Gender Inequality
In 1776, America declared independence from Great Britain and created a government based on the rights of all men. Thomas Paine, a supporter of these ideals, believed that this new and just government resulted in equality between all. However morally sound the government was, there was still one flaw: it was centered on the rights of men. During this time, the creators of the government did not give the same rights to women as they did to men. This male centered government resulted in gender inequality. Today, while the government may be taking great measures to reduce this inequality, women are still not equal to men. Today, women are not economically equal to men despite the measures the government has taken in the past …show more content…
The Huffington Post states that one in three women have experienced workplace sexual harassment, whereas only one in ten men have. Though the government has had laws protecting workers in these situations since 1964, this problem has always existed in America. According to the government’s White House website, in January 2015, President Obama, Vice President Joe Biden, and the White House Council on Women and Girls created a task force based on combating sexual assault. This task force came out with the Not Alone report, which provided “new steps [for] federal agencies to improve enforcement of federal laws” in regards to workplace harassment. However, a study conducted by ABC News found that only 56% of women believed that if they filed a sexual harassment report at work, it would be handled fairly. Even after the government’s task force put their plan into action, women felt nothing had truly changed. In addition, the Huffington Post’s study also found that of the 29% of women who did report their harassment, 85% believe it was handled unfairly. Women do not have the same sense of security as men in the workplace, nor are they treated in the same way. This inequality has always existed in America, and despite the government’s current action against it, women’s sexual harassment and assault rate continue to soar above …show more content…
For example, in the 2013 case Vance vs. Ball State University, the U.S Supreme Court redefined who a supervisor is in regards to harassment in the workplace and made it harder to win workplace sexual harassment cases. As previously stated, sexual harassment is a larger issue for women than for men, and is one of the many underlying issues of gender inequality. The ITT Chicago-Kent College of Law explains that the court ruled a supervisor to be someone with the “power to hire, fire, fail to promote, reassign to a task with significantly different duties, or cause a significant change in benefits available to the victim.” This dramatically changes how Title VII of the Civil Rights Act, the current standing law regarding workplace rights, which is used in harassment cases, can be applied. Title VII holds supervisors and employers to a different standard, with a supervisor being easier to prove for harassment than an employer. By narrowing down what a supervisor is, it is immeasurably harder to win a harassment case. In doing so, it will now be even harder to show that more women are sexually harassed in the workplace then men, because people will no longer be able to win cases against it. However, this ruling was not made with gender inequality harassment in mind, and the government sees the ramifications of this ruling.
In 1776, America declared independence from Great Britain and created a government based on the rights of all men. Thomas Paine, a supporter of these ideals, believed that this new and just government resulted in equality between all. However morally sound the government was, there was still one flaw: it was centered on the rights of men. During this time, the creators of the government did not give the same rights to women as they did to men. This male centered government resulted in gender inequality. Today, while the government may be taking great measures to reduce this inequality, women are still not equal to men. Today, women are not economically equal to men despite the measures the government has taken in the past …show more content…
The Huffington Post states that one in three women have experienced workplace sexual harassment, whereas only one in ten men have. Though the government has had laws protecting workers in these situations since 1964, this problem has always existed in America. According to the government’s White House website, in January 2015, President Obama, Vice President Joe Biden, and the White House Council on Women and Girls created a task force based on combating sexual assault. This task force came out with the Not Alone report, which provided “new steps [for] federal agencies to improve enforcement of federal laws” in regards to workplace harassment. However, a study conducted by ABC News found that only 56% of women believed that if they filed a sexual harassment report at work, it would be handled fairly. Even after the government’s task force put their plan into action, women felt nothing had truly changed. In addition, the Huffington Post’s study also found that of the 29% of women who did report their harassment, 85% believe it was handled unfairly. Women do not have the same sense of security as men in the workplace, nor are they treated in the same way. This inequality has always existed in America, and despite the government’s current action against it, women’s sexual harassment and assault rate continue to soar above …show more content…
For example, in the 2013 case Vance vs. Ball State University, the U.S Supreme Court redefined who a supervisor is in regards to harassment in the workplace and made it harder to win workplace sexual harassment cases. As previously stated, sexual harassment is a larger issue for women than for men, and is one of the many underlying issues of gender inequality. The ITT Chicago-Kent College of Law explains that the court ruled a supervisor to be someone with the “power to hire, fire, fail to promote, reassign to a task with significantly different duties, or cause a significant change in benefits available to the victim.” This dramatically changes how Title VII of the Civil Rights Act, the current standing law regarding workplace rights, which is used in harassment cases, can be applied. Title VII holds supervisors and employers to a different standard, with a supervisor being easier to prove for harassment than an employer. By narrowing down what a supervisor is, it is immeasurably harder to win a harassment case. In doing so, it will now be even harder to show that more women are sexually harassed in the workplace then men, because people will no longer be able to win cases against it. However, this ruling was not made with gender inequality harassment in mind, and the government sees the ramifications of this ruling.