Apa Essay on Sexual Harassment

Sexual Harassment Sexual harassment is a demeaning practice, one that constitutes a profound affront to the dignity of the employees forced to endure it. By requiring an employee to contend with unwelcome sexual actions or explicit sexual demands, sexual harassment in the workplace attacks the dignity and self-respect of the victim both as an employee and as a human being. Sexual harassment is well defined as an unwelcome sexual request for sexual favors and other verbal or physical conduct of a sexual nature. In many countries, sexual harassment is considered a form of sexual abuse and employment discrimination. Sexual harassment is most prevalent is organizations both professional and academic, though it can occur almost anywhere. Unfortunately, sexual harassment is a complicated issue that confronts employers and employees far too often in the workplace. It causes confusion and uncertainty which interferes with a productive working environment. Sexual harassment interferes with individuals work performance or creates an intimidating, hostile or offensive work environment results in poor performance and lack of motivation. Policies and facts Organizations should have a policy that will not cause any confusion. Men and women were using the same word to describe different behaviors may contribute to the continued existence of sexual harassment. But when a man thinks that sexual harassment only comes from a supervisor, he may feel free to make sexual comments to a female coworker. The female coworker is likely to see the sexual comments as a quest for power and label it as sexual harassment. There are facts that men are considerably less threatened by behaviors that women found harassing. They also found that men and were threatened by different things such as, whereas women were more threatened by behaviors that emphasized their sub ordinance, men were more bothered by behaviors that threatened their feeling of dominance. Sexual pressure was found by the most threatening behavior to men, and they felt threatened by behavior that had not been identified as threatening for females. Quid pro quo harassment occurs â€Å"when submission to or rejection of such unwelcome sexual conduct by an individual is used as the basis for employment decisions affecting such individual†. Hostile environment harassment, on the other hand, occurs when unwelcome sexual conduct causes the environment to become hostile, intimidating, or offensive, and unreasonably nterferes with an employee's or student's work. Quid pro quo harassment occurs where employment decisions or expectations are based on an employee’s willingness to grant or deny sexual favors; whereas a hostile environment is created where verbal or non-verbal behavior in the workplace that focuses on the sexuality of another person or occurs because of the person’s gender, a unwanted or unwelcome, and is severe or pervasive enough to affect th e person’s work environment. Many hostile environment harassment claims have nothing to do with speech, for instance when a harassment claim is based only on offensive physical touching or vandalism or discriminatory job assignments which have generally been seen as â€Å"harassment† rather than discrimination. When harassment claim it is based on generally unprotected speech such as threats or fighting words or slander. Factors contributing to determination in much time victims are the men and women tend to have a victim mentality to begin with. Bullying† is defined as repeated less favorable treatment of a staff member by another person or others which is considered unreasonable and inappropriate. It includes behavior which intimidates, offends, degrades, humiliates, undermines or threatens. Bullying may take place in private or in front of others. Whether or not the person responsible for the behavior intends to harm, the effect of the behavior is harmful. A single incident of bullying behavior i s unacceptable workplace behavior and should not be ignored or condoned. Bullying or other unacceptable behavior may also be a form of unlawful discrimination or harassment. Severe, â€Å"pervasive,† â€Å"hostile and â€Å"abusive† are mushy terms, as courts have specifically acknowledged. I'm not completely sure what it means to say that people have to say it’s bizarre. They might just have had a different notion of how offensive something must be to be â€Å"severe,† or how frequent it must be to be â€Å"pervasive. †Ã‚   Certainly courts have taken very different views of what these terms mean. Men Working or jokes about sexually graphic road signs to be â€Å"severe† or â€Å"pervasive† enough to create a hostile environment; but obviously other people, who probably thought themselves to be quite reasonable, have disagreed. When we judge a rule, we can't judge it simply by how we would apply it ourselves, or by the best-case scenario of how it could be applied. The United States Equal Employment Opportunity Commission states that prevention is the best tool to eliminate sexual harassment in the workplace. In 1997, the United States Supreme Court ruled in Knabe v Boury that companies must take action that is reasonably calculated to prevent harassment (â€Å"Facts Sheet† 2001). However, the responsibility also falls on victims to do their part to prevent harassment. This does not mean that the actual harassment is the fault of the victim, but rather that the victim has certain responsibilities in how they handle and respond to incidents of sexual harassment. These responsibilities include reporting the incident or incidents through proper channels as well as cooperating with investigations of sexual harassment. Sexual harassment in the workplace presents an ongoing and growing risk to businesses operating in the United States. Today, the time is right for businesses to begin to manage their risk in this area more wisely. Preventing sexual harassment in the workplace requires a considerable investment of time and personnel. In the end, however, these costs will be offset by significant savings in legal fees and health-care costs. Companies will also benefit from increased worker productivity. From a purely business perspective, a company only stands to gain if it takes a no-nonsense, hard-line position on sexual harassment. Not only is it the right thing to do, it is the smart thing to do. Reference American Psychological Association. Sexual Harassment Myths and Realities. Retrieved from http://all. net/games/sex/harass. html Equal Employment Opportunity Committee. (2002). Facts About Sexual Harassment. Retrieved from http://www. eeoc. gov/facts/fs-sex. html Sexual Harassment. (n. d. ). In Merriam-Webster online. Retrieved from http://www. merriam-webster. com/dictionary/sexual%2Bharassment Shockwaves: The Global Impact of Sexual Harassment, Susan L. Webb, New York 1994. Retrieve from http://www1. umn. edu/humanrts/svaw/harassment/explore/1whatis. htm