Bill's rules without fully bothering to read the points raised. Bill is not above criticism, he is fallible like all of us (except God should he/she/it exist). Does that clarify what I mean? Oh, and I used to happily pay a membership myself so it's not like I've not put my money where my mouth is myself here.

Alien: understood now that you have explained it, point taken.

Regards,

J. P. Kelly

The whole Selfie thing is a non-issue for me. The Selfie was a generational practice that has gone mainstream. I used to be surprised at the Selfies people would tie to their professional profile via social media.

I think it is just a societal change as it was with say tattoos 15- 20 years ago.

cheers J.P :D no hard feelings my end, I wasn't clear first post. (it's that being fallible thing ya see ;-p )

Alien: same here.

Why was my attempt to add a little levity to try and lighten up this obvious attempt by some ex-members to attack Bill Snipped? It's just empty threat that will go nowhere fast. Robert

Check your PMs – I already sent you an explanation.

Dear Gearhead,

Most people think sexual harassment means the unwelcome or inappropriate promise of rewards in exchange for sexual favors. That would be its legal definition in most of the U.S., so it's not surprising that men who work for American companies and have some degree of responsability in those understand that definition and think it's the only one.

But a wider and more sociological definition is this:

"Sexual harassment is bullying or coercion of a sexual nature."

When you FORCE women to adhere against their will to what you consider to be an "appropriate" dress code or behavior code, you are also sexually harassing them.

My aunt won a legal victory in Wisconsin decades ago on this very principle. Schools were firing or forcibly retiring female teachers who became pregnant because this was not "appropriate behavior" for the classroom.

Sure, today you're probably not going to get called out in court for insisting your employees up their decolage, but shouldn't the bigger point be protecting women's freedoms and rights and not "protecting women" as if they were not adults or rights-bearing individuals?

Under that understanding of "sexual harassment", which is the basis for most laws about it, what Bill needs to worry about legally is the first definition. What he should worry about MORALLY AND POLITICALLY is the second.

What this means is letting those women decide for themselves what is appropriate and what isn't, not deciding for them, as long as it doesn't break the law.

"Sexual harassment" is also you, Gearhead, telling women they NEED to do this or that for "their own safety". Women can decide for themselves what their own safety is.

I know you work in a complex field where you're dealing with an awful lot of people with bad impulse control, Gearhead. Advising women that they might want to take that into account is a great move. Forcing them to dress the way you think they need to dress is coercion and sexual harassment.

There's a couple things you might want to take into consideration here…

First of all, those guys with the poor impulse control? They are the problem, not your female employees. They are the ones whose behavior needs to be modified and censored, not your employees. If one of them is an Islamic or Christian lunatic with stone-age ideas about women, it does not follow that your female employees should be forced to wear veils "for their own security" because of this guy's problem.

Secondly, in spite of what you might have been taught as a kid and have spent your whole life believing, clothes do not cause women to be raped: attitudes cause women to be raped. If you're dealing with violent people with poor impulse control, you're probably being charged by the State to modify those people's attitudes, NOT the attitudes of your female employees.

Finally, I very much doubt that you even think about – let alone have rules dealing with – male on male sexual harassment. I doubt your company charges male employees to avoid wearing tight-fitting clothing or prohibits them from showing their well-developed arm muscles "their own safety", even though if we were to take your argument logically ("poor impulse control leads to sexually-based violence"), there's no reason whatsoever to suspect that men are somehow "protected" from this, just by being men.

"Sexual harassment" is not some sort of warped, blanket call to impose a western form of purdah on female employees.

Obviously, dress codes are a part of work. If you can indeed show that you need a dress code for reasons of professionalism, fine. Hooters does the same, after all. Suggesting that women's clothing needs to be somehow more restrictive (or less) than men's is sexual harassment.

And, in fact, someone could make a legal case around just this sort of thing, if they could show that "sexually revealing" men's clothing, more or less equal to that which you're censoring for women, was tolerated in your workspace.

Now to get back to what a sexual harassment policy should really do:

It should protect adults from UNWANTED and INAPPROPRIATE sexual advances.

It needs to focus on the perpetrators of these advances as the problem, not on the people who receive them.

While, sure, the people who receive these advances should be duly warned when they engage in behavior that might attract such advances, they are ADULTS and their constitutional rights cannot be abridged by your notions of what you need to do to protect them from themselves.

Bill needs to put his editors' complaints and suggestions up front as his first priorty. His second priority should be cracking down on guys who MAKE innapropriate sexual advances on the editors, ESPECIALLY when they complain to him.

In other words, the primary power over what is and is not considered to be sexual harassment should be in the young editors' hands, not yours or Bill's.

There's another thing that should be brought up here, which people are tip-toeing around and which I'll just toss in everyone's faces: racism and colonialism.

It seems to me that there are a lot of really condescending attitudes being expressed about the Editors that are getting a lot of their emotional "oomph" from some pretty nasty unexamined prejudices about "non-Western" and "Asian" women in general.

One of the first of these is the ideas that because these women look very young to eyes trained to Western European and American physical standards, they needs must be treated like children because they are "innocent" and "inexperienced" and "not aware of how we do things".

The other is that, somehow, as "non-European" and "non-American" women, the Editors are somehow exceptionally vulnerable to "sexual exploitation" or "trafficking", which seems to be Lord Raglan's position and which is utter .

"Sexual exploitation" is just another synonym for "sexual harassment", with perhaps a more operative and profit-making charge. We've already dealt with what that is, above.

Let's get to what "trafficking" means, then.

Trafficking is using coercion (including false promises) to get people to move from point A to point B so that they can be exploited in situations that resemble slavery.

This is the United Nations' rock bottom definition of trafficking, not "'non-Western' women being talked about in a sexual context'."

If Lord Raglan and people like him are concerned about trafficking and sexual exploitation, then they shouldn't be wasting people's time trying to stretch those two definitions to meaninglessness by applying them to everything under the sun.

This "grooming" thing, to my mind, is particularly noxious and reveals some pretty deep racist presumptions on Raglan's part.

"Grooming" is what monkeys do. Adult human beings "flirt".

Flirting happens all the time, whether it's appropriate or not. To my mind, it's very suspect when you see a [presumably] white guy flirting with an adult Asian woman and you dehumanize this behavior by applying a term to it that's straight out of primatology.

Now, is TMP a proper forum for flirting?

How is Bill supposed to know or repress what is and isn't flirting? Should he care if two gay TMP men start flirting? Should he censor them? What if, say, a female gamer starts flirting with her husband using the TMP board because she's at a convention in SF and he's home in Salt Lake City?

Does the fact that she's married suddenly give her a "pass"?

Why should it?

And what if she wasn't married? What it were just her boyfriend? What if it were a guy she met at a con and wanted to hook up with in the future?

Is all of this now going to be censored because Bill is supposed to keep people from "inappropriate" flirting on the TMP because it somehow leads to sexual harassment?

What all this boils down to is this:

Legally, Bill needs to do what he can to protect his employees from unwanted sexual advances. This means, concretely, listening to them and taking steps to squelch such behavior in TMP members, when it occurs and is pointed out to him by his employees.

He has no legal requirement WHATSOEVER to keep his employees from flirting. In fact, Bill would be completely legally within bounds to let his employees flirt as much as they like while STILL canning TMP members who respond to this, if their response angers or upsets his employees.

This is the point several people were bringing up regarding bars: there is no constitutional or legal requirement to make any working place assexual. There IS a legal requirement to react to what one's employees understand to be sexual harassment.

Bill has a huge latitude to establish the work guidlines he wishes and as long as he makes those clear to employees and responds to what they point out as harassment, he is on very solid legal ground. Like Hooters, he could have his employees dress up in shorts and t-shirts if he likes and they agree to it. Hell, he could even put them in bikinis and post a picture of themselves with every edit.

Note to Editors: I am in no way suggesting Bill do this and I would find it horrible if he did. I'm sure he's not even contemplating anything like that. I'm just making a legal point: if he decided to it and that was clearly stated as part of the job and you agreed to it, such a "work uniform" would have no bearing whatsoever, positive or negative, on later charges of sexual harassment laid against Bill or the TMP "customers". Sexual harassment continues to be defined by perpatrators' acts, not by the victim's clothes or even their acts.

Yeah, I know it's simpler for puritan professionals to simply try to ban sex from the workplace. That, in and of itself, is another form of sexual harassment, however. More importantly, it doesn't protect the company legally and it CERTAINLY doesn't "protect the women".

What bothers me the most about this is that we haven't heard word one from the women themselves. When did they stop having a public voice in this debate?

Of course, maybe they don't WANT to say anything and that's cool, too.

But it's worrisome that every seems to think we should be talking ABOUT them, as if they were precious little objects, rather than WITH them. Especially when 90% of "everyone" in this context is cis-gendered white guys above 30 who live in Western Europe or North America.

Thanks Macunamia,

This is a very good explanation and makes perfect sense. It is a relief that the law hasn't gone crazy and that the common sense still prevails.

Good to know that the bullies will not win!

Secondly, in spite of what you might have been taught as a kid and have spent your whole life believing, clothes do not cause women to be raped: attitudes cause women to be raped.

Odd, no-one brought up rape. I'm glad you used the word "might," or I'd be ed as all hell at your presumption. Rape is a topic about which I have no sense of humor and zero patience for anyone who wants to play "blame the victim.

And we HAVE heard from some of the new Editors about all this.

I responded to some of your other points in a different thread.

Dear Gearhead,

I was responding to this comment of yours:

"In my own work, our supervisor periodically has to take an intern aside and gently suggest that they not display so much cleavage, leg, midriff, etc. This is due in part to potential risk from our clientele (some of whom have impulse control problems, issues with misogyny, are sexual predators, or just downright creepy,)…."

It's your supervisor doing that, not you, so I stand corrected. However, it seems that you are OK with your supervisor's attitudes there and you indicate that you disapprove of the women who find them presumptuious.

Is this not true, or is that another presumption on my part?

Because what it very much looks like you're saying is that at your job, women are forced to change their dress habits because of your clients' misogynist attitudes and "poor impulse control".

Let's not say "rape". Let's put it this way: your female colleagues are not responsible for your clients bad attitudes or poor impulse control.

Ah, gotcha. Outright rape is unlikely in our setting, but there are a whole host of other things that can happen, none of which are particularly helpful. But yeah, it can be problematic, and it really is best to minimize potential issues. You also need to consider the other bit, where I mention other things like their credibility and clinical effectiveness.

It's not at all misogynous, because it applies to all genders I settings like this. I honestly do believe that a big part of the problem is that women get most of the social/media/whatever pressures to dress more flashy, and therefore encounter more clash between what fashion tells them and what professionalism requires. So you're correct in that I do agree with the supervisor's actions in such instances, but I interpret it quite differently from the way you do.

It really is careless (and dangerous) to pass it off as being all on the clients, with no expectation of workers doing due diligence. If you know someone's struggling with something, it's not a good idea to wave it at them and say it's entirely their problem; it's best to avoid pushing problem buttons until someone's in a better condition to deal with it. Think if someone were trying to kick an addiction, and a friend comes over and starts using in front of them!

Again, women are not responsible for other folks' prejudices. If someone can't find them "credible" unless they're over 40, ugly, or in nuns' habits, that's not your female employees' fault and they shouldn't be punished for it.

I really don't think it applies to all genders in settings like this. The assumed "eye" is a male heterosexual one… a conservative male heterosexual one. That's the eye that you're working to not "disturb" here. So, OK, you're going to ban women wearing short dresses but not men wearing short sleeves. And I bet a guy would have to go way more overboard trying to look "sexual" before the folks at your job noticed it.

Professionalism does not require women to look like nuns. Casual clothes? OK, maybe both sexes shouldn't be wearing them. But I really don't think you or any other man should be telling women what's "inappropriate" in terms of their clothes' perceived sexuality.

That is indeed sexual harassment, strictest sense.

Also, I do not think that normal female behavior can be compared in any way, shape, or form to drug abuse. What a horrible analogy! You are basically saying women should be controlled substances, Gear. Do you REALLY want to be saying that?

I'm not saying that at all, but the analogy, while extreme, still works. But we could be talking about ANYTHING, because people can become addicted to, or have problems with anything. We could be talking about booze, or porn, or sex (with a dizzying variety of types of people/animals/objects, etc,) or gambling, or exercise, or stealing, or adrenaline, or coffee. I'm working with people who simply don't think the way you do. We deal with people whose minds, for whatever reason, are functioning in very different ways from what most people would consider normal or healthy. So why is it that you, who claim that I'm being being offensively over-protective of people -women- who don't need protection, are getting so upset when I say that people can become addicted to them in potentially dangerous and unhealthy ways, just like anything else?

Again: If you KNOW someone has issues with something, be it an addiction, self-destructive behaviors, problems with people of a given sex, color, religion, etc. or controlling impulsive behaviors, why on earth would you not take reasonable precautions against provoking a reaction? You want provide them with an environment that will make them feel more comfortable and able to work on their problems, until later on maybe they can handle things better. There are PLENTY of times that clients of either gender won't work with me because I'm male. They have all kinds of different reasons for doing so. I don't get upset and insist that they work with me no matter what because they're just being prejudiced, and you would probably think I was being a complete jerk if I did (and you'd be right!)

You're blowing what I'm saying out of proportion. WHEN did I ever say people need to dress like nuns, and since when is it "punishing" to ask someone to modify something in their demeanor, dress, or behavior? The simple fact is that, no matter how much everyone says "you can't judge a book by its cover," just-about everyone in the world does exactly that. Yes, it's less than ideal, but it's a balancing act: If I show up to a meeting in Bermuda shorts, flip-flops, and no shirt, with a beard down to my waist, that is absolutely going to affect the way people perceive me, completely irrespective of my actual abilities or experience. And I'M not going to blame them, so instead I'm going to dress and groom to match the occasion, and at least try to meet them halfway.

Oh yeah, and that clinical supervisor I was talking about? She's female, young-ish, liberal, and not at all unattractive. I'm sure she would resent being accused of having a "conservative male heterosexual eye."

Maybe we should break for a bit; there's too much TL:DR flying around.

<edit> Dude, seriously, you really are jumping to too many conclusions about what I'm saying. "Women should be controlled substances"? Really??

No, the analogy doesn't work.

You're effectively saying that your clients can't control themselves when they see women act in a way they deem to be sexual. And you damn well know (or should know) that ANYTHING a person does can be deemed as sexual by a sick mind.

You are implying that women's sexuality is some sort of "drug" from which these clients of yours must be shielded. The question I have is this: what are they going to do when they see regular, normal women on the streets?

I fully accept that these guys don't think the way I do. But if they are that out of control and that dangerous to other people, they shouldn't be walking about, neh?

While it is true that people can become addicted to anything, sex addicxtion has been specifically rejected on many occasions by the APA. And if you're going to stretch addiction to such reidiculous extremes that ANYTHING can be addictive and people who are addicted needs must be protected from the sight of what makes them so sick…, Well, , Gerahead, shouldn't you at least eliminate all the coke machines, coffee machines, computers and what not in your offices, too? And how are you going to deal with adreneline addiction? Or with the folks who are addicted to sex with men?

Sorry, man. You're using very bad pop-psychology to justify your prejudices on this one, I think.

"Women are addictive". Oh, come on!

Oh, and hey, "people of a given color" cause these reactions, too? So do you guys also racial profile your employees, then?

I bet you do something like this: if a client is a racist, you give them someone of a race they feel comfortable working with. You don't say "Gee, Bob, could you be, y'know, less provocatively black/white/asian"?

So why do women get different treatment in this?

I don't think I'm blowing what you said out of proportion at all. I'm not calling for your head or for your institution to be investigated. I AM saying that it is indeed sexual harassment to tell women to "dress less provocatively" because it presumes that female sexuality is exceptionally provocative.

It also assumes that there's some sort of objective line that can be drawn between "provocative" and "not provocative".

Your bosses keep on making assumptions like that and sooner or later, someone's going to land them in court.

"Oh yeah, and that clinical supervisor I was talking about? She's female, young-ish, and not at all unattractive. I'm sure she would resent being accused of having a 'conservative male heterosexual eye.'"

Why? Do you think you have to be ugly or a man to see the world through that sort of a construct?

Why? Do you think you have to be ugly or a man to see the world through that sort of a construct?

No, but it's just one more assumption you're making.

But if they are that out of control and that dangerous to other people, they shouldn't be walking about, neh?

That's an entirely different matter, and one over which I have no control.

You don't say "Gee, Bob, could you be, y'know, less provocatively black/white/asian"?

Quite so: That would be absurd, since that quite clearly is something that you cannot change. Oddly enough, you CAN change your clothes. Quite easily, too.

Your bosses keep on making assumptions like that and sooner or later, someone's going to land them in court.

Another assumption. I'm glad your aunt or whoever was able to win her lawsuit. Litigiousness is definitely the wave of the future!

it presumes that female sexuality is exceptionally provocative.

How many times do I have to repeat myself? It applies to both genders, but because guys don't tend to walk around in miniskirts and low-cut blouses where I come from, that particular issue doesn't tend to arise very often. If a homosexual client felt hot and bothered because one of our guys was wearing too-tight clothing or assless chaps, you can bet he'd be asked to look through his wardrobe for something different.

And if you're going to stretch addiction to such reidiculous extremes that ANYTHING can be addictive and people who are addicted needs must be protected from the sight of what makes them so sick

I can't control what anyone sees or hears, but a humongous part of why what we do is effective (for a given value of effectiveness) is that we provide a place that DOES, in fact, take them out of situations and stimuli that have been so problematic, to give them a chance to work on their issues without being triggered every 2 minutes.

Sorry, man. You're using very bad pop-psychology to justify your prejudices on this one, I think.

Cute. Do you have any idea how many lobbies pester the American Psychiatric Association every time they so much as think about updating the DSM? Anyway, if it helps, we can substitute the word "unhealthily obsessed" for "addicted."

Well, it looks we're not going to find much to agree on about any of this, and I'm sure people are sick of seeing us going back and forth. You go back to thinking I'm a prejudiced, bigoted, chauvinistic *ahem*, and I'll go back to whatever it is I'm doing. If you've got some pointers on a good paint wash technique, though, I'd love to hear it, because my washes never look anything like the pros.

It could have been worse. It could have been link

"Oh yeah, and that clinical supervisor I was talking about? She's female, young-ish, and not at all unattractive. I'm sure she would resent being accused of having a 'conservative male heterosexual eye.'"

Why? Do you think you have to be ugly or a man to see the world through that sort of a construct?

"No, but it's just one more assumption you're making."

If I'm assuming things, why the heck did you bring up the fact that she's female, young and pretty in the first place? What possible relevance could that have to this discussion unless you felt that being those things somehow "innoculates" her against reacting to other female employees with the viewpoint of a conservative old het guy?

"Quite so: That would be absurd, since that quite clearly is something that you cannot change. Oddly enough, you CAN change your clothes. Quite easily, too."

Ah, but you can't change the fact that one is a woman (not easily, at least) and THAT is what's provocative here Gearhead, not theire clothes.

You apparently work in social services so you should know, very well, that it's not the cut of a woman's clothes that causes inappropriate male behavior. Clothes are used as an EXCUSE for that kind of behavior and any type of clothing or lack of it can be so used.

So in fact, from my point nof view (and from that of a judge who knows anything about sexual harassment), you're not protecting your female employees at all by forcing them to change their clothing. In fact, you're not even focusing on what's the real problem, which is your clients' attitudes. IF those attitudes are so harsh that the can't see a woman in a skirt without flipping out, then the question becomes what, exactly are you trying to do?

You're not "curing" them by censoring female employees' dress and you're not protecting your employees. To a reasonable judge, what it might look like is that the folks in charge are in fact trying to impose a differential set of moral values on employees according to their gender.

Your bosses keep on making assumptions like that and sooner or later, someone's going to land them in court.

"Another assumption."

No, that's a PREDICTION, Gearhead. What is it with the word "assumption" and you today?

And yeah, it might not happen. But I'm guessing that given the current climate, society's is going to become increasingly less and less tolerant of the idea that women should have some sort of different set of rules for work than men. Right now, things are about as conservative as they can get without actually regressing into something like fascism. The probable swing is back the other way.

All you need is one supervisor telling some woman to go home and raise her hemlçine on the day that some guy walks in fresh from the gym with muscles bulging under a short-sleeved shirt. You wouldn't notice because you don't like guys. Your cute, young supe won't notice because she's aiming higher in her career and thus thinking about what the conservative folks at the top are thinking about.

But if that women gets that sort of behavior down on record – and we ARE headed for a world of ubiquitous recording – you could indeed have a lawsuit on your hands.

None of this is a threat or an "assumption": it's just a nudge to get you to think about what sexual harassment laws are really supposed to do. They aren't there to de-sexualize the work place or workers: they are there to give workers a tool to fight back against unwanted intrusions of a sexual nature.

And this is, to me, a great indication of how badly you miss this whole issue of the two sexes, Gearhead: " guys don't tend to walk around in miniskirts and low-cut blouses where I come from".

I mean, even when you're attempting to imagine these rules applied to guys, you think in terms of low-cut blouses and dresses, as if that's what guys would wear if they were trying to get other guys' attention.

That's how impoverished your eye is when looking at this issue. You can apparently only see women's behavior as provocative because you a priori define "provocative" in terms of women's behavior. You seem to be implying that a guy would have to dress up in drag or at least weart what you call a "douche shirt" before his sexualized behavior would even be perceived by you.

Most gay guys I know? They'd be just as thrilled to see some nice biceps or really built pecs under a perfectly passable shirt. A button opened to show a little chest hair… I nice pair of tight jeans that don't have to be PAINTED on. Stuff you'd probably not even notice but which would be as much appreciated as a low-cut blouse would be by straight guys.

There's a whole spectrum of male sexual behavior out there that simply doesn't get codified as "unacceptable" the way female behavior does because it's largely het straight guys – or people thinking in their terms – who make up these rules.

Yeah, I do have a notion how many lobbies pester the APA when they change the DSM. In this last edition, there was a huge lobby of pop-psych people who believe in sex addiction pestering the APA to include that. There was no lobby, as far as I have heard, pushing for the opposite. So I very much doubt the APA's decision not to include sex addiction was based upon politics. Very much the opposite, in fact.

And no, changing the word really doesn't help in this case because, as you know, the underlying biological mechanism is exactly the same.

There are huge social, political and historical reasons for perceiving sexuality as dangerous and in need of control. That's what's really going on out there with these debates over "sex addiction", "trafficking", "homosexuality" and "sexual exploitation". And always, always, always the controls don't come down equal on everyone. They tend to be emplaced upon sexual minorities and women (who can also be deemed a "minority" in the sense that they hardly have any political say in the laws which are passed over their bodies).

No, I do not think you are bigoted, chauvinist, or an (wanna talk about "assumptions"?) I DO think that you carry about a good handful of relatively unexamined prejudices regarding women and sexuality. I DO think that your work's dress codes lean more towards censoring and controling women's behavior than giving them tools to fight back against unwarranted sexual advances. In fact, given what you've said to me, I say you guys are way more interested in protecting your clients than your workers… Which is understandable, laudable and actually quite noble, given the current political climate.

But what your employers DO NOT do is protect people from sexual harassment.

And that is the main reason why, in the final analysis, I do not think your employers' codes and rules regarding this are an appropriate guide, in any degree, for TMP's rules.

Another poster, above, brought up the example of the bar and you apparently didn't understand why he did. That's why I entered into this discussion, once again.

What Pictor is trying to say is that standards can be ALOT more relaxed than what you're used to and still be completely legal.

What the legal standards regarding sexual harassment are is excactly what I described them as, above. They do not involve dress codes or even necessarily behavior codes: they involve an employee's ability to make complaints and have those complaints acted upon.

Restricting employees' dress and behavior actually can get you into as much trouble, legally speaking, as not restricting it, ESPECIALLY if there are different codes being employed for men and women.

Both you and Pictor completely failed to grasp the point, and his bar analogy showed that: I am not talking about legality, I am talking about established standards FOR A GIVEN LOCATION. A bar, no matter how relaxed DOES have standards for things like appearance and behavior. There IS a line, somewhere that, if you cross it, you will be asked to leave. Those standards are already in place, and people going there should have some idea of what they're getting themselves into.

All of this started because something new and somewhat unexpected happened here on TMP, where the standards of behavior (I only give a damn about all of this because of how many of the members have been behaving. I have not, in any way, blamed the new editors, and all I have done is said that perhaps some standards -not particularly restrictive ones- should be set for them so that their positions and professional credibility be maintained.

I am tired of having everything I say getting blown out of proportion. I am tired of being accused of sexual harassment, Puritanism, or having a stick jammed up my digestive tract for having the unmitigated gall of saying that people might be asked to modify their behavior now and then. You and I are not going to agree on anything in this discussion. Whether you like it or not, the sort of laxity that you're advocating would be foolish at best, and criminally negligent at worst in a setting like the one in which I work. I'm sorry if that offends your PC sensitivities, but you're obviously not going to see it any differently.

So, as I was saying, I've tried all sorts of washes and application techniques, but I just can't seem to get that nice shade transition that the really good painters get. Often it winds up looking dirty, or even not very dark in the recesses, even when I try multiple applications and applying locally like a paint. Maybe I'm just not using enough applications?

Ok, I lost it after one point and couldn't be bothered reading all of it.

So Macunaima,

1) equating women wearing short skirts and mend wearing short sleeves, it is a stupid analogy. Women do not find it titillating when men wear short sleeves. Men do find it titillating when women wear short skirts. But an rate, lets turn the item of clothing to the same are of the body, your example was false reasoning. Both women and men wearing short sleeves is accepted in a professional environment. But even in Australia, where it is really hot in summer, men do not wear shorts. Similarly short skirts are unprofessional for women.

btw, I only ever changed my dress code at work one, when I was sexually harassed by a woman. One example of many being when I had a cold, she said "I wish I could rub the vicks on that chest". I started wearing higher necklines. I eventually went into her office and told her to stop it or I would take it further. She ended up being asked to resign, I didn't make a complaint, but someone after me did.

2) your definitional of sexual harassment is wrong. Perhaps here lies the problem. Women in the office should be treated as professionally as men are. They deserve respect. Now some working relationships are more open than others and boundaries need to be established.

Sexual harassment can be such things as making off colour jokes, making sexist or demeaning comments about women, acting in ways which sexualise the woman. None of these can be considered asking for sexual favours in promise of advancement (Though it is a major factor in the worst case.

My Dad was sexist, and when I was younger always made comments about women being bad drivers, or women being this or that. he demeaned women. If it was a work environment I could have claimed harassment. As it was my dad, I eventually told him (in my late 20s), that I was a women, and I would appreciate he didn't make those sorts of comments round me. He stopped. btw I didn't go to Uni when I left highschool, because he didn't believe women needed an education.

You need to look out of your definition of sexual harassment

Interesting.

I cannot believe this tripe. The Editor has a few young women employed as Editors and all this trash erupts.I actually saw the pics of the young women in question and then instantly started a new topic and forgot about it cos I didn't think owt of it( oh the topic was why are modern historians lowering the Towton dead, totalled 109 posts, is this a record Bill, just wondered )

After reading what lord raglan said I really cannot blame Bill for his reaction, this is one of best forums and is a great place to come and share debates and topics compared to other forums where the mentality is juvenile at best.

Bill most of us are behind you so keep up the work cos you got a great forum here

Thanks, whiterose!

As long as I am back here temporafrily, Mrs. Pumblechook, let me respond to your post – particularly in light of the on-going brou-ha-ha over the editors.

It is quite obvious that you didn't read a dmaned thing of what I wrote before you responded. If you had, you'd know that I wasn't using WOMEN'S response to men in short shirts as my primary example.

Just can't get around that heteronormative thinking sometimes, I guess.

But what is really damned silly is that your own example shows that women can and do sexually harass people. Why you think it is unlikely/impossible that they would sexually harass men, then, is something that makes no sense.

And no, my definition of sexual harassment is NOT wrong – which you'd quickly learn if you would actually read it.

Yes, it can be many things. But holding women to a dress or behavioral code that is DIFFERENT than that of men is definitely sexual harassment.

And no, "sexual harassment" doesn't mean "any time sex comes up in the work place". It DOES mean sexualizing men or women. It also doesn't mean "the State gets to decide whether someone can have a sexuality or not". It means giving workers the right to grievance when they feel that they have been unduly sexualized.

Look up the laws, Ms. Pumblechook. And read what a person writes through to the end before you react to it.

YouTube link

Wow. This train just will NOT stop crashing.