THOUGHTS! I haz them.

In the meantime, here's an article that was brought to my attention today by a former co-worker friend about women in the workplace, and how we treat each other:

Canadian Financial Post: No Sisterhood At Work

The friend and I used to work at the same non-profit in DC, and she still works there now. Me and several other females at that workplace were being bullied and crapped on by one female manager in particular. The complaints in the HR department had started long before I ever came on board.

This manager is a self-proclaimed "feminist", yet her ideas of feminism include being corrupt, abusive, sabotaging, manipulative, and selfish toward her female co-workers and subordinates. Just as I had come on board to manage a 2-year campaign, another girl, let's call her 'S', was searching for a new job after months of seeing a therapist and getting physically ill because of this manager's behavior toward her. Strangely enough, this manager kissed the asses of every other male in the building. She would often not arrive in the office until noon, would leave early, and then "work from home" sending me emails at 11pm at night. She was constantly out of the office with some sickness or another. Meanwhile, the women like 'S' and I were working three times as hard yet being insulted and told we weren't good enough, were given false information or withholding important information from us, were sent on wild goose chases, worked overtime without pay, and otherwise had our time wasted and used. She stole ideas from us to claim as her own, and sabotaged attempts to meet our client's needs. She did not seem to grasp the understanding that when her team is succeeding, she looks good. Instead, she felt her subordinates were a threat, and sought to stomp them out.

She told me once, directly, that she has gotten to where she's at because she stepped on people on her way up. She freely admitted that, and it made me sick. And of course, the HR manager and executives are afraid of her, and conflict-avoidant, so although they told 'S' and I (and several other women) that they would "look into it and do something about it", admitting that there was a long-term problem, they would never do anything, and the problem only continued to exacerbate until the culmination of my 2-year stint when I left the organization. It's a gigantic shame, actually, because I loved everything about that job, and everyone else at that organization, and they loved me too, but the Bully-Manager was making my life hell and making me physically sick, as well. It was sad to leave that job, but a relief to escape a destructive female bully manager.

I know several women on my LJ have been victims of 'feminine-bullying' in the workplace or otherwise, so thought I would share this article. It's important to talk about these issues instead of sweeping them under the rug. If "women are the new men", then we're going to need to learn to work together without clawing each others' eyes out, or trying to act so 'unempathetic' that we go to the extreme of being corrupt and mean. We shouldn't have to seek therapy and medical attention as a result of this social catastrophe. It just ain't right.