Being male and the boss gives you no pastoral rights over your female colleagues/employees

Soo the other day a friend of mine called me ranting. It was her first day at work and as she introduced herself to her unit head, the man started shaking his head, looked her over, patted her on the back and said “my dear, I don’t like how you are dressed”. She looked at herself again to be sure that the plain office trousers and a full button up shirt with the pair of shoe she put on that morning hadn’t been mutated into something else. Then the man said “I don’t like ladies who wear trousers therefore go back home, change your clothes and then, come back to work”. Then,  he turned and walked away.

She was livid and stood confused until another colleague (a lady who had worked about 2 years already) called her aside and advised her to go home and change, as she was on training and would be graded at the end for qualities like ability to take corrections.  She explained that the man was vindictive and would surely hold her back or give her a low grade which would lead to her repeating the training now without pay.

Now this kind of story fuels my anger because they happen everyday and we let them slide. This is the same reason why ladies don’t get key positions in organisations because the menfolk decide and agree that religiously, the woman is below the man therefore the president should be male while the vice is female (in essence the men get all the important positions while the women get those ‘name-only’ ones).

What was my friend’s boss’s business with her trouser, that place wasn’t his church premises.  He doesn’t think women should wear trousers because it’s sinful– that’s his personal and religious belief. It has nothing to do with the way a female worker does her work, her rapport her with the clientele and her co-workers, the suggestions and positive changes she makes to an organisation.

I’ve heard stories of ladies being advised and preached to, privately and for over an hour because their male bosses feel they are want to become “career women”. Or is it the cases of being passed over for a promotion because they’ve decided that a married woman should put more time into her home.

Or is it when your male colleagues give somehow pitying looks because you always eat at the canteen in the office as they believe that a virtous woman should cook her meals (according to their holy book).

Or when you are transfered to that boring department in your organisation where workers never make it to the top inorder that you may have quality family time without being asked your input and expected to thank your oga for the favour.

I will stop here for now………