DefinitelyDressage.com

OK, this just grated on me at work today.

The lady I share a cubicle wall with is getting a new power outlet installed. She was gone and the building manager brought the electrician by to look at it and schedule the work. The BM referred to her as "this girl" like 4 times in 5 minutes (she was out of the office). Is that not obnoxious? I can't in a million years imagine him referring to one of my male co-workers as "this boy." She's a grown adult - in fact, he could just say "this person..." So weird and annoying!

Not weird but definitely offensive. Any female adult should not be referred to as "girl". He is rude and it a way of not acknowledging the person's worth and identity in the work place.

I'm not on the same page as you two, and probably all alone in my thinking on this. Not only wouldn't it bother me, but I would not have even noticed it.

MC, do you think you would notice if a 60 year old man was referred to as "that boy?" In this context (e.g. not "I'm watching the game withy boys."

That is obnoxious. How hard would it be to refer to her by name? She is a coworker after all ...

StraightForward wrote:MC, do you think you would notice if a 60 year old man was referred to as "that boy?" In this context (e.g. not "I'm watching the game withy boys."

Yes I would notice that. When I hear 'boy' I do think young. When I hear 'girl' I do not necessarily think young. That has to do with my generation I think. I remember women saying "where's the girl's room" Even "I gotta go to the little girl's room". I highly doubt the guy was being disrespectful. I don't get bothered if a guy calls me 'dear' or other names like that either.
I'll bet you wouldn't have been bothered if he called her "the old lady" either, but I would.

I think old lady would be equally disrepectful in a professional environment.

I would have spoke up and said that is "Sharon's cubicle" just to clarify and politely remind the BM. What is his approximate age as that may be partly the reason too?

When I was job interviewing in the late 60's, there was a job called "Girl Friday". Webster definition:
a female assistant (as in an office) entrusted with a wide variety of tasks

Josette wrote:I would have spoke up and said that is "Sharon's cubicle" just to clarify and politely remind the BM. What is his approximate age as that may be partly the reason too?

He is about the same age. The power outlet is so she can plug in a space heater. He has a history of essentially dismissing any complaints about the temperature as women being whiny, so I'm probably extra sensitive about it (despite him admitting this summer that the air duct dumps 55 degree air right above her computer station, and the men in our section also keeping coats at work).

It would not have bothered me - but, using her name would have been more professional.

I guess if it was a man's cubicle he would have said "this guy".

Now that I'm 60 something - I would not mind being called a girl or lady. I do dislike when someone calls me ma'am.

When I was in my 40's a guy not too far from my age called me ma'am and I wanted to slug him! LOL

If it were a guy, he would have used the guy's name. Calling a 60 year old woman a girl is just MCP.

I like hearing all the perspectives on this type of situation. In our 'neck of the woods', one gets so used to hearing the local colloquialisms that it doesn't always stand out as unusual or disrespectful. For instance, a man might say, "that ol' boy ran like heck from that bull....". 'Ol boy' in this instance could mean a man anywhere from 30-70 years old.

Men might refer to younger women as a "little lady" if the person is obviously older than a child, maybe in their teens or 20's, but not middle-aged. One typically hears that term coming from older men. I can't remember having heard a 20- or 30-something refer to a female as "little lady". I would take exception to being called "little lady" now, especially at my age. However, I've been referred to as "young lady" more times than I can count. Of course, that was 10-15 years ago!

I honestly think it is how folks are brought up, especially in a rural setting like ours. "This gal" or "that gal" is common in conversation if the speaker doesn't know the person by name. And I've had 20-somethings in TSC refer to me as "ma'am" (I'm still in my 50's!) out of politeness.

musical comedy wrote:When I was job interviewing in the late 60's, there was a job called "Girl Friday". Webster definition:
a female assistant (as in an office) entrusted with a wide variety of tasks

Yes, and I'm looking forward to the time that the men who assume the women in their workplace are their professional peers, rather than assistance who are there to run errands for them go ahead and retire. I think it's often sub-conscious, but it happens, and takes away from professional achievements. Am I being taken seriously as an expert in my field if I'm referred to as "that girl" when I'm out of the room?

texsuze wrote:Men might refer to younger women as a "little lady" if the person is obviously older than a child, maybe in their teens or 20's, but not middle-aged. One typically hears that term coming from older men. I can't remember having heard a 20- or 30-something refer to a female as "little lady". I would take exception to being called "little lady" now, especially at my age. However, I've been referred to as "young lady" more times than I can count. Of course, that was 10-15 years ago!

Also TX here. I get "little lady" and "young lady" all the time-- and I'm in your 20-30-something demographic (emphasis on the 30something). I found a grey hair in my hairbrush the other day, which means that my gray hairs are no longer the youngest hair I have. Oof.

I'm an engineer and frequently get the diminutives from our operations group. Not my favorite part of my job, but also doesn't hit my top-10 list for things-I-struggle-with-at-work.

.

It irks me too. I accidentally referred to someone as a girl the other day and then corrected myself because I think she might have graduated from high school last spring and is now an adult. The issue is that women have agency and girls are still children.

When I was about 18, my then boyfriend’s best friend’s brother explained to me that calling a chick a woman is like calling her a bitch. Oh, ok.

And then when the whole Epstein thing broke in the news, they decided to refer to those poor girls as “underage women”, minimizing what was done to them.

I probably wouldn’t notice any of this if women earned the same money for the same work, or if they were equally represented in top leadership positions.

Being in my 70's, I'd take it as a compliment!!

I am also in my 70s and I would not take it as a compliment. I would find it (intentionally or not) demeaning. A 60 year old woman is not a girl. And she is not "60 years young," either.

I *might* be more tolerant of "diminutives" being used on people in the workplace when we are all paid the same for the same work...but that's because I care more about financial equity than the stupid $3!$ people say.

piedmontfields wrote:.but that's because I care more about financial equity than the stupid $3!$ people say.

Absolutely, laughing all the way to the bank. Maybe it's because I worked for a fortune 100 company, but I never saw the income inequality that so many of you have seen. In my company, each job title had a pay grade so if you were doing that particular job, you got paid somewhere within that range whether you were a man or a woman. There would be maybe a starting and ending range, based on time on job and performance. And really, I was fortunate enough to be in the workplace at the time when they were really stressing affirmative action, so lots of women were getting promoted to meet the quotas. To be honest, many weren't really qualified either.

Where I work now, the pay grades are quite large in range (easy to have pay differences of $50k+)---so it is easy to have a good deal of disparity amongst "equal roles". Frankly, a lot starts at the beginning, when people are first hired and have a different starting salaries. There's been quite a bit of study of this.

musical comedy wrote:

piedmontfields wrote: I never saw the income inequality that so many of you have seen. In my company, each job title had a pay grade so if you were doing that particular job, you got paid somewhere within that range whether you were a man or a woman.

same.

If pay reporting legislation requirements that emerged from the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (2016) were actually executed, we would know even more of pay inequities. Many people are limited in knowledge by their own experience about this topic (and I'm happy if they've had good experiences!) Also, given that many employers in the US do not share salary information, it can be very hard to know just how equal or unequal pay is for the same work.

My current employer (non profit R&D) actually has quite a flat pay scale compared to fortune 500 companies. Where I am, the top paid leadership are making around 12-15 times x the least paid hourly worker. In contrast, average CEO pay is in the US more than 250 x average worker pay.