h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

"The book does suggest that you dress for the job you want rather than the job you have" (Sho)

That makes sense, of course, and I can surely understand people who act this way

It does not help moving society forward to equality, but you have yourself and your own family to think of first, of course

- - -

re 20:

Rules 2 through 5 go for men also and I'm not quite sure about the first

Here we all use christian names and have done so for decades, so that's not a problem

We have maternity leaves for both mothers and fathers, but as long as fathers are not forced by law to take it we will never reach equality

Good advice, WS. Although the bare legs thing is dropping off a bit in summer if your legs are brown and smooth.

I'd add: if you do go the bare-legged route and you wear sandles, make sure your legs/feet are very well cared for.

I'll echo the coffee thing though - I simply never ever make coffee and when I absolutely have to be involved in setting up a meeting, I make sure that I'm either doing the technical stuff, or learning how to do it.
(but then, as I said: I've been there the longest so I have a lot of leeway there especially as the other people are mostly in their 20s and 30s - I do make sure the men take their turn at coffee, setting up drinks/biscuits etc and, very important, clearing the room again afterwards.

3 weeks after a cesarean? blimey. But yes, deffo take sick days. And take your lunch break. Never ever work when nobody can see you do it

I work in the public sector. So I can wear silly hair, and pretty well whatever I like, in the office (obviously I have to look professional when I'm out meeting unsuspecting members of the public ), and I can honestly say sexism doesn't exist. Within the office, that is - unsuspecting members of the public are sometimes rather different. Thinking about it, the sexism in the private sector was one of the main reasons I wanted to get out of it (sorry girls).

But there's currently considerable pressure for the public sector to operate more like the private sector. I wonder if it's possible to do that, without sacrificing the ways in which the public sector far outstrips the private.

Mol

Don't we have two issues floating around here? One is, if you like, 'official', like equal pay, which clearly should be a complete no-brainer, but isn't the issue of banter and who makes the coffee a bit different?

There's 12 people in my team, 3 of which are female. There's no people that never make a drink, one male, one female, the standard rule for everyone else is if you're thirsty, make a drink, and pick up the tray and make everyone else one. No one gets asked to make the tea (except in semi-jest if it's noted that someone's slacking). Office banter? Everyone gets that, there's something everyone can be teased about. Being bald. Being young, having a hole in your ear the size of an old penny, having hobbies outside the mainstream. If everyone gets ragged about something, where's the problem. Helps build an enjoyable working place.

If you take the last start brewing the next. Simple as that

I stick to no bare legs after 25 and I've worked in some very hot countries. Took the stockings/tights off when working out of the public gaze. Wore long cotton skirts in Africa.
When I was 20 (in the early 60s) I had a temp job with the ANZ bank, where I was backstage but told to wear stockings. As a student I said I couldn't afford them - so they bought them for me. They also gave me an enormous bunch of flowers when I finished typing all the share certificates for an issue with no mistakes, and offered me a job post graduation. But my life had taken another turn by then.
They were not actually being sexist- my father had to wear white shirts, even on Saturdays twice a month. He wasn't front of house,
If you want to wear whatever you like, be an IT contractor. The Spearcarrier had a beard in his youth, and when the ultimate boss, one Ross Perot, paid a visit was told that "Mr Perot doesn't approve of beards" to which his reply was "I don't approve of short bigots".

Good answer.

I think we do have two different goals, here. One is about inequality between men and women at work, in terms of equal opportunity for advancement, earnings, and equal treatment - and how to get rid of this inequality.

The other idea is about how individual women can move on to the next wrung of the ladder from where they are now. Sometimes, if it comes at the cost of conforming to the sexist expectations that already exist, this can reinforce the obstacles for women who come after them, by confirming and reinforcing the double standards that already exist.

So they can be complementary questions, in that a break in the glass ceiling is a good thing, but individual advancement and greater equality for women don't always work together.

But what's the best way forward? (Not a rhetorical question).

We're talking about Margaret Thatcher here.
I think I was quite good helping younger women (I still have a few thankyou letters)but I don't suffer fools gladly and the sort of woman who puts on helplessness and flutters her eyelashes is still, alas, too common.

Hmmm, to me, banter is just part of what makes my work fun.

We don't really have much of a dress code, either (except for the guides) - part of the banter was always teasing the former boss about the hole in his jeans through which you could see the colour of his underpants...

There's banter and there's the kind of thing that if it were about someone's religion or skin colour would be flagged early as racism or whatever. For eg, when I was in the army, there were 5 women in my troop of about ... hmm, 40? And 3 black guys. When we had weapon inspection the SSgt would shout: F-troop, weapon inspection! Males SLRs, lumpy jumpers SMG or pistol, F-tribe shake your spears.

Now... in that context, not used too often it could be banter. But in an organisation like that, dominated by white males it does wear very very thing very very quickly. And lumpy jumper wasn't the worst term...

I'm with WS about people pulling the helpless female act, and am sure to send female as well as male (junior) staff to lug up the boxes of copier paper when it's delivered, or other such things. Anyone over 30 is exempt from that, on the grounds that we've all put in our years as office juniors.

But I also insist, no matter who they are, that the person who uses the last coffee makes the next. To the point that I had a quiet word with a senior manager who sent one of the younger women off to do it when he ran out.

a - what a *quiet* word you

oh, all right, if you say so

()

I'm very bad at noticing sexism because I never ever expect it. There's probably far more of it around than I'm ever aware of. I'm also dubious about equality for women, why would I want to stoop that low.

When I worked in Sweden in 2001 I would occasionally empty and re-fill the dishwasher in the kitchen area at work. One of the American men told me it was not a task I should be doing. I'm not sure if that was because it was letting down the sisterhood or if it was because I was letting down him and our band of "International Consultant" brothers.

Either way, if I see a task that needs doing, I'll do it. I don't feel particularly demeaned by pouring tea or handing out donuts, and I don't mind being under-estimated; in fact I find it quite useful.

However, I've been fortunate in that I've never worked in an environment where there is institutionalised harrassment like "lumpy jumpers". I do remember once being at a meal where I was the only woman and wondering whether I should ignore, accept or challenge the generic sexism flowing round the table, and feeling increasingly uncomfortable about it. I can't remember what I did in the end.

The one time I did work in an environment where there was an aggressive atmosphere I just bantered back. Seemed the best thing to do, though it made me rather brassy for a while.

Ben

All of that said, I think I would have been on a higher grade at my most recent employer if I'd been male, and I would certainly have been seen as "strong" (which is a good thing) rather than "over-assertive" (which is a bad thing).

But do you know what? I don't really care enough to mind. It suited me to stay. No-one made me work in IT in the private sector, I was the one that chose that option.

Over the years, I think I've had more prejudice against me for being southern and sounding relatively posh than I've had for being female. One of the things I liked about working with Europeans and Americans was freedom from that particular strand of class prejudice.

I now feel very English in Scotland... Anyone but, etc, etc.

B

*waves to Ben* Nice to see you here

I'm like you - rather pragmatic about things. The dishwasher thing - we have one at work, and if it's not topped up and loaded and switched on during the day, there is too much and the cleaning team don't have time to get through it all. But i stopped being a good team player in respect of doing my bit if I go in the kitchen when I observed that all the men, even the ones who generally aren't sexist at all, just ignore the fact that there are no spare worktops in there and just pile dishes on dishes.

I take my mug home with me and bring a clean one every day because that's, quite frankly, not a fight I'm prepared to have as it does tend to pigeonhole people. (otoh - now I'm considered a "senior" person, on grounds of time served and "rank" I could address it if I really wanted to)

Nobody minds banter - one guy got very close to the mark and I made an equally tasteless remark to him (via MSN) to point out how close it was and to onsider the feelings of the other staff who are not... quite as used to crudity as I am - which to his credit he took well on board.

Had I been a man I would DEFINITELY be a higher grade and have been taken a lot more seriously at work. As it is I reckon I'm lagging about 5 years - but am finally getting there in terms of trust and responsibility.

I definitely don't want the gruesomes to feel, as I and many others in my position do, that they have to be twice as good to even get into the running workwise.

So, as I said before - slowly slowly catchee monkey.

I really look forward to the day when I don't wake up to news headlines such as "WOW! Woman prime-minister in Australia" rather than "new prime minister in Australia"

As do I

We take terms filling and starting the dishwasher. There is a schedule pinned to the wall

More often than not I have had to do this for female co-w*rkers, who forgot...

I guess stuff like this is what man has to live with after decades of struggling for equality - and I live quite well with it

Even if I am older and thus more experienced than most of my colleagues. Did I mention that I am a member of the board?