Not Bad

  I woke up a hundred times at least last night. My mouth was dry and my throat was sore. My head was pounding. And not for the first time in my life I cursed these Warner sinuses. It doesn't help that my Mom's family has the same issues so I've got it doubly, if that is a word, bad. 

  So with a headache and sore throat, I crawled back to bed after the kids left hoping for some relief. I took the laptop with me to check my stocks and maybe make a few dollars after a crappy week for the stock market. Scrolling through a few news sites I saw an article about a man in his seventies who lost his job at PBS for saying Meghan Markle was "Not bad".

  Here's how it apparently went down. This man was working on an article about the royal couple with another male coworker and was overheard by two female coworkers when he made the not bad comment. They could not see the picture in question but complained to their superiors about it and two days later he was fired without ever being asked about the comment or the context of it. Which he says had more to do with her grace and charm melding nicely with Harry's.

  It would never occur to me that this comment would ever be considered bad enough to lose your job over. But he did. But here is where the story gets interesting for me. The same two women who complained about his comment had been seen looking at a photo of our very own PM Justin Trudeau and called him "hot". They were not investigated and they suffered no consequences. Hmmmm that's interesting.

  Now the women's comments were witnessed. It was known they were looking at a man and I don't know how you can take "hot" and make it anything but sexual. So where were the disciplinary actions? How come they weren't fired? Is there a double standard at play here? The answer to that is absolutely. And that bias can hurt women who are legitimately harassed at work. Here's why.

  Once a woman gets a pass for doing something wrong men will use that as the basis for getting out of consequences when they do the same thing. That's a fact. And who can blame them? Either the rules are for everyone or they are for no one. Living in the real world we know that isn't always true but we cannot expect men to be punished and not ourselves. That would mean we are not equal and not able to suffer the results of our actions. Back to square one.

  Most likely this man will get his job back and some compensation for the damage to his reputation. What should happen is both of his female coworkers are fired. What's good for the goose is good for the gander. Then perhaps they will understand that not only men harass and they will take a closer look at their own behavior.

  Feminism is about equality. If women truly want to be equal then we cannot accept two sets of rules just because one is leaning in our favor. 

  Ang