Sexual harassment in the office is usually a little more subtle these days compared to the blatant skirt-chasing on Mad Men, but there's no question it still exists. Whether it's in the form of inappropriate comments over instant messenger, email, text message, or in person, Forbes points out that a flirtatious "omg, u look gr8" can land someone in a ton of trouble and possibly cost them a job. Has a colleague ever crossed the boundaries of appropriate office behavior?
Photo courtesy of AMC
Free People
Not a coworker, but I did get sexually harassed by my former boss. He was what you'd call a "dirty old man" and sometimes he would make very inappropriate comments to me and some of the other women I worked with. Once, I was talking to him and he reached over and tucked my bra strap into my shirt and said "Let me fix your shirt...your bra strap is showing". I told him it was inappropriate to touch my person in that way and that I was perfectly capable of fixing my own shirt. There were other isolated incidents like that, but none of us were surprised when he got fired later on for using the company computer to look at and download porn.
1Yes, I have and now that I think about it, it's happened a LOT. An ex-coworker would not stop asking me out even though I blatantly turned him down every single time and I never ever showed the tiniest bit of interest. It got to the point that I was disgusted to even be in his presence. He finally gave up and got a girlfriend elsewhere. And my ex-boss would always grope my arms and one time he touched my thigh while throwing something at the trash bin near my leg. He had some strange comments about my attractiveness... Another one of my ex-coworkers (these people all worked at the same damn place) always had some inappropriate comment for me. Even if it was a compliment, he was extremely slimy and vindictive and even went so far as to very rudely insult me in front of customers one time. Creepy stuff. There are more examples, but you get the idea.
2At my current place of employment, nothing has happened with coworkers and I hope it stays that way.
Yes. I was young college student, freshly graduated from high school. It was a new job, and I was being trained by an experienced co-worker. He was an older, middle-aged man. He was very inappropriate with his hands. In one instance, he touched my bottom. I just came out of high school. Yes, I was 18 years old, but I looked like I was 12. I was inexperienced and innocent about these physical matters. I was confused, baffled, and discomforted by his behavior (to say the least). In hindsight, I think that man took advantage of me.
Well, I was a quick-study. After that awful encounter, I put up some boundaries. I told my supervisor about it (but he laughed it off. It turns out he pursued me later, but that's another story
). So I decided to fend for myself. Whenever that awful co-worker came into a
room, I left it. When he tried to approach me, I gave him the dirtiest look. One time, I stopped him dead in his tracks with my glare (he was walking towards me). 
After some time, he left the department. That was fine by me.
3Our lab director has had numerous complaints about sexual harrassment over the years. I don't know what kind of enthrallment he has over management, because in addition he's a liar, lazy, unprofessional, racist & an morbidly obese slob. I'm happy to be in marketing & avoid the lab as much as possible!
4Almost 50/50? That is terrifying.
Glad some of you did something about it, good for you.
5I was harassed by a former supervisor for not being up to his standards. I was a sophomore in high school and he made no qualms about calling me flat chested and saying he would have slept with me if I had a bigger butt. I regret not suing the pants off of him but I found out that he still worked at the job for at least 2 years after I quit and then was fired when someone else complained about his behavior.
Thinking back on it now I have been sexually harassed at a good number of jobs that I have had. I had one guy ask me out for weeks at a job even though I said no and make sexually charged comments about my clothing and speaking voice on the phone. I had to sit him down and tell him outright that I would never go out with him even if I got rid of my boyfriend.
6There were some double entendres, comments, and touches from this one guy in my office, but fortunately it's all about context: there was mutual attraction and we were on a direct path to dating. But other than that, no. My coworkers have been nothing but highly professional. I work for a powerful female Senator, so that type of behavior would never, ever be tolerated in her office.
7Well i said yes but it wasn't a co-worker sinse I only just graduated highschool and am about to start college but alot of male peers of mine kept harrassing me such as in english class one boy kept touching my thigh and such and another thing they did was repeatedly ask me really innpropriate things i'm not going to mention. One thing that really ticked me off though was a group of boys i don't know felt the need to grab my butt and the most outragous part was that we were in a CHURCH for youth club, i'm not christian but come on!
8Post New Comment
Please share your opinion with our community, but make sure it is on topic and follows our Community Rules. We moderate comments and prohibit personal attacks, threats, spam, lewd images, or the promotion of your personal website.