The summary is all about the latest techniques which are deployed in the name of sexual harassment. These techniques have been revealed due to the number of facts identified by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) otherwise they would have remained unknown for many reasons, of which the most fundamental one is over the issue of ‘Third-party harassment’. It was discovered by the EEOC that the new century harassment took place when sexual harassment cases were filed mostly by men which not only increased from 481 in 1991 to 1,500 in 1994 but also doubled on an annual basis to 14,420 (Velasquez, 2008).
The most amusing issue over Third-party harassment discloses the loophole of the Civil Rights Act 1964 by realizing the difficulty of limiting the law only to employees, and not-self employees. Now, this indicates the ‘usefulness’ of the Act that enables prosecuting harassment only to employed workers leaving behind the offenders that are literate enough and engaged in some professional services. Another blunder shouldered by the EEOC tells us that despite so many consecutive harassment claims, EEOC has failed to maintain a record of the actual statistics.
The consequences of Third-party harassment in the presence of such a vulnerable Act as raised by Velasquez concerns about those individuals or practitioners who want to respond to the allegations. Now how could it be possible that victims who are self-employed or own some respect in society claim openly and not lose their business? Such individuals have their careers at stake and with a fear of losing credibility or losing other clients they usually are unable to afford speaking out and as Velasquez says that “Setting your goals against a client means that the company is asking for career suicide” (Velasquez, 2008). Obviously, for a growing or stable organization, association with such negative incidents as nothing more than losing credibility and future prospective clients. Therefore the only available option for such organizations or self-employed individuals is to freely take appropriate action by responding to any complaints and inquiries with efficiency. However, the solution that Velasquez has proposed is the negotiation or short-term loss by the victim according to the victim’s wish. He further names it as “short-term financial sacrifice” which today’s organizations must be capable of making in order to gain the trust and confidence of their new prospective clients (Velasquez, 2008). This way the organizations are able to establish new official rules and mentioning them in their contracts would set an example to their workers and their colleagues.
I prefer strict management rules that under any cost must not tolerate signs that later escort to sexual harassment. In this context, I think two actions must be taken. First, all the complaints must be taken into account irrespective of class, gender, or race in order to take action for or against them. Secondly, each complaint must be dealt with confidentiality so as to conduct a proper investigation and immediate disciplinary action (Velasquez, 2008).
Work Cited
Velasquez Mauricio, (2008) “A new era in sexual harassment” Web.