Dress code violaton

[RecoveringKinkoid]

Honey, women are far, far, FAR worse than men. That glass ceiling? That's firmly held in place by women.

Oh, don't get me wrong, there are plenty of male hands helping hold it. Women are far and away the main ones who persecute and undermine women, though. There are women out there who will be your sisters in arms and will support you. Just don't rely on it.

See this quote here: "Certain clothes look more.........sexy on a girl like you, and that's why we feel you need to dress more conservatively" You need to wield this back at them like a weapon. What do they mean by "a girl like you" exactly? Make them explain in excruciating detail. In fact, if you can record the conversation, do it. What kind of girl are they saying you are? Cords and a layered sweater are not conservative enough? Then what IS conservative enough? Make them explain that in excruciating detail, too. What exactly do they want you to wear? A habit? A bhurka? What?

What kind of men are your male co-workers exactly? Are they violent? Are they going to attack you? Which of them are they afraid will attack you? You need to know if you are in danger, they are obligated to diclose job hazzards. Which guy? Can he come into the office, too? Maybe he needs to know the boss thinks he is a potential rapist. Maybe they all do. If it's not true, it's libel.

Blas, your employer has a history of allowing sexual harassment of women. I bet if you talked to some of the other girls about it, you might find out some things. You were harassed, other women have been harassed. Time to end it.

[Seshat]

RecoveringKinkoid is right, unfortunately. The glass ceiling is held in place by people of both genders, and what's happening to you is one of their methods.

I'm not going to tell you what to do, because I don't know. But I can tell you what I'd do, and it's very practical.

Buy safety gear. You work in a factory setting, so go to your big-box department stores on sale day, and buy those unisex hard-wearing 'work clothes' that are designed as work clothes/safety clothes. In Australia, top brands include 'Hard Yakka' and 'King Gee'. You can see the type of thing I'm talking about here http://www.yakka.com.au/index.asp. (Look at the men's stuff. I buy that stuff, some of the women's 'work' wear is more factory-office than factory.)

There's a Yakka factory and factory outlet up the road from me. I use the stuff (a mix of brands - depends on what's on sale) for everything from gardening to fixing the cars to crawling under the house to stop a squeaky floorboard.

The clothes will LAST, they're made very very tough. And they'll do a better job of protecting your skin from the hazards of factory work than any tshirt will ever do. And there's NO valid reason ANYONE can come up with for finding them objectionable in a factory setting. They're designed and made for factory work.

. . . and males who pass the house while I'm wearing them tend to call me sexy in them. (sigh)
I just don't see what's sexy about a woman in workwear, sweating her way through fixing a fence.

[RecoveringKinkoid]

Seshat,while I agree that nobody could object to factory clothes, that doens't really address the problem. The problem is that Blas, and apparently other women, are being singled out for harassement deliberately. Changing her clothing is not going to change that. The problem is not with clothing. It's with assholes who are, quite frankly, breaking the law by doing what they are doing. They are setting their company up for a lawsuit.

[blas]

And quite frankly, that factory cannot afford a lawsuit if they can't even afford name brand toilet paper.

There was a woman who worked there a year ago with me. She was nearly 40 but didn't look a day over 20. Tan, gorgeous, dolled up, but wore all appropriate (or what WE thought) clothes.

Immediately all the women her age and older had a problem with her. She was beautiful, funny, smart, and classy. Her clothes were complained about on a constant basis, yet she never showed any cleavage and always wore a belt. Eventually, she ended up being harrassed by a maintenance man until she threatened a sexual harrassment lawsuit and ended up just quitting. I wish she would have stayed and fought it out.

My argument here is that there is ONE standard dress code. There isn't a special dress code for every single employee based on gender, body shape, weight, chest size, age, etc. I repeat, there is ONE standard dress code. It even states on the dress code that it applies to ALL employees.

There is no spot on the dress code that states "You are exempt from these rules if you are underweight, overweight, or flat chested because you'll never be harrassed anyway". Because that would be BULLSHIT.

This is such a huge company and one of the largest employers in the county. For them to be so IGNORANT as to ASSUME that ONLY young ladies of certain body shapes are going to be sexually harrassed is just beyond me! So are they implying if a flat chested girl or a larger girl walked into the office and told her boss that she wanted to report harrassment, she'd be told "That's impossible. You don't have big boobs and you're too skinny/too fat. Good day!" Or if a guy walked in and said another guy was harrassing him or a woman was making unwanted passes. Would he be then told "Nope, boys don't get sexually harrassed, see ya!"???????

EDIT: I almost forgot. Another great point made by you guys. That person so obsessed with my safety because of men in the past? Well, are these men still working here? Or are they still out there victimizing female employees? Just HOW thorough is your criminal backround check. Just how much do you allow before you consider it violence or sexual harrassment? If the men here are THAT notorious, they need to be terminated. I just want to go to work and do my new job. I do NOT want to hem and haw in my closet, get bitched about, and be paranoid of these "men" they speak of.

One more time being complained about and I will be written up. If it gets to that point, I will then schedule a meeting with HR and repeat just about everything I just stated up there, except in a more mature and professional fashion.

[morgana]

Blas, don't wait to be written up. Go to HR now.

[RecoveringKinkoid]

Exactly. Why wait? The problem is NOW. The longer you wait, the weaker your argument will become. Why? Becuase then they can show they wrote you up and you are now angry and trying to retaliate. And it can be asked by HR "Why did you wait so long."

You are looking for logic in their actions. Stop. There isn't any, because you are not legitimately being complained against. You are being harrassed, like others before you.

[Jester]

I just don't see what's sexy about a woman in workwear, sweating her way through fixing a fence.

Honestly, that is not something that can be explained....but a lot of men will find it sexy. Me among them.

Just remember, everyone has a different definition of sexy. What I find hot, others might not, and so on and so forth.

The actual wording was "Certain clothes look more.........sexy on a girl like you, and that's why we feel you need to dress more conservatively"

They may FEEL that you need to, but the dress code does not SAY you need to.
Their argument is flawed.
And frankly, I think you need to call them out on it. And drop phrases like "persecution," "sexual harrassment," and "discrimination lawsuit." These phrases tend to get people's attention.

Because frankly, they are harrassing you and discriminating against you.

Now, if you were wearing clothes that were NOT allowed by the dress code, they would have an argument. But what you described was (a) conservative, and (b) according to you allowable by the dress code.

If a company has a dress code, it applies to everyone, both positively (what people can wear) and negatively (what they can't wear). If you are not violating the negative portions of the dress code, they have not a leg to stand on, nor will any writeup they draw up for you for any future "complaints." And if they DO write you up for this shit, absolutely, positively refuse to sign it. At all. For any reason. Even the "this is just to acknowledge that you read this" reason. (Feel free to check out my comments on this in my "Saga of Shit Weasel" in the Morons in Management section...)

But the others are right. You need to go to HR or the higher ups NOW about this, BEFORE any write up. You need to be proactive, and cut these pendejos off at the pass.

By the way, when you go to HR, I would have this whole thing typed up in business document form, detailing every point of this whole situation, and also why you feel like this is discrimination. Keep it professional, do not let emotion intrude overly much on the document, but HAVE a document that they can READ and pass on to those above them. Documentation is impressive, and makes the people doing the complaining have to backpedal/explain very fast.

[blas]

As far as pictures go, they are forbidden at the factory because of security and the fact that they are paranoid that someone working for the competition is taking pictures. So camera phones and digital cams are a no go.

However, I can take pics of me in the complained about outfits at home and save them for HR.

Since I can't just hunt down other employees who wear inappropriate tshirts and whatnot, I don't really have any proof that others are doing it. It's my word against theirs. But of course, their word is "Blas is curvier and therefore she can't wear it", so maybe I still will have the upperhand.

[Seshat]

But of course, their word is "Blas is curvier and therefore she can't wear it", so maybe I still will have the upperhand.

That you do.

Kinkoid: I know that what I'd do isn't a solution. To me, it's got two purposes: one is to make the harassment so bloody obvious it's got a neon sign hanging on. The other is to have a wardrobe of really good workwear.

Jester: thank you. I guess right now you probably wish you were in Aussieland. Me and my best friend are doing a slow renovation of this house, and you'd get your pick of curvy or athletic to watch.

Blas: yes, you're being picked on, harassed, hassled, bullied, and probably a bunch of other things besides. Do up that documentation. Ask folks here for advice - maybe ask some of the more management/HR experienced to go over the docs (pm or email, not open post) and help you state your case more strongly than you otherwise might.

Get a friend to take a group shot outside the factory, where it's okay by the rules, and have the photo submitted to the company newsletter or something. That'll give you the 'what everyone wears to work' photo you want. (I'm a sneaky bitch.)

And decide for yourself if the job is worth the hassle of fighting the harassment. It's not going to stop until the workplace culture in that workplace gets changed. If no real changes are made, it'll just get sneakier and sneakier until it's under HR's radar, or until you've proven that it's not going to work.
Things that will make real changes include:
* Authority making it clear that NO harassments will the tolerated.
* Authority making it clear that you (and other curvy women) are accepted members of the workplace.
* Peer-authority (ie, someone in the workplace who everyone looks up to) making it clear you're accepted.
* You making it clear that bullying and harassment is something you don't tolerate.
* The harassers and bullies getting fired simultaneous with authority (and preferably peer-authority) making it clear it's their own bloody fault.

[Ree]

By the way, when you go to HR, I would have this whole thing typed up in business document form, detailing every point of this whole situation, and also why you feel like this is discrimination. Keep it professional, do not let emotion intrude overly much on the document, but HAVE a document that they can READ and pass on to those above them. Documentation is impressive, and makes the people doing the complaining have to backpedal/explain very fast.

...And if you go to HR, I would refrain from mentioning that they allow the same clothes on "bigger" or "heavier" girls, or "older" women. That makes you sound conceited, and taints your argument a bit. I would simply say they are allowing the same outfits on other girls and not making complaints against them.
Make it about how they are picking on YOUR clothing choices, and discriminating against YOU.

[blas]

I understand what you mean Ree, but I want to be specific...and I know that would come across as conceited but how else can I word it? Maybe I could just say women who are shaped differently? I want to make the point clear that certain girls CAN wear these clothes and I can't. I want to make it clear that questionable brand names or words on shirts are fine on men and certain girls, but not me.........I realize it's unprofessional to use words like "flat chested" "heavy" "toothpick" and "large" but I just want to find some way of sending the message that I seem to be the only person that rules are in strict force to.

[iradney]

You could maybe say that it appears different builds are being discriminated against, even tho there is nothing stated in the official dress code. IF they asked for details, stick to YOU. Say that you feel you are being harrassed for your body type, as other women with different builds to you wear the same type of clothes and are not harrassed about it. You don't need to say curvy or busty. I suppose if you REALLY had to you could say statuesque (http://thesaurus.reference.com/search?r=20&q=statuesque) or rubenesque (http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/rubenesque)
If the other women range in age and colour, it rules those particular types of harrassment out. whereas if just young women were being targeted, it could be ageist and sexist.

[Seshat]

I agree with iradney's 'different builds' approach.

If you like, google the words 'ectomorph' 'endomorph' and 'mesomorph': those are terms for the three main variations of human body.

Ectomorph is the skinny type that when it builds muscle gets called 'wiry'. Ectomorphs tend not to put on fat.

Small mesomorphs are 'athletic', and when they build muscle they're 'muscular'. Mesomorphs tend to put fat on evenly, and can add a fair bit of fat tissue without looking 'fat'.

Endomorphs put fat on in lumps around the belly, breasts, hips and thighs. In endomorphs who don't put on extra fat tissue, the girls are 'voluptuous' and the boys are 'muscular' without even trying, but solid through the middle where the mesomorph 'muscular' boys are narrow through the middle.

That's a really oversimplified form of the terms, but gives you words you can use while still sounding objective and scientific. Unfortunately, that might lead to you needing to explain the terms.....

[Emrld]

I agree with Ree that I wouldn't mention how the other females are shaped or built. They are flat out other women who work the same job and are wearing the same clothing that YOU are being harrassed by Managment over.

It really needs to be that you are being singled out. You may bring up that the manager explained comments about your shape in his comments to you - that makes him the one who is harrassing and descriminating in the work place.
Whomever you speak to in HR will be able to make their own impressions about how other employees are shaped . . .that is not for you to "put in" their minds.

[RecoveringKinkoid]

I absolutly agree that she shouldn't mention the builds or ages of her female coworkers, but I think she should use the same language that the idiot supervisors are using to describe what is happening to HR. "You're too sexy" and "you're a curvy girl" or whatever other lawsuit inducing wording they are using. Hearing that she's being routinely called into the office and told she's curvy or sexy really ought to cause a lot of asses to pucker down in HR. That's the sort of thing lawyers have erotic dreams over.