Seeing Double
I guess I expected more enlightened behavior from the people I work with. To be truthful, I expected more of the guy at work, a fellow veteran. I certainly expected more than the antiquated double standards he has about women in the workplace.
I’m coming up on my one year anniversary at this work study position. Not a bad gig, I certainly like the ability to get my homework done during the slow times and the fact that I can tailor my schedule around my classes. It also allows me to be home in time to be with my kids.
What I have begun to resent is that as I become more familiar with the people I work with, the less anonymous I become as a result of repeated interactions, the more I see that I am being treated differently than I was before.
I have tried to not let it bother me. Until the other day when the supervisor, came into the office for the weekly pow-wow and decided to casually mention that he was nominating this other guy, M, for employee of the month. Normally I wouldn’t have issue with someone else being recognized for the work they have done, if it’s been deserved.
The backstabbing betrayal from the boys club
Unfortunately, in this case, it’s just another episode of life in the boys club. I felt like I was back in the Navy again, getting passed up for recognition for reasons that under scrutiny screamed of discrimination and sexism.
How is someone going to get nominated who missed three weeks of work? And not because he had a “family emergency”, as the supervisor insisted when M disappeared suddenly on the eve of our most important campus orientation night. A little bird says that it wasn’t a family emergency but instead it was a polite euphemism for being in jail.
Then I found out the supervisor was talking shit about me behind my back to C, the other female work study, when I called out of work on Friday morning to stay home with my son who had a high fever.
That Friday I made sure there was nothing going on and nothing scheduled, so it wasn’t like they even needed me that morning. But apparently when I call out to take care of my sick child, I must be having a lark and just taking time off “because there’s no way my son is actually sick, right“?
This is what he supposedly said to C, after I texted her to let her know I wasn’t going to be there when she came in for the afternoon shift.
The male double standard
M missed several days of work during the World Cup, for no other reason than he admitted to being hungover and wanting to stay home to watch his soccer team play. But oh, when M takes the day off, it’s perfectly okay, even when the supervisor jokes that it’s for less than legit reasons.
I’m sick of the bullshit. I’ve had to listen to the supervisor talking shit about all the other female full time employees, all mothers in their own right, and how they “get out of work all the time because of their kids”. It’s the same bullshit I had to hear when I was in the military.
The supervisor is also a veteran, and he obviously shares much of the same military dogma as all the other dudes I ever came in contact with at multiple commands while I served on active duty. However, I had hoped he was a little more enlightened, and more importantly, a little more professional, given the academic environment.
On the internet, on TV, in the news, and in real life I am surrounded by the evidence of just how unequal it can be for women in the workplace. Even in here at this job, where the supervisor’s boss is a woman, he still behaves like a jackass, and unfortunately gets away with it just because he happens to think that since he’s marginally attractive and therefore considered charming, that should compensate for his utter lack of sensitivity and empathy.
The only thing I regret about a prior fauxpas was in how it reflected on my character, I don’t regret any of the opinions I professed at that time.
It’s going to be a struggle to keep his current chauvinism from affecting my performance, as every day he reminds me in little ways of mr horrible and the many delightful traits these two ass clowns seem to have in common. One day maybe I will actually make the acquaintance of decent men who were raised to respect their fellow HUMAN, and not dose it out solely to those who have dangling appendages between their legs.
I am better than this
I have to remind myself that I am better than this. That this job is not my endgame.
That I am working hard for better things for myself and my children. It’s not easy to do, and it is hard to stay positive, but I have to do it because some days I just want to throw my hands up and not get out of bed. I’m certainly not in it for the money, I earn a pittance and sometimes the aggravation at work negates all of the fringe benefits.
I truly wonder when will this double standard ever end?
