“The Sanitized Workplace”
“Contrary to the prevailing orthodoxy, this Article argues, workplace sexuality is not always discriminatory or disruptive: Sexual conduct takes its shape and meaning from the larger organizational context. Sociological research shows that women who work in well-integrated, egalitarian settings often participate and take pleasure in sexual interactions—probably because their numerical strength gives them the power to help shape sexual norms to their own liking. Thus, rather than encourage employers to desexualize, we should encourage employers to desegregate.”
“Using a historical and sociological analysis, this Article demonstrates that the law¡s focus on eliminating unwanted sexual conduct has provided added incentive and increased legitimacy for a managerial project of suppressing sexuality in the workplace. In the name of preventing sexual harassment, many employers are prohibiting potentially benign forms of sexual conduct, without attending to the larger structures of sex segregation and inequality in which genuine sex harassment flourishes.”
In the full article, Schultz also went on to suggest that sexual rigidity hinders female advancement because men are discouraged from close interaction with women.
TheStateOf . . . Sex in the workplace. This is a provocative article, but I can’t believe that it’s a good idea to make sex a more open work issue. Sex discrimination and hostile workplace suits are ubiquitous. I won’t even tell my female coworkers, “nice dress.”
Filed under: Uncategorized
