News headlines have recently been mired with a seemingly never-ending list of high profile members of entertainment media and politics being accused of sexual misconduct, assault, and even rape. WBGO's Alexandra Hill reports the decades old problem has once again been thrust into the spotlight leaving many employees and employers wondering what they can do to protect themselves in the workplace.
Everyday it seems scores of women are joining the growing list of brave and mad as hell victims in what has quickly become a national reckoning on sexual harassment. New Jersey resident James Joyner says its way overdue.
“They need justice for it they deserve to get closure, Most people are just left with it and they’re not happy with it later on so, sexual harassment is something we need to look at in our culture, and we need to learn how to deal with it better than just slandering people who coming out talking about it.”
Joyner says he understands it is the sometimes messy and complicated human interactions between men and women that can often lead to sexual harassment, but Joyner warns it could also lead to wrongful prosecution if the accusations are not properly and fully investigated.
“We should always check the facts and we should never just assume that what they say is true. Some people aren’t the nicest and they do it because, especially (against) high profile men (cause they) have a lot more money, so maybe that’s their motive.”
As victims continue to become embolden the consequences have been non-stop, including the immediate termination of many of the accused as well as an on slot of lawsuits, and with many if not most of these cases occurring in the workplace, the question looms just what can be done to protect both the victims and employers big and small. Steve Adler is with the Roseland NJ based law firm Mandelbaum Salsburg.
“One thing that is absolutely required in New Jersey is that every employer regardless of size, you can have one employee or you can have a thousand, you have to have a written policy against harassment that spells out what an employee is supposed to do if he or she is a victim of sexual harassment.”
And when it comes to what Victims can do to protect themselves Adler says the law is on their side.
“The law requires that employers not retaliate against anyone who comes forward in good faith and makes a claim. I think we’re going to see women coming forward a little easier now, and they need to have some comfort that if an employer doesn’t handle it correctly when they come forward and there retaliation either by the alleged harasser or the company not handling it correctly, that the law provides a remedy.”
While there are laws in place to protect both the employer and the victims of sexual harassment, Adler admits that as long as there are women and men in the workplace it will always be a problem.
“We all thought back in the eighties when Anita Hill came forward that there would be change but obviously change is slow, and if women come forward and speak out like they’re doing now , and obviously there’s strength in numbers, its got to have an affect on employers, so I think we will see change it’s a question about how quickly, and then we have to hope that that change stick and that people don’t over time go back to their old ways.”
The daily headlines featuring a parade of accusations against powerful men have put a spotlight on an age-old issue. Newark resident Christopher Frye says, what becomes clear under that spotlight is the power struggle between men and women that Frye says will continue to exist until women are both looked at and paid as equals.
“It’s a shame how guys with a whole lot of power could think that just because they have power they have power over people.”
While there is no clear solution to the problem of sexual harassment in the workplace, what is clear is that the brave women, dubbed the silence breakers by Time Magazine, have finally broke the logjam and society has embraced them with the clear response that enough is enough.
