With all of the high profile men being accused of sexual harassment & assault, I’m compelled to talk about a much less obvious, but still morally inexcusable behavior; passive sexism. As a female in a male dominated industry, it’s something I deal with every single day. I’m sure I’m not the only one. I still get irritated when people find out I’m not just the “festival girl” for the brewery, when people (not always men) are surprised to learn I run the brewery, and when people assume I need to ask permission from my brother to make decisions for the company. As infuriating as it is, because it happens so frequently, we accept it as just how things are…and now that I see all of this happening in the news, I wonder how much of our accepting this passive sexism contributes to the sexually inappropriate behavior these men have been exhibiting. Have we made it ok for men to think calling a female coworker “sweet cheeks” acceptable? Is it our willingness to accept this treatment as females being viewed as permission to treat us as sexual objects, and inferior humans, rather than the incredibly capable, equally accomplished creatures that we are?
Here’s a great example of passive sexism: I recently had some business dealings that caused me to come to a decision that wasn’t favorable to one of our vendors. His response was to copy my brother on an email to me explaining why he thought I was making the wrong decision. I’ve done business with this individual for 3 years…during this time he’s had no brewery business contact with my brother. However, he felt compelled to copy him on an email about a decision I made in the best interest of our company, saving us thousands of dollars, and one that I have 100% authority to make. Lets just say the scenario didn’t work out well for him…
Another: my boyfriend accompanies me to a brewfest where he’s there to spend time with me and he helps me lug shit in and out of the festival. People are there to sample beers and ask questions about the company and it’s products. It’s not unusual, actually it’s the norm, to have someone ask a question about the beer and when I answer, they look to him for confirmation. He’s a smart dude, but he doesn’t work in the industry…why, when given an intelligent, well thought out response, would they look to him for confirmation? Because I’m a chick in a man’s world…and it’s not just male patrons that do this, females do as well, and that is what makes me the most angry. It’s become so commonplace that even we, as women, practice passive sexism.
I encourage you, male or female, to pick your head up and look around when you’re out in public. You’ll see it everywhere. At restaurants, the check is often handed to the male diner first; at the mechanic’s shop, questions about the vehicle get directed to the male; in almost any store if a male and female walk up to the counter to purchase something together, the clerk will almost always look at the male for payment; in the grocery store though, completely different story! In the grocery store, the deli person always looks to the female to see what they need…hmmmm….
And I’m not male-bashing, not by any stretch, because it’s not always males perpetrating this issue. We all do it, women do it, hell I do it. When we were younger there were roles that were defined as male and female and while many of the roles are now interchangeable, our mindset about them has yet to catch up. We still, often, hand the keys over to the male partner to drive, many women still consider the role of cook as theirs and while the number of stay at home dads has increased in the past 20 years, it’s still usually considered the female’s responsibility to rear children.
So, how do we fix this? We pay attention, demonstrate equality and demand it from others. We can’t make it ok to assume that because a male is present he has all the answers, he makes the important decisions, or that he is responsible for handling the money. We also can’t make it acceptable for women to feel like they have to be the housekeeper, the child rearer, the cook, so they feel like a failure if they’re not. We need to stop associating jobs with femininity or masculinity; no job is more masculine or feminine than any other, they’re just jobs that aren’t assigned based on genitalia. A penis doesn’t make you smarter when it comes to beer any more than a vagina makes you a better chef. The next time you’re interacting with someone, make the conscious effort to NOT assign their role based on their gender, and the next time someone assigns one to you based on yours, call them on it. I guarantee you, most don’t even know they’re doing it….make sure they do.
I Rise ~ Andrea