I don’t talk to women at work, or even make eye contact with them, for this very reason. Sorry ladies, but in your quest for making a quick buck by being a professional victim has marginalized and isolated you from men in the workplace.
“I don’t talk to women at work, or even make eye contact with them, for this very reason. Sorry ladies, but in your quest for making a quick buck by being a professional victim has marginalized and isolated you from men in the workplace.”
I use many of the same rules. I also keep, as much as possible, a 10 foot circle around me in which women are not allowed. I speak to women only spoken to and all answers are kept as short as possible.
It is not as bad as it used to be, but in the nineties it was really awful. I knew guys who had their careers destroyed for nothing more than an innocuous comment or look.
You probably are making your HR person crazy, if she is a female. She’s already made a note in your folder about you and dubbed you passive-aggressive! LOL I know because I handle HR for our small company, and that is exactly what I did with an engineer who used to work here. He wouldn’t look you in the eye, or give a straight answer about anything. I just let my husband handle him, and he finally quit. Nobody was sorry.
I have another one just like him, and I won’t be sorry if he leaves. The one I have now is the only person who ever swore out a sexual harassment complaint in the 50 year history this company — over teasing that some of the assembly line women directed his way. The complaint? The ladies used to whistle the “Lassie Song” whenever he walked by. My husband and looked at each other increduously. The Lassie Song? How is that sexual harassment? Well, it seems that he married one of them who was not popular with the others, but who didn’t work here anymore; and The Lassie Song was supposed to suggest that he followed his wife around like a little dog.
We didn’t “get it” either, but we suspended the whistle instigator for a week, and he seemed satisfied. The 2 of them still work for us 12 years later. He is still at the beck and call of his wife, but we are a small company and can roll with it.