Posted on 12/05/2025 5:33:00 AM PST by where's_the_Outrage?
Many companies claim to be modern and fair, yet some old habits still survive surprisingly well. One employee found out just how quickly things can escalate when she questioned a task she’d been quietly assigned for months.
Hello, Bright Side,
I’m 27F, a project engineer. My boss kept asking me to take notes at meetings with clients. I didn’t mind at first, until I noticed I was the only one he asked. When I finally refused, he smirked and said, “Women are best at it.” I reported him to HR.
The next day, I was heading to my desk when a coworker grabbed my arm and whispered, “He’s pissed. He’s been blaming you all morning.” I honestly felt sick walking to my workstation because I had no idea what he’d try next.
When I came up to my desk, I saw a small box sitting on it. Inside was a note. It said: “We both know you’ve overreacted. Let’s fix this between us.” There was also a Starbucks gift card for $10.
I immediately gave the box to HR. They asked if he’d contacted me outside of work (he hadn’t). They said the gift card was an attempt to influence an active investigation, which is against policy. He was suspended and then let go. I’m very glad HR took it seriously before things escalated.
But... am I wrong for not giving him a chance to talk privately before going to HR?
Mary
Hello, Mary,
Well, this line—"Women take better notes“—could be displayed right next to “You’re too emotional for leadership” and “We’re like a family here” in the Museum of Workplace Misconceptions.
1. The note-taking comment wasn’t harmless—it was a clear bias cue. Your boss didn’t say, “You take good notes.” He said, “Women are best at it.” That’s not a compliment. It’s a category error.
That smirk you mentioned? That’s the behavioral equivalent of someone saying, “I know exactly what I’m doing, and try me.”
2. The gift card wasn’t a peace offering—it was a policy violation. A $10 Starbucks card is many things:
A gesture of apology? A weak attempt at bribery? A liquid asset valued at precisely one latte and a cake pop? But what it is not is an appropriate response during an HR investigation.
In corporate compliance, even small gifts can be considered attempts to influence outcomes. There are entire HR training modules dedicated to this.
3. Giving him a “private conversation” first was never your job. Let’s imagine what a private talk would have looked like:
You: “Your comment was inappropriate.” Him: “Relax.” You: “I won’t take notes on command anymore.” Him: “You women are so sensitive.”
You heard your colleague, your boss spent the morning blaming you. He didn’t consider that he was wrong. Not a single second.
Going directly to HR was the only appropriate step.
So, are you wrong? No. Not even slightly. You handled this like someone who understands not only her rights, but also the psychological pattern of someone trying to test boundaries and save himself when caught.
Bright Side
And Mary isn’t the only one who’s faced this kind of pushback. When Gloria, a senior analyst, was told a leadership role was “too demanding for women,” she filed a report—and a few months later, she was the one sitting in her boss’s chair.
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It’s very accurate. Women ARE better at the tasks of a secretary. Organizing, notifying people of meetings, filing, keeping deadlines, note taking, reminders etc. They are very good at small repetitive tasks that keep things running.
They are also much better as teachers for very young children and as nurses.
But he shouldn’t have said it out loud. They are highly emotional and legalistic. Saying it out loud could spook her. He should have said “because you are the best”, or “because I want to get your opinion on something later on the meeting”.... then give her a gold star or something.
He was correct, but you have to be careful not to spook them.
Thank you for your post, one of the few working from actual info rather than knee-jerk speculation. I was about to press the "Neanderthal" button on this thread.
These morality fables are everywhere. And with AI they are flooding all over YouTube also.
My sister-in-law recommended a dentist she had been going to that was near my place of employment, so I began going there. It was kind of okay for a while, but odd.
He was a late thirty-ish body builder kind of guy, who had his whole practice outfitted with very attractive young women. Not a homely one amongst them.
It all went well with checkups and such until I had to go in for a root canal. As I lay in the chair looking up, he and his dental assistant were having a...er...what I recognized almost immediately as a "lover's quarrel".
It was like listening to a married couple have a fight in front of their friends, but...I was the friend in the chair, my mouth held wide open with a dam, and they argued.
Here is what it was like, if you can imagine it (I know this sounds unbelievable, but it is true) Also, I don't remember the names of the implements they argued about, so I call them a "probe" and a "poker"...)
DENTIST: "I need the #3 probe."
DENTAL ASSISTANT: "It's right there in front of you."
ME: (I look at Dental Assistant)
DENTIST: "NO! Not the #3 poking device, I need the #3 probe."
ME: (I look at Dentist)
DENTAL ASSISTANT: "It's right there in front of you."
ME: (I look at Dental Assistant)
DENTIST: "NO! That is a #3 poking device, I need the #3 probe."
ME: (I look at Dentist)
DENTAL ASSISTANT: "That's what you asked for!"
ME: (I look at Dental Assistant)
DENTIST: (Yelling) "NO IT ISN'T WHAT I ASKED FOR. I need the #3 probe NOW. GET IT!"
ME: (I look at Dentist)
DENTAL ASSISTANT: (Yelling) "FINE. We don't have any left, I have to go upstairs to get it!" (The Dental Assistant ends this with a defiant and angry huff)
ME: (I look at Dental Assistant)
DENTIST: "Well, what are you waiting for? (Yelling) GO GET IT!"
ME: (I look at The Dentist, and then The Dental Assistant. She slams the #3 poker in the tray, and storms out of the exam room. My eyes follow her out. I look at The Dentist, whose eyes are burning holes into her retreating back. For an interminable length of silence with The Dentist standing there, I hear the elevator music playing)
DENTAL ASSISTANT: (Returning) "We only had one left."
ME: (I look at Dental Assistant as she appears to hold it over a Bunsen burner or something...she hands it to The Dentist with a huff and an aggressive swoosh of her implement-holding hand across my face)
DENTIST: (Yelling) "NO, NO, NO! THIS ISN'T A #3 POKER, THIS IS A #3 PROBE-AND YOU DON'T HEAT THESE UP!"
ME: (I look at Dentist)
DENTAL ASSISTANT: (Yelling) "THAT'S WHAT YOU TOLD ME TO DO!"
ME: (I look at Dental Assistant)
DENTIST: (Yelling) "NO I DIDN'T! YOU DID THAT ON YOUR OWN, AND NOW YOU HAVE RUINED IT! GET ME ANOTHER ONE NOW!"
ME: (I look at Dentist)
DENTAL ASSISTANT: (Yelling) "I ONLY DID WHAT YOU TOLD ME TO DO!"
ME: (I look at Dental Assistant)
DENTIST: (Yelling) "FIND ME ANOTHER #3 PROBE NOW. I DON'T CARE WHERE YOU GET IT. JUST GET ONE NOW. AND DON'T PUT IT IN THE DAMN HEATER THIS TIME!" (The Dental Assistant slams down the tool and exits)
They eventually finished up, I went out the the three very pretty young girls at the desk and when they asked if I wanted to set up a follow up appointment, I said something like "Er...um...er...uhhhh...No. No thanks. Can you guys give me my dental record please?"
When I got back to work, I walked into a bathroom and looked at my face in a mirror. I had white powdery crap all over my mouth, and those piece of crap secretaries at his desk didn't even say "Sir, here is a tissue, you have some dried white substance from the procedure on your face..."
They just let me walk out with that white stuff all around my mouth. I felt very vulnerable in that dentist's chair, but when I saw that stuff on my face, it really pissed me off.
It is astonishing. I have seen unprofessional behavior before, but nothing ever like what I saw on that day back in the the Nineties!
In retelling it now, it seems absurdly funny (as if I were watching a tennis match with scads of hardware protruding from my open mouth) but at the time, it was quite alarming.
it wasn’t the pill ... it was the takeover of the education and legal systems by clueless DEI females who had a “better way” to run things ...
The attitude doesn’t stay isolated in the workplace. There are feminist stories in the press of late bemoaning the fact that young men aren’t dating. Maybe it’s because they’ve been turned off by the behavior they see.
Women in the workplace and HR are the two primary reasons, in my opinion, that AI is being pushed to hard.
To sum it up, basically due to feminism, women are acting masculine.
Young guys don't want to date a lady who's acting like a man.
“women have destroyed the workplace ... and the USA”
No
I’ve worked with women for decades. In Medicine
Women can take the heat, be engineers, sociologists, diplomats, think and walk, think and do CPR, take abuse from others and go to school same time.
Some women who pull the damsel card are idiots
Back in the day when there were few women doctors, the doctors were so abusive verbally, psychologically and physically that no one would have put up with it now
Now that there are about 50% women doctors no one ever yells at anyone
There is passive aggression among women. What can you do? That’s upbringing. he doesn’t fix that
Anyway fake story
Before I retired, every meeting I went to, I took detailed and voluminous notes, because I could not trust myself to remember the details later. Also, I could write them down in a way that made sense to me, and helped me understand better. It was a habit of mine.
There were many times I had people who were supposed to be taking notes calling me later saying “I saw you typing away furiously taking notes...could you share those with me?”
I assumed the person just wanted to doublecheck their notes, but when the notes were distributed, they were always my notes nearly word for word! I took this as a compliment...and it helped me again.
Now, I am the secretary for my local Republican group, and I take the meeting notes in an official role...:)
What is this?
You’re turning this thread into a porn chat
Stop talking to me.
I worked in the applied arts for many decades as a closeted conservative. While it's not the same as cleaning the sewers, women in the arts often will do the dirty jobs in publishing, art facility management or the like alongside the men. The pecking order in our sector was "How liberal, gay or gay-sympathetic are you?"
My observations in that environment only reinforced my belief that those who claim to be LGBT are making a choice.
“ I fail to see how this comment was bad, it seems more like a compliment.”
It isn’t. Anyone wanting to move up or along in the workplace will take a task and run with it.
Anyway fake story
I’m a feminist.
If a job needs doing, I do it and do it well.
And I do NOT whine.
When she complained all he had to do was say “from now on we’ll rotate the job”. End of problem.
Nowadays, they’d be happier getting a dog instead.
Why is that a porn chat? That is a very strange characterization. I understand you might not find it funny, but why “porn chat”?
I thought you would find it amusing, given how you characterized women at Dentist offices, but I guess not. You characterized women as engaging in “hate chat”, but I guess people have different ways of looking at it. They had “hate chat” and my post was “porn chat”.
Sorry. I’ll make it a point not to bother you again.
They also want sex without commitment and if they do get married, they do not want to be the sole supporter. Nor can they be, in this quasi-socialist democrat-induced economy. So it's a dilemma.
Better to ask, “how would she know a ‘porn chat’ when she sees one?” LOL
I remember that endless BS back then too. Non stop “man bad women delicate flowers.” The men were all told to basically shut up and the women were all told they can report even the tiniest thing (with a wink wink they can sue). It got so that NO ONE interacted in the slightest way around women and they were avoided everywhere. Then of course, they complained they were being ignored. I am so glad I don’t have employees anymore.
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