#Me(n)Too

According to the Washington Post, nearly one in five — about 17 percent — of harassment complaints filed with the EEOC come from men.

And many involve same-sex harassment.

• Example 1: “A group of salesmen were subjected to severe and repeated sexual harassment by male managers. The unlawful conduct included the touching and grabbing of genitals, pelvic thrusting on the buttocks of male employees, exposing of a manager’s penis in the workplace, crude sexual language, crude sexual jokes, and referring to male employees in sexually obscene and derogatory terms.” Although the employer had an anti-harassment policy in place, the lawsuit alleged that “complaints by the salesmen went unheeded by management for nearly a year,” and “management generally dismissed the offensive conduct as ‘horseplay’ or ‘locker room antics.’”

• Example 2: “A male floor supervisor made sexually charged insults and innuendos on a near-daily basis and also engaged in unwelcome grabbing, groping and humping the victims, attempting penetration of male employees’ buttocks with a broomstick, and kissing. Although members of management received numerous complaints from the employees about the harassment,” the employer “failed to take action to stop the harassment.”

• Example 3: “A former lot manager … subject[ed] a class of men to egregious forms of sexual harassment, including shocking sexual comments, frequent solicitations for oral sex, and regular touching, grabbing, and biting of male workers on their buttocks and genitals.” The manager further retaliated against anyone who objected.

• Example 4: “The head chef … frequently pinched or squeezed his subordinates’ private parts, flicked their genitals with his bare hands, and groped them from behind, [and] even used kitchen utensils from the restaurant to touch his victims’ genitals through their clothing.” Further, “several managers … knew what was happening well before formal charges were filed but did nothing to stop it.”