Workforce Stereotypes

[Tennesseer]

Sadly, the below is true. Happened the other day. In addition to assuming the woman was a stewardess, it has been years since women have been called stewardess'. They have been called flight attendants for some time.

Link to an article about it after the picture.



A Delta pilot corrected a senator who called her 'stewardess'

[busymom]

Glad she corrected him.  Old geezer called her a stewardess, too.  Maybe he doesn't understand who works for the Pilot's Association?  

[Cheesy FL-Vol]

I am in a male dominated construction related field. Every time a contractor came into our office, they automatically assumed that I was the receptionist. 

I have been working in my field for over 30 years and so glad that I can work remotely and don’t have to have ear or face time with customers.

[tallguy]

Mar 23, 2024 15:58:36 GMT -5 Tennesseer said:

Sadly, the below is true. Happened the other day. In addition to assuming the woman was a stewardess, it has been years since women have been called stewardess'. They have been called flight attendants for some time.

Link to an article about it after the picture.



A Delta pilot corrected a senator who called her 'stewardess'

"No, senator, I have no real idea.  I would like to thank you though for once again demonstrating that white Republican men are about fifty years behind the times.  That is about how long we have had women as commercial airline pilots and also about how long it has been since flight attendants, of which many are men by the way, have been called stewardesses.  Now, may I again thank you for the opportunity to testify on behalf of the AIR LINE PILOTS Association International?"   

[chiver78]

Mar 23, 2024 17:27:37 GMT -5 tallguy said:

Mar 23, 2024 15:58:36 GMT -5 Tennesseer said:

Sadly, the below is true. Happened the other day. In addition to assuming the woman was a stewardess, it has been years since women have been called stewardess'. They have been called flight attendants for some time.

Link to an article about it after the picture.



A Delta pilot corrected a senator who called her 'stewardess'

"No, senator, I have no real idea.  I would like to thank you though for once again demonstrating that white Republican men are about fifty years behind the times.  That is about how long we have had women as commercial airline pilots and also about how long it has been since flight attendants, of which many are men by the way, have been called stewardesses.  Now, may I again thank you for the opportunity to testify on behalf of the AIR LINE PILOTS Association International?"   

I forgot how much I love you. lol...


I have a bunch of similar stories to what Cheesy said, from my work travel in my early 20s. that was early 2000s. I'm in a good mood tonight, though, so I'm going to punt on revisiting all of that bullshit til tomorrow. but shit.....lots to say. 

[tallguy]

Mar 23, 2024 17:32:08 GMT -5 chiver78 said:

Mar 23, 2024 17:27:37 GMT -5 tallguy said:

"No, senator, I have no real idea.  I would like to thank you though for once again demonstrating that white Republican men are about fifty years behind the times.  That is about how long we have had women as commercial airline pilots and also about how long it has been since flight attendants, of which many are men by the way, have been called stewardesses.  Now, may I again thank you for the opportunity to testify on behalf of the AIR LINE PILOTS Association International?"   

I forgot how much I love you. lol...


I have a bunch of similar stories to what Cheesy said, from my work travel in my early 20s. that was early 2000s. I'm in a good mood tonight, though, so I'm going to punt on revisiting all of that bullshit til tomorrow. but shit.....lots to say. 

I am truly stunned.  I know I don't post nearly as much as I used to, but how could you possibly forget!!??

[chiver78]

[ken a.k.a OMK]

One time my wife had to take our son for a haircut where I usually take him. The barber/owner I knew was a male chauvinist pig and he didn't disappoint. He asked my wife where she worked, then said she must be a secretary. Our 8 yo son cringed as she told him she was the manager of corporate quality control for the world's largest spice company. 

[Pink Cashmere]

A male manager at my job, years ago, told a woman that she might get promoted to one of the jobs she was applying for if she tried to look like a woman and at least put some lipstick on. 

[happyhoix]

Mar 23, 2024 21:12:38 GMT -5 Pink Cashmere said:

A male manager at my job, years ago, told a woman that she might get promoted to one of the jobs she was applying for if she tried to look like a woman and at least put some lipstick on. 

Thirty years ago when I was a female manager at a male dominated company my dinosaur boss told me I needed to be ‘nicer’ to the male managers. (I had argued with a male colleague). 

This guy had his admin open and read his emails for him, and if there were any important ones, to print them out and set them on his desk for him to read. He told her to only bother reading emails from ‘important’ people (not admins). This back fired in a big way when his boss came to the site and wanted to know why the dinosaur had not responded to an email the bosses’ admin had sent. The dinosaur claimed he never got it. The boss told him to open up his email. Dinosaur had to ask his admin what his computer password was.    Dinosaur opened his email and was scrolling down, and sure enough, there was the email from the bosses’ admin, unopened. The dinosaur of course blamed his admin, yelling at her in front of his boss, but boss was not impressed when he found out the admin was having to open and print out emails for dinosaur to read. 

Took another couple years, but that racist, sexist dinosaur was finally fired. 

[andi9899]

If I had a nickel for every time I was referred to as a secretary. I've never been a secretary. No hate to the secretaries out there, but that's not what I do.

[andi9899]

Mar 23, 2024 21:12:38 GMT -5 Pink Cashmere said:

A male manager at my job, years ago, told a woman that she might get promoted to one of the jobs she was applying for if she tried to look like a woman and at least put some lipstick on. 

Please tell me that man was fired or at least reprimanded.

[happyhoix]

Mar 24, 2024 9:16:48 GMT -5 andi9899 said:

Mar 23, 2024 21:12:38 GMT -5 Pink Cashmere said:

A male manager at my job, years ago, told a woman that she might get promoted to one of the jobs she was applying for if she tried to look like a woman and at least put some lipstick on. 

Please tell me that man was fired or at least reprimanded.

I’m willing to bet he was not. 

Around 1990, when they were talking about creating a law that would let women take 3 months of unpaid leave off work in order to stay home after the brith or adoption of a baby, the head of HR for our whole company came to our site for a group meeting, and someone asked him about that proposed law. HR went off on a rant about how ridiculous that proposed law was, how he would fire any woman who asked to be able to stay home for 3 months after having a baby, how women should just quit and be a SAHM if they wanted to spend time with their babies. 

And this guy was the head of HR for a large national company. We forget how far we’ve come in just a couple decades. 

[Tennesseer]

Mar 24, 2024 10:25:01 GMT -5 happyhoix said:

Mar 24, 2024 9:16:48 GMT -5 andi9899 said:

Please tell me that man was fired or at least reprimanded.

I’m willing to bet he was not. 

Around 1990, when they were talking about creating a law that would let women take 3 months of unpaid leave off work in order to stay home after the brith or adoption of a baby, the head of HR for our whole company came to our site for a group meeting, and someone asked him about that proposed law. HR went off on a rant about how ridiculous that proposed law was, how he would fire any woman who asked to be able to stay home for 3 months after having a baby, how women should just quit and be a SAHM if they wanted to spend time with their babies. 

And this guy was the head of HR for a large national company. We forget how far we’ve come in just a couple decades. 

I was the backup HR rep for the HR rep assigned to my employer's HR division. While this post is not about a job stereotype issue, it was HR's job to keep politics and religion (among other things) out of the workplace. So I am covering for the HR rep while she was on vacation. I get a call from a HR director telling me her boss, a HR VP, is posting Christian scripture as part of his daily email messages to his management team. She asked me to ask him to please stop with the religious messages.

It was a little bit awkward telling the VP to stop because I usually had lunch each day with him and one of his managers. But he did stop without questioning me why.

HR can screw up too.

[Pink Cashmere]

Mar 24, 2024 9:16:48 GMT -5 andi9899 said:

Mar 23, 2024 21:12:38 GMT -5 Pink Cashmere said:

A male manager at my job, years ago, told a woman that she might get promoted to one of the jobs she was applying for if she tried to look like a woman and at least put some lipstick on. 

Please tell me that man was fired or at least reprimanded.

He definitely was not fired. I doubt he was reprimanded.

[happyhoix]

Mar 24, 2024 10:41:36 GMT -5 Tennesseer said:

Mar 24, 2024 10:25:01 GMT -5 happyhoix said:

I’m willing to bet he was not. 

Around 1990, when they were talking about creating a law that would let women take 3 months of unpaid leave off work in order to stay home after the brith or adoption of a baby, the head of HR for our whole company came to our site for a group meeting, and someone asked him about that proposed law. HR went off on a rant about how ridiculous that proposed law was, how he would fire any woman who asked to be able to stay home for 3 months after having a baby, how women should just quit and be a SAHM if they wanted to spend time with their babies. 

And this guy was the head of HR for a large national company. We forget how far we’ve come in just a couple decades. 

I was the backup HR rep for the HR rep assigned to my employer's HR division. While this post is not about a job stereotype issue, it was HR's job to keep politics and religion (among other things) out of the workplace. So I am covering for the HR rep while she was on vacation. I get a call from a HR director telling me her boss, a HR VP, is posting Christian scripture as part of his daily email messages to his management team. She asked me to ask him to please stop with the religious messages.

It was a little bit awkward telling the VP to stop because I usually had lunch each day with him and one of his managers. But he did stop without questioning me why.

HR can screw up too.

Speaking about not talking about religion or politics at work (which I have heard repeatedly, all through out my working life, from multiple different companies) my current touchy feely company had a diversity training class about a year ago that encouraged employees to discuss their political and religious beliefs with their co-workers in order to make a ‘safe and comfortable’ work environment. Really? In the current cultural climate in the US right now, we want people to start talking about that shit at work? 

In the same class with me was a very nice young man from the distribution department who is a very devout Christian who had already had some run ins with some of the out gay people who work at our company, trying to get them to see the error of their ways.    Now HR is telling him he SHOULD be discussing his religious beliefs with his co-workers ‘so everyone can get to know each other better?’ 

The guy was very excited. Fortunately, about a month later he resigned to go work someplace else, because if I had run into him and he tried to corner me on his religious beliefs we would have had a problem. 

[Tennesseer]

Mar 24, 2024 19:26:37 GMT -5 happyhoix said:

Mar 24, 2024 10:41:36 GMT -5 Tennesseer said:

I was the backup HR rep for the HR rep assigned to my employer's HR division. While this post is not about a job stereotype issue, it was HR's job to keep politics and religion (among other things) out of the workplace. So I am covering for the HR rep while she was on vacation. I get a call from a HR director telling me her boss, a HR VP, is posting Christian scripture as part of his daily email messages to his management team. She asked me to ask him to please stop with the religious messages.

It was a little bit awkward telling the VP to stop because I usually had lunch each day with him and one of his managers. But he did stop without questioning me why.

HR can screw up too.

Speaking about not talking about religion or politics at work (which I have heard repeatedly, all through out my working life, from multiple different companies) my current touchy feely company had a diversity training class about a year ago that encouraged employees to discuss their political and religious beliefs with their co-workers in order to make a ‘safe and comfortable’ work environment. Really? In the current cultural climate in the US right now, we want people to start talking about that shit at work? 

In the same class with me was a very nice young man from the distribution department who is a very devout Christian who had already had some run ins with some of the out gay people who work at our company, trying to get them to see the error of their ways.    Now HR is telling him he SHOULD be discussing his religious beliefs with his co-workers ‘so everyone can get to know each other better?’ 

The guy was very excited. Fortunately, about a month later he resigned to go work someplace else, because if I had run into him and he tried to corner me on his religious beliefs we would have had a problem. 

I won't say by name the company I worked for for thirty years. But let me say their headquarters is in Memphis as is their primary sort facility and where our airplanes fly to each night to pickup up packages and then fly the freight to multiple airports around the country early morning so they can be delivered.

In the late '90s, I was a one of a number of HR reps supporting that sort facility. One day, one of the sort facility employees (I'll call her Ethel) came to my office with a concern. She told me one of the members of her work group was gay and that employee was now entertain questions from his workgroup as to what gays do having sex with each other. Ethel told me she was one of the co-workers who did ask the gay employee questions. But now she was uncomfortable with the questions and conversation in her workgroup.

I told Ethel I would have a short workgroup meeting with her and her co-workers. When I met with the group I just asked to keep the conversations about work and ask questions about each of their personal lives after work like over diner or their local beverage hangout. All the members were cool with my request.

About two weeks later, Ethel was back in my office with a new concern. I asked her if her co-workers were still asking the gay co-worker about his sex acts. Ethyl said no. The did stop the questions. Ethyl said her current concern was she could not get it out of her head what gay sex acts might look like. I told Ethyl what was going on in her head was way beyond my control. But I did refer Ethyl to our 1-800-People Help phone number where she could get counseling to help the stuff going on in her head.

[tallguy]

Mar 24, 2024 20:00:27 GMT -5 Tennesseer said:

Mar 24, 2024 19:26:37 GMT -5 happyhoix said:

Speaking about not talking about religion or politics at work (which I have heard repeatedly, all through out my working life, from multiple different companies) my current touchy feely company had a diversity training class about a year ago that encouraged employees to discuss their political and religious beliefs with their co-workers in order to make a ‘safe and comfortable’ work environment. Really? In the current cultural climate in the US right now, we want people to start talking about that shit at work? 

In the same class with me was a very nice young man from the distribution department who is a very devout Christian who had already had some run ins with some of the out gay people who work at our company, trying to get them to see the error of their ways.    Now HR is telling him he SHOULD be discussing his religious beliefs with his co-workers ‘so everyone can get to know each other better?’ 

The guy was very excited. Fortunately, about a month later he resigned to go work someplace else, because if I had run into him and he tried to corner me on his religious beliefs we would have had a problem. 

I won't say by name the company I worked for for thirty years. But let me say their headquarters is in Memphis as is their primary sort facility and where our airplanes fly to each night to pickup up packages and then fly the freight to multiple airports around the country early morning so they can be delivered.

Sounds like a movie I saw once, but I can't for the life of me think what company it was....  Starred Tom somebody, right?    
Didn't turn out well.

[Tennesseer]

Mar 24, 2024 21:11:28 GMT -5 tallguy said:

Mar 24, 2024 20:00:27 GMT -5 Tennesseer said:

I won't say by name the company I worked for for thirty years. But let me say their headquarters is in Memphis as is their primary sort facility and where our airplanes fly to each night to pickup up packages and then fly the freight to multiple airports around the country early morning so they can be delivered.

Sounds like a movie I saw once, but I can't for the life of me think what company it was....  Starred Tom somebody, right?    
Didn't turn out well.

I attended the wedding of the woman who kissed Tom what's his name goodbye as she and her husband left his Welcome back to Memphis party.

[djAdvocate]

Mar 23, 2024 17:57:35 GMT -5 ken a.k.a OMK said:

One time my wife had to take our son for a haircut where I usually take him. The barber/owner I knew was a male chauvinist pig and he didn't disappoint. He asked my wife where she worked, then said she must be a secretary. Our 8 yo son cringed as she told him she was the manager of corporate quality control for the world's largest spice company. 

that is the world they live in, but in MAGA Land, they get to pretend otherwise, and the MAGAssholes just dittohead their way through the conversation.

it makes their hatred of Obama totally understandable.  he represents the end of that world.

[pulmonarymd]

Try being a female physician, or even better a surgeon. The stories they could tell. They put up with crap I never have to deal with, and have to be nicer to a-holes than I have to be as well. And it is both Men and Women who act this way.

[haapai]

Mar 25, 2024 15:03:38 GMT -5 pulmonarymd said:

Try being a female physician, or even better a surgeon. The stories they could tell. They put up with crap I never have to deal with, and have to be nicer to a-holes than I have to be as well. And it is both Men and Women who act this way.

Could you clarify whether this a-hole-ery is coming from patients or coworkers or both?  I'm tempted to assume that it is coming from all sides, but I figured that I'd at least ask. 

[Tennesseer]

Mar 25, 2024 15:03:38 GMT -5 pulmonarymd said:

Try being a female physician, or even better a surgeon. The stories they could tell. They put up with crap I never have to deal with, and have to be nicer to a-holes than I have to be as well. And it is both Men and Women who act this way.

Your post reminded me of an old riddle from the '60s?

A father and his son are in a car accident. The father dies at the scene and the son is rushed to the hospital. At the hospital the surgeon looks at the boy and says "I can't operate on this boy, he is my son."

[pulmonarymd]

Mar 25, 2024 15:23:22 GMT -5 haapai said:

Mar 25, 2024 15:03:38 GMT -5 pulmonarymd said:

Try being a female physician, or even better a surgeon. The stories they could tell. They put up with crap I never have to deal with, and have to be nicer to a-holes than I have to be as well. And it is both Men and Women who act this way.

Could you clarify whether this a-hole-ery is coming from patients or coworkers or both?  I'm tempted to assume that it is coming from all sides, but I figured that I'd at least ask. 

Everyone. I can be short or less than pleasant with the nurses, and they just sort of brush it off or talk amongst themselves. A female physician doing the same thing-OMG it is like she committed the Manson murders. The gossip, etc is ridiculous. Patients will be seen by a Female physician, and then ask when the Doctor is coming to see them. They will be shocked when they call them a nurse, and then are told, "No, I am the Doctor". They think male PAs are the Doctor and the female Physician is a nurse or a PA. It is getting better, but it is still a problem for them

[hurley1980]

Mar 23, 2024 21:12:38 GMT -5 Pink Cashmere said:

A male manager at my job, years ago, told a woman that she might get promoted to one of the jobs she was applying for if she tried to look like a woman and at least put some lipstick on. 

About 5 years ago, I had a supervisor tell me I would be taken more seriously for a promotion if I wore more conservative shoes ( I was wearing red heels). That didn't go over very well with our female director (who loved my heel collection)! About 6 months later I got the promotion, and he had resigned and taken a job in another state....

[swamp]

I have so many stories

You must be the court reporter.  
you’re cute when angry, accompanied by a head pat. 
why aren’t you home with your kids 
I don’t take direction from a little girl 
you only got the job because you slept with x 
wait turn, you’re just a little girl 
boss asks a question. I answer it.  I’m ignored.  Male coworker says the same thing. He’s listened to. 

[tractor]

Sad. In my office I know who's really in charge, it's the admins. Those women can make your life easy, or create a living hell. How you treat them dictates where you end up in your career. We have one male admin, and he's incredible.

[NastyWoman]

Story of my life. When I retired at age 70 things had gotten better than almost half a century earlier when I started work after  college, but sadly not all that much. And now even that tiny improvement is being threatened by MAGA supporters. It really is bad and IMO it will take a couple of generations before we see real change and only if we teach our children well. My feminist sons are more exception than rule in today's world.

[Spellbound454]

I was the pretty little blond girl when I first started working....... didn't I know it
Not taken seriously for anything
"Don't you worry about that dear".... "can you just go and get us some tea and biscuits" "I like that new dress/jumper"

Had to learn to stand up for myself..... and never forget being in a meeting when someone started talking over me (as per usual).... and saying "ACTUALLY, CAN I JUST FINISH MY POINT"

and that was the liberation...... never looked back

[hurley1980]

Another one.  When I was in my early 20s (early 2000s), and first starting my career, a guy said to me at the start of a meeting "pull up a face! Opps....I mean chair!" I was working on a construction site full of men, and it was a small company so very little it the way of an HR dept. I just laughed it off and moved on, but I think about it often now, and how that would never fly in ANY setting. 

I was so used to that kind of comment from guys everywhere in my life, that I never even gave it another thought until about a decade later. I worked with him for many more months, went to happy hours, attended lunches, etc. This was also a man that was about 20-30 years older than me. 

It was just normal in the construction industry as a woman. Its gotten ALOT better now, I'm glad to say!