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A LOOK AT SEXUAL HARASSMENT THAT GOES ON BEHIND THE SCENES OF LOCAL BUSINESSES

CONTENT WARNING: THIS ARTICLE DISCUSSES SEVERAL POTENTIALLY TRIGGERING TOPICS, INCLUDING SEXUAL HARASSMENT, SEXUAL ASSAULT AND EATING DISORDERS

She didn’t know if she wanted to laugh it off or writhe in disgust. Her manager’s persistent remarks about her bathing suit became more and more blatant, and she grew progressively more uncomfortable.

This is sexual harassment. Specifically, verbal sexual harassment. Sexual harassment can be separated into three categories: verbal, visual and physical.

Verbal sexual harassment is defined as anything spoken or written that insinuates sexual or inappropriate behavior. Visual sexual harassment, on the other hand, is slightly more complicated. It is defined not only as unwanted sexual exposure to another person, but also as showing or sending inappropriate or offensive images. Physical sexual harassment is easier to identify than the other two—it is any unwanted touching with sexual intent.

The disturbing reality is that many teens, including those at McLean, face sexual harassment in the workplace. Due to job shortages as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, teenagers across the country are being hired at considerably higher rates—businesses are in desperate need of employees and high schoolers are eager to make money.

THE DARK REALITY

Almost every neighborhood in McLean has a pool, filled with job opportunities for students. With commitments that end when summer does and an opportunity to tan all day, it is a dream job for a lot of teenagers.

Like any job, working at a pool comes with complaints about taking out the trash or cleaning the bathroom. For some employees, however, complaints about tiresome chores seem insignificant compared to the frequent harassment they face.

“There’s a lot of creepy older [male lifeguards] that

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ANA PAULA IBARRARAN MANAGING EDITOR ANDREW CHRISTOFFERSON SPORTS EDITOR

LAINE PHILLIPS MANAGING EDITOR

EMILY FRIEDMAN OPINIONS EDITOR CC PALUMBO OPINIONS EDITOR

prey on the younger girls and make really disturbing comments,” said senior Victoria*, a lifeguard. “One of them was touching girls and made a lot of [disturbing] comments about going to his car, doing stuff after work, and comments about my body.”

The age difference between older employees and teenagers can create a distressing situation. The disparity between management and employees forms an even greater power imbalance.

“[My boss] started making comments about my swimsuits and I was the only girl who was being treated like that,” said senior Becky*, a lifeguard. “He told me that I was going to have a costume malfunction with my bikini and that my bikinis were hard to look at. He said that he didn’t think I should be wearing them anymore.”

Despite this swimsuit being Becky’s uniform, she was verbally harassed by her superior because of the way she looks. The nature of the pool uniform can lead to unwanted comments about the lifeguards’ bodies based on the misconception that revealing outfits are “asking for attention.”

Even without revealing uniforms, employees are still subject to inappropriate comments regarding their clothes and bodies. Restaurants are a common place for verbal sexual harassment to occur.

Senior Kylee Majkowski is a hostess at a local restaurant and constantly receives comments about the way she dresses.

“I’ll be wearing an off-the-shoulder dress or something, and people will be like, ‘You’re just about to bust out of that thing,’” Majkowski said.

While doing table checks on a busy night, a couple enjoying their meal made some comments that rattled her.

“[A man and a woman] stopped me...and the lady asked, ‘What time do you guys usually get out of here?’ So I said, ‘A little while,’ and they responded, ‘Well the reason we’re asking is because we were actually headed to the Ritz Carlton after this to grab some drinks and we were wondering if you wanted to come with us,’” Majkowski said.

Majkowski told the couple she was in high school, yet they persisted. When she was able to get away from the situation, she began to process the encounter and feel

*These names have been changed to protect the anonymity of sources, some of whom continue to work in these locations

*from a poll of 110 McLean students

the weight of what she had just faced.

“I was good for like 10 seconds and then I just totally freaked out and [started] crying,” Majkowksi said. “I went up to my manager and I told him what happened and [told him], ‘I’m going home.’”

Restaurant employees are not only subject to sexual harassment by their customers, but also by their coworkers.

“There’s this one [man], where any time we are working up front, all the girls move to the back because he grabs us by the waist and moves us around,” said senior Jenny*, a bakery worker. “It’s the worst because the managers know about it, and they just don’t do anything.”

At times, a situation can escalate from physical harassment to a potential criminal offense.

“A couple of my friends have been consistently harassed for nudes by this one guy who’s now fired. He was older than us, so it was very scary,” Jenny said.

Sexual harassment is prevalent in all kinds of businesses. Multiple employees at a local hardware store said they reported sexual harassment as well as other inappropriate acts to their manager. One male employee in particular was the source of four complaints from teenage female employees at the store.

“There was this older man who worked there named John who was in his 60s,” senior Sophie Tursi said. “He would ask all the underage girls if they have a boyfriend or if they go to parties.”

Besides his frequent questioning of the teenage female employees, John would regularly make other inappropriate comments and offers. His odd curiosity about their private lives often went beyond uncomfortable questions about their activities.

“[John] asked girls to come over to his house to smoke [marijuana] or drink [alcohol] with him,” senior Alice* said. “A few girls actually went over there.”

His unwelcome advances towards young girls continued for years, but the store failed to take any protective measures for its vulnerable employees.

“I worked there for two and a half years and I complained for two and a half years, but [management] didn’t do anything,” Tursi said.

For restaurant employee Majkowski, sexual harassment seems to come with the territory of having a job.

“Unfortunately, a large part of the real world is there’s always gonna be a creepy old guy who says things that aren’t welcome,” Majkowski said. “It does kind of suck, but at the same time it’s something that, unfortunately, a lot of people just have to get used to.”

DOUBLE STANDARDS

There’s a societal stereotype that women are the only ones affected by sexual harassment. In reality, men experience sexual harassment more frequently than most people realize.

Senior James Ross has been on the receiving end of

THE REVERSED DYNAMIC DEFINITELY AFFECTED HOW THE HARASSMENT WAS RECEIVED. MY MANAGER HAS NOTICED IT A FEW TIMES AND WILL TEASE ME ABOUT IT SHORTLY AFTERWARDS—THE TOLERANCE FOR THAT KIND OF STUFF DIRECTED AT MY FEMALE COWORKERS IS NOTICEABLY LOWER.”

- JAMES ROSS SENIOR

inappropriate comments from multiple women while working as a restaurant host.

“There was this one lady in a wheelchair who picked up her fork, made eye contact with me, and dropped it on the floor. She said, ‘Do you mind getting that for me?’ So I kind of knelt down, and as I was kneeling down, she said, ‘It’s been a while since I’ve had a pretty young man like you down on his knees for me,’” Ross said.

The harassment Ross has faced has also escalated to a physical level.

“There’s a lot of single old ladies who come up and put a hand around my hip [and say things like], ‘Oh, gosh, you have such nice hair, young man.’ They’ll start leaning on the podium and flirting with me and whatnot,” Ross said.

Verbal sexual harassment at work will surprise anyone, but when it is so blatant and unexpected it can be particularly jarring. “A lot of times it’s kind of out of the blue and it takes me a second to realize what they were just saying,” Ross said. “It kind of took a second to register that this 80-yearold woman was hitting on me.”

When male employees are able to recognize and report the harassment they experience to their superiors, their reports are often not handled the same way as those of female employees.

“The reversed dynamic definitely affected how the harassment was received. My manager has noticed it a few times and will tease me about it shortly afterward,” Ross said. “The tolerance for that kind of stuff directed at my female coworkers is noticeably lower.”

Unlike reports from male employees, reports from female employees, although not always handled correctly, tend to be taken more seriously by higher-ups and more frequently result in action being taken.

“My boss, a female assistant manager, was really nice about [my complaint] and so was my direct boss, who is a man. They were both very supportive and [the harasser] was fired immediately,” lifeguard Victoria said

KNOW YOU ARE WORTHY OF BEING RESPECTED AND IF YOU FEEL UNSAFE OR HURT IN ANY WAY YOU NEED TO COMMUNICATE THAT TO THE PEOPLE DOING IT. IF THAT DOESN’T STOP, TALK TO MANAGEMENT, OR WHOEVER’S IN CHARGE, BECAUSE IF YOU JUST SORT OF SIT BY AND LET THIS HAPPEN, IT’S GOING TO HAPPEN TO SOMEBODY ELSE.” - CHRISTINA*

JUNIOR

SOUND THE ALARM

The effects of sexual harassment can go far beyond the uncomfortable interaction itself. Sexual harassment attacks people’s self-worth and self-esteem. Consequently, mental and physical health can deteriorate.

“My attitude when going to work was a lot more pessimistic,” Becky said. “I couldn’t be myself at this pool because people had issues with me [over something] I couldn’t control, and it obviously affected my mental health.”

For Christina*, a McLean junior, comments from her male co-workers at a marina were a catalyst for the development of an eating disorder.

“I did not want to go to work anymore. I felt sort of disgusted. They critiqued my body, and because of [those comments], I ended up not eating as much as I should have,” Christina said.

Verbal sexual harassment, such as comments about a person’s body that are sexual in nature, can cause detrimental effects on a developing teenager’s mental health. These issues can manifest in degrading victims’ self-image and can increase their social anxiety.

“For students who are very young, still in their teenage years, it can be quite devastating and have a long-term effect,” school social worker Marly Jerome-Featherson said.

Despite the consequences of sexual harassment on the victim and their mental health, at times, management fails to handle reports of harassment in a timely and effective manner.

“Everyone’s been [trying to report the sexual harassment] for years,” hardware store employee Tursi said. “I mean, I’m the third generation of cashiers because we have them go in and out every season, and I’m the third generation of cashiers that’s been saying that [the men at my job] are creepy.”

Managers have an obligation to recognize that every report should count towards some course of action that would prevent similar things from happening again.

“If the manager isn’t taking the complaint seriously, they can go to the next channels and have communication with the President or the CEO of the organization,” JeromeFeatherson said. “They too have a reputation and they certainly don’t want their organization to be labeled as a place where employees are sexually harassed.”

When the responsibility to enforce sexual harassment policies is placed in the hands of the victims rather than the

HB 2155 VIRGINIA HB 2155 VIRGINIA HUMAN RIGHTS ACT HUMAN RIGHTS ACT

NONDISCRIMINATION IN EMPLOYMENT, SEXUAL AND WORKPLACE HARASSMENT.

“... Provides (i) a nonexhaustive list of factors to consider when determining whether certain conduct constitutes workPlace harassment, (ii) guidelines for when a court may find an emPloyer liable for workPlace harassment, (iii) that a Person claiming to be aggrieved by an unlawful discriminatory Practice may file a written comPlaint with the division of human rights within two years of the occurrence of the alleged unlawful discriminatory Practice, and (iv) that an aggrieved Person who has been Provided a notice of his right to file a civil action for such grievance may do so within one year of receiving such notice.”

employers, incidents often go unreported.

“It’s rare to be able to find a teen who is so confident and is willing to speak up and risk losing a job or being harassed even more,” Jerome-Featherson said. “My job is to empower students who report these incidents to me and to tell them about the laws and how they are protected under the law, and inform them of the channels through which they can file complaints and make it known, because it’s unacceptable here and everywhere else.”

Sexual harassment does not have a one-size-fits-all definition. Some comments may be interpreted as sexual

harassment without this being the intention.

“I’ve been guilty of this. I’ve actually at one time said to one of my employees..., ‘Your hair looks good with that [hat] on’ as sort of a boost,” Tuckahoe Recreation Club general manager Rob Castorri said. “It came back to me that I made that comment, so sometimes you just don’t know. It would have been nothing to anyone I would normally say that to. I don’t fault that person, but it wasn’t my intent.”

It is evident that times have changed as notions of appropriate behavior in the diversifying workplace have evolved.

“What is being [taught] is acceptable and not acceptable to you is a bit different than [what people were taught] 10, 20 or 30 years ago,” Castorri said. In order to combat frequent sexual harassment, businesses, including Tuckahoe, have altered their policies over the years.

“I didn’t handle [the last sexual harassment case] as well,” Castorri said. “It is a reaction to an incident from four or five years ago that [led to the policy being] strengthened and upgraded.”

Tuckahoe’s current procedure following a harassment report includes a written statement, an interview with those involved and the presence of an attorney to help the process go smoothly.

“We want them to know that, ‘Hey, we’re a team and this is a great place to work and a very safe place,’” Castorri said.

By putting in stricter regulations and a clear-cut policy to deal with sexual harassment, employees are able to feel much safer at their job.

Tuckahoe is somewhat unique in McLean for enforcing such a comprehensive sexual harassment policy, as even businesses with policies often do not implement them as much as they should.

“We have a [list] of, ‘These are the things you don’t do,’ so pleading ignorance after reading it is kind of hard to do,” Castorri said.

Although some businesses have taken steps to improve the policies and create stricter regulations regarding sexual harassment, students’ experiences reflect insufficient responses when it comes to taking reports seriously.

“The taxing part of the harassment at my work is that the management’s response is a pretty blunt reminder of how little they actually care about the people they employ,” Ross said.

Although the mental burden of experiencing sexual harassment can be very damaging to an employee, reporting it can help prevent future incidents.

“Know you are worthy of being respected and if you feel unsafe or hurt in any way you need to communicate that to the people doing it,” Christina said. “If that doesn’t stop, talk to management, or whoever’s in charge, because if you just sort of sit by and let this happen, it’s going to happen to somebody else. And then that’s going to hurt more people.”

IF YOU OR SOMEONE YOU KNOW HAS EXPERIENCED SEXUAL HARASSMENT OR ASSAULT, PLEASE CALL THE NATIONAL SEXUAL ASSAULT HOTLINE: 800-656-4673