Jack & Jill Politics

When you’re a victim of workplace discrimination, you feel just like that 3/5 of a human being that the Founding Fathers said we were in the Constitution.  You are not being heard on the issues, and your boss tells you that “that’s your opinion.  Because I say it didn’t happen, it didn’t.”

What did the young punk take me for, a fool?

I’ve experienced workplace discrimination in the past – usually, I couldn’t prove it.  All I could do was sense it.  Today was different.  My boss actually looked me in the eye and didn’t deny what I accused him of; in fact he had the good God audacity to tell me if I didn’t correct my attitude within 24 hours, I’d be out of a job.

W-T-F?

It started like this – we’re downsizing and there can only be one supervisor in the departments in my office.  I was one of two supervisors that bastard had to choose from.  I had the longest tenure, and demonstrated I could handle any and all office operations, including EEO, Employee Relations, Community Relations, Training and Teaching – all done with the utmost professionalism and highest competency.

So what does my boss, a 29-year-old white male, d0?

The bastard tells me I have to take a demotion while he retained the 25 year old Etheopian guy as my supervisor, and tells me that because he has the authority to make that call, without explanation or justification, he did so.  Just because HE CAN.

As I sat there in the office listening to this utter and foul bullshyt, I thought about my parents, my grandparents, any of my relatives, my friends or other co-workers who had to sit in a similar position  to me and had no law to protect them from this injustice.  This shyt rips your heart out; it demoralizes you to the point you almost want to say…..

No, I will NOT go THERE.  But, this story appears to be nearing resolution.  I can’t say “happy ending” because there is NOTHING happy about having to fight for your job and call your boss out for being a sexist pig.  But, here’s what’s going down to this point.

After getting a counseling and warning to clean up my act within 24 hours, I remembered I already bookended this shyt before he could game me – the bastard didn’t know he was about to get hit and hit hard.  I don’t know why, in this era of the first African-American Presidency, some white guys and girls still think they can get their bigotry on without it coming back to bite them in the ass.  Anyway, before I got called into that meeting, I had already done the following:

1.  Called the office EEO Counselor and filed a complaint. I claimed age (40+) and gender (delightfully female).

2.  Called my lawyer and told them to prepare a letter demanding explanation of the employment action taken against me, without any rationale or justification for it. On my say so, it will be Fed Ex’ed to the HNIC, not the local management officials.

Since I’d mumbled, “I’ve done what I needed to do” before I left – my boss asked me, “What do you mean by that comment?”

“Just what I say”, I said.  I didn’t do the ghetto head popping and swivel this fool expects from sistas.  And why do they call our anger an “attitude problem”?  Y’all should have heard me – in my best academic voice, I said the following:

“It is not an attitude – it is my ANGER.  There is a difference, and yet, I have not allowed it to affect the way I perform my duties – as little as they are, since you insist on giving S— the lion’s share of the job duties.  Since you chose to do that, you have already engaged in disparate treatment of me regarding my job performance. You cannot set me up to fail and penalize me for something you have orchestrated.  I have a right to my anger and I will express that anger – I don’t care if it makes you uncomfortable.”

Guess I was supposed to drop a few Sugar Honey Iced Tea bombs.  NOT.  My voice was low, steady and even – I had my note pad in the room and took copious notes for what I would have to say later.

Dude’s look got a lil’ goofy at that point.  The other HR person in the room was taking copious notes as well.  I got up and left.

Later in the afternoon, as I was getting ready to leave for the day, the HNIC in my office asked me for a meeting.  When I got there, my boss was gone for the day, but the HR person from the morning meeting was there.  Apparently, they got the call from the EEO office that they received my complaint.

The lady who runs my office is a really nice woman, and inasmuch as I can give her props, I shall – but part of me is pissed that she recommended this SOB for promotion in the first place.  Anywhoo, she said to me:

“I’m concerned that you feel uncomfortable working in this situation.  I want to hear from you – we can change your department, or work something out, but first, I’d like to hear from you.”

Here’s what I said:

“I believe Joe is a sexist because for the past five weeks, ever since it was announced that the downsizing was going to occur, he started giving S the lion’s share of the work and leaving me with very little to do.  I pulled his coattail on this on at least three occasions and he ignored me and refused to listen to what I had to say.  Anyone else being asked if they were being racist or sexist in their treatment would have at least made a token effort to calm my concerns.  He did not do this and I think he’s so used to being a bigot, he did it without much thought – not even looking at my work background or S’s to make his decision.

I was offered the opportunity to work somewhere else in the office.  “I’m not running from this SOB – now WHAT ARE YOU GOING TO DO ABOUT IT?”

After that, I got co-signing on where I get to work in the office, and my understanding is that the SOB has to explain himself to upper management.  I want him to put my workload before he became my supervisor on the table and explain why it got reduced (and he didn’t deny it, y’all).  I want him to put my resume on the table and compare it with S’s – here’s what he’ll find that he’ll have to explain away:

Me: College graduate, two graduate degrees, including Certificates of Study from Cornell and Oxford Universities, as well as 22 years of direct related job experience.  Not to mention that list of work projects I was responsible for – AT HIS REQUEST.  Dipshyt.

S: Community College student who’s in the NationalGuard and will be going off to training for the next few weeks. Any work projects he had, they came from yours truly.  He was never asked to interact with the public because he speaks passable English, but I’m the articulate sista who can actually promote our office to the damned community.  He’s also a sneaky bastard who would take my work projects and work on them himself before I got to the damned office, and my boss sat on his ass and did NOTHING.

Who do you think will win that if the investigation comes down to it?  And I’m not withdrawing my action, either.  But, in this time in the 21st Century, we should be realizing Dr. King’s dream of being evaluated by merit and the content of our characters, but somehow, dipshyts like my boss refuse to get the message.

But when Rush Limbaugh is your Hero, what the hell can you expect?

Thanks JJP family – I needed to vent today, and blogging was good therapy.

Next time, I’ll post on why Cheney’s ass needs to go to jail.