Gender Discrimination and Sexual Harassment - Custom Essay

DQ2: What is the difference between gender discrimination and sexual harassment? What types of behaviors are prohibited and what types are not?

FindLaw describes gender discrimination as being whenever someone is treated differently at work on account of their gender, this can be anything from hiring decisions to promotions (2014).  "It is unlawful to harass a person (an applicant or employee) because of that person’s sex. Harassment can include “sexual harassment” or unwelcome sexual advances, requests for sexual favors, and other verbal or physical harassment of a sexual nature" (EEOC, 2015, para. 1).  The EEOC does go on to say though that harrassment does not need to be sexual in nature, it can also include offensive remarks about that persons sex (2015).  As we can see from these examples the main differences are that discrimination is treating someone differently just because they are a man or a woman in the workplace.  Sexual harassment can be either sexual in nature or offensive remarks about a persons sex.  The key here is that harassment is harassing behavior towards a person.  

In gender discrimination here are some examples of some prohibited activities:

·         firing or demoting someone based on factors* other than job performance

·         lowering someone’s pay or paying them less than a co-worker with a comparable job, if the pay difference is based on their race, sex, etc. 

·         applying a policy that negatively affects one group of people more than others (i.e. hurts only women or only men; or hurts a minority group or people of a specific religion or national origin)

·         offering different discipline, work terms, conditions, benefits or pay to one group* than to others (PHRC, 2015, para. 6).

If the activity targets a group for exclusion based upon their sex it is essentially a prohibited activity.

The EEOC describes sexual harassment as, "unwelcome sexual advances, requests for sexual favors, and other verbal or physical conduct of a sexual nature constitute sexual harassment when this conduct explicitly or implicitly affects an individual's employment, unreasonably interferes with an individual's work performance, or creates an intimidating, hostile, or offensive work environment" (EEOC, 2015, para. 2).

Questions:

1.What other things can you find that constitute sexual harassment? 

2.What can a business do to ensure that they are not guilty of gender discrimination?

3.If a manager has a playboy calendar on display behind their desk with women in bikini's is this considered sexual harassment?

4. Can only women suffer sexual harassment?

References

EEOC. (2015). Sexual Harassment.  Retrieved from http://www.eeoc.gov/laws/types/sexual_harassment.cfm.

EEOC (2015).  Facts About Sexual Harassment.  Retrieved from http://www.eeoc.gov/eeoc/publications/fs-sex.cfm.

FindLaw (2014).  Gender Discrimination.  Retrieved from http://employment.findlaw.com/employment-discrimination/gender-discrimination.html.

PHRC (2015).  Employment Discrimination.  Retrieved from http://www.portal.state.pa.us/portal/server.pt/community/phrc_home/18970/employment_discrimination/707816.