Misogyny

Let Her Quit

Arianna had the opportunity to work on a flagship billion-dollar construction project, she was glad to have a role that would see her through the GFC. The complete disregard for female staff was not at first apparent, until female staff nose-dived into flytraps, to avoid the taunts and complete lack of sensitivity in the workplace. These women were no wallflowers; they gave as good as they got, but the workplace culture was toxic, and women were placed to the side, vying against each other for advancement, required to meet quotas in a little black dress at a corporate work function; very few female employees would last the distance to climb the ranks of the construction arm of the project.

The company touted a great level of respect in the marketplace but were renowned for piledriving their staff into the ground; as the only female left in the project office, Arianna felt taunted by her male counterparts. They poked and prodded her with verbal jibes, just out of earshot; the sound of uproarious cackling grated on her soul. The jibes were such she had to review them on urbandictionary.com; 'rusty trombone', for one, referred to a male receiving analingus whilst his penis was stroked from behind, an act that simply was not part of her repertoire; nor was it likely to make an appearance in the future. She seriously pondered the way in which her male counterparts bandied to the Project Manager; one had to question whether they were in fact guilty of the 'ol rusty trombone in the project office fire egress stairs.

There was no direction as to what was considered acceptable behaviour, with the exception of an overstep by staff that required immediate action to avoid reputational damage in the marketplace; sexual harassment was legitimately the only issue that was addressed. Even in that instance it was the affected females who were queried as to whether they wanted to pursue charges, or have the men dismissed; a process which pitted them against their male counterparts, and you best believe there was stigma as a female, attached to talking to human resources.

Arianna did her own heavy lifting, she was regularly stoushing with ineffectual million-dollar contracts, in order to complete her role in compliance. Her authority was regularly undermined by project managers too concerned with reaching project completion early and under budget; they selected inferior contractors to administer multi-million dollar contracts, in order to beef up the pool for their hefty bonuses; a common practice in construction was to cut corners; compliance was done in a lacklustre fashion, personally taxing those responsible for completion.

The project manager remarked to Arianna, that she should be 'barefoot and pregnant', to which there was uproarious laughter; she laughed uncomfortably, she was in the midst of changing out of her runners after personal training at the local gym; 'dolly birds,' as they called them, were respected and revered in construction. Her male colleagues regularly attending the local gentleman's club for a ten dollar steak, chips and salad, often remarking on the perkiness of their breasts, on the way back into the office; her male co-workers were the first to remark on a woman's outfit, shoes, or figure. Men, in Ariana's experience, en-masse were quite bitchy; it was necessary to infiltrate the boy's club in order to do her job, so she kept her mouth shut, only occasionally piping up if they were negligently out of line.

It came to a point where she could no longer deal with the entrenched misogyny, she felt she had a target on her back, they toyed with her emotions, and the fact was home life was no better, she was stuck in a dead-end relationship, with a narcissistic misogynist, who quite frankly enjoyed the sound of his own voice. He was a blue collar worker, Arianna was a white collar worker, each had their merits and pitfalls, but the longer she worked in this role, the more she began to see what he stood for as a man and she began to resent him. It was one thing to deal with this in a professional environment. It was another matter altogether to partner with a man who inherently displayed the same disatisfsctory traits; there was literally no escape from the realities of patriarchy.