When is it "too friendly"? Ladies, what do you say?

[sweetpee_1993]

BTW, for whatever its worth..

I work at a MAJOR company. One that most of the americans in here do business with on a daily basis.

I have a co-worker whos been in this company for over 30 years and Has been brought up on sexual harrasment charges 8 or 9 times in the last 6 years and god knows how many times before that.

We work in the I.t. department that covers mostly female employees .

He touches them while doing work . Rubs their necks, shoulders, and arms.. calls them "sweet heart" "Honey" and has even got caught ease dropping on womens conversations....

Its gotten so bad that the head of some of these departments call our supervisor and tell her to send anyone but him.

My supervisor even had to tell him to stop staring at her breast...THE BOSS is feeling creeped out by this guy!!


Hes even had husbands contact him to tell him to knock it off..including a Cop!!

He has NEVER been reprimanded for any of this stuff and the day is coming that one of these women are gonna have themselfs a HUGE lawsuit against this company for their complete and utter failure to take any action against this clown for his behavior.

Its a sad statement that in 2013 with all the time and money spent trying to advert these situations that some people still dont get it and never will.

Id testify on anyones behalf in a heartbeat...This guys got it coming in a big way.

My husband worked in a small drafting department at a Monsanto facility years back. One of the people who worked in the room with 4 guys was a woman. She was actually related by marriage to one of the guys there. Anywhoo, she had a train-wreck of a drama-filled life outside of work. One of the other guys was forever flirting with her. He even gave her a card once when she was down that he had written in it "Penny for your thoughts, quarter for your (underwear)." Duuuuumb guy. The senior guy there asked her all the time if she wanted him to step in and reprimand the creepy flirty guy. (I met him once. He was an odd fellow.) She always declined. Well, she ditched work one too many times and her poor attendance ended up getting her fired. Within a week there was a lawsuit filed for sexual harrassment. She had saved emails, the card, other little notes, even recorded conversations she instigated with the guy. In the end, she got the creepy guy's job and walked away with a high 6-digit sum of money. Was she wrong in what she did? I think she baited a lot of it and played along entirely too much to make it entirely what she made it out to be in the end. Had she not been canned she would've been perfectly happy to stay and not file suit against the company. But, how stupid was the creepy guy??? My husband and the other guys told him all the time he needed to knock it off even if she was the one starting a lot of the inappropriate interactions. He was just too dense to listen.

Reminded me so much about the situation you described. It's going to take 1 chick ready to cash-in and there's gonna be an implosion of monumental proportions here. It only takes ONE. For this to be so widely known and even documented, it's only a matter of time. The supervisors need to wise-up. The only saving grace for the senior/supervisor guy above was the several emails he saved asking the girl if she wanted him to intervene and she replied with "No, I don't mind." He almost lost his job, too. The company still shelled out a big settlement. All those supervisors who know need to have documentation that they've tried everything they can to do the right thing. It's the only thing that could save their jobs when the inevitable happens.

 

[Hot Lava]

How does this even happen in this day and age at a major corporation. I can understand a mom and pop shop, but in this litigious society you'd think there would be steps that Human Resources would take to cover the companies butt and get this guy out on the pavement ASAP.

I worked for a very large company at one time, where I had a boss who also never was punished for his bad behavior. Called the women "honey", "sweetie", "girl" (as in "Girl, get this paperwork to me ASAP"), made racial slurs (the very first time I met him, he did that) - the bad behavior went on and on. This on top of being completely incompetent and never doing any work at all.
After a year, I finally quit. He was only finally fired after the majority of the department left within a month of the time that I did. I too was stunned that the upper levels of management know this was all going on and nver did anything about it.

Given what I have experienced in jobs, the stories I have heard/read, and even famous cases (such as this thing with the behavior of Paula Deen's brother at their restaurant), it seems to me nowadays they only cure is a lawsuit. It seems to be the only thing to make most companies sit up and take notice. Sad.

 

[BoarderPhreak]

My husband worked in a small drafting department at a Monsanto facility years back...

She totally set up an "insurance plan." Devious, by any measure.

As for the OP's server... What an annoying creep. I'd have just left. Maybe reported him for good measure.

 

[aristo_cat]

Wow, I haven't had a chance to check on this thread for a while.

Let me say a couple of things: my friend and I had this experience. We decided it was creepy but not so creepy that we had to report it. At my work place, a client came in and overheard me talking to a coworker and commented about how she knew someone who worked there and she had similar experiences as have been described with the marriages and the citizenship. Apparently some of you all have way bigger and shadier information to share with Disney. My friend and I don't want to make a huge deal out of this because the guy didn't touch her (I read on here something about touching I never said he touched!)

THAT BEING SAID: LET'S SIMMER DOWN !

The fact of the matter is that it IS a cultural disconnect and I do not wish to pick on these people. I regret posting this now because I simply wanted to open a discussion about what is and isn't appropriate behavior when you are at the parks and was curious if anyone else had had this kind of experience or if it was an isolated incident. Now I have people messaging me telling me they are going to report this thread to Disney because of their great concern.

Now, I'm grateful that strangers on the internet find this creepy situation so concerning that they have to report it to Disney. But my friend and I were weirded out but we did not feel the need to report him because of the chance that maybe he was just silly, awkward and meant well in his weird little way. I went to high school with guys like him. Guys who have no idea how to talk to women. I have no intention on making this an international incident and I have to lament it and I have to wonder if so many people would be so upset if this wasn't the Moroccan pavilion and it had been the UK or the Norway pavilion where the guys are more "attractive" by universal standards.

As women, we get this kind of attention more often than not and it is something we deal with on a daiy basis. Does it behoove a Disney employee to get a little too personal with park guests? No. Do we need to lynch him? No. He was simply being weird. I highly doubt that at any point in the interaction my friend or my life was in any kind of peril. I do think that Disney needs to do a better job of addressing these issues with their employees and doing more cultural sensitivity training with the park employees/interns.

This is all I have to say about it at this point. I wish not to be involved in any more crusades for justice and what not. We weren't assaulted. It sounds like some others here have had worse experiences and if you want to take it up with the Mouse, go ahead. But honestly, I meant this as social commentary not a witch hunt.

We have to assess our society in terms of our oversexualized times and how our western culture translates to these more traditional countries. We have to always keep context in mind. Also as I read t hrough these comments I can't help but notice how many remarks were made about how posters wish that the girls in the German or Norway pavilions would have done the same thing to them as these guys did to me. In fact, later on that evening my friend and I were at the Rose and Crown and we were commenting on how attractive the gentleman serving bar were and why were they not as flirtatious. I feel ashamed to admit it but bias plays a role in how we perceive interactions.

Had my friend and I been touched or followed, had we been younger than in our mid to late twenties, had I been a parent of a teenage girl and this happened to her, perhaps I would have reported it. But it was an unfortunate interaction with a young man who either wasn't trained correctly or was simply arrogant. I hardly think it needs to involve DISNEY LAWYERS for crying aloud, guys. Come on. Let's not lose our heads here.

I think if this does indeed go to Disney, I wish them to engage in better training of their foreign employees on ways and customs and perhaps a crash course on sexual harassment/customer service standards is in need. It doesn't need to go any further.

 

[aristo_cat]

I worked for a very large company at one time, where I had a boss who also never was punished for his bad behavior. Called the women "honey", "sweetie", "girl" (as in "Girl, get this paperwork to me ASAP"), made racial slurs (the very first time I met him, he did that) - the bad behavior went on and on. This on top of being completely incompetent and never doing any work at all.
After a year, I finally quit. He was only finally fired after the majority of the department left within a month of the time that I did. I too was stunned that the upper levels of management know this was all going on and nver did anything about it.

Given what I have experienced in jobs, the stories I have heard/read, and even famous cases (such as this thing with the behavior of Paula Deen's brother at their restaurant), it seems to me nowadays they only cure is a lawsuit. It seems to be the only thing to make most companies sit up and take notice. Sad.

Well, or, my solution is that these kids need training. I don't know how Disney does it, I would assume they have a high appreciation for liability so they must have some kind of training but perhaps it isn't translating across the cultures. I think we are far too a litigious society and I do not wish to sue anyone for a creepy little person being too flirty. That's bonkers. I'll be going back to the Morocco pavilion and I'll probably order that Casa beer at that stand because it is so good on a hot day. Yum.

I just want these guys to be trained better. Surely this can happen. And I am hesitant to call it sexual harassment because he didn't touch her rump or lick his lips. He was just being inappropriate/weird but it never truly crossed that harassment line. As for other commenters, they seem to have worse experiences or have heard of worse experiences.

 

[aristo_cat]

To clarify, the Morocco pavilion is not owned by the Moroccan government, but King Hassan II did help fund it and sent his own designers to help WDI create and construct the pavilion. The Cast Members that work in Morocco (and every other pavilion for that matter) are very much Disney employees and are on a one-year work visa from their respective countries.

Each Disney CM goes through a rigorous class on Disney's standards and knows very well what is acceptable when on stage. This sort of behavior is far from acceptable (even if it were light-hearted) and should ALWAYS be reported to Guest Services. A first name from their nametag and where they were working is all you need! Whether or not it is a big deal will be for Disney management to determine, and should not be for you to have to worry about.

@aristo_cat, I hope the "magic" still continues to outweigh the nonsense like this for you!

Yes, absolutely, I'm not at all going to let this unfortunate guy's less than gentlemanly behavior stop me from enjoying Disney or the Morocco pavilion (one of my favorites) at Epcot. It was just an unfortunate incident. It seems to be that those guys need special cultural sensitivity training and I hope that they get it.

 

[aristo_cat]

BTW, for whatever its worth..

I work at a MAJOR company. One that most of the americans in here do business with on a daily basis.

I have a co-worker whos been in this company for over 30 years and Has been brought up on sexual harrasment charges 8 or 9 times in the last 6 years and god knows how many times before that.

We work in the I.t. department that covers mostly female employees .

He touches them while doing work . Rubs their necks, shoulders, and arms.. calls them "sweet heart" "Honey" and has even got caught ease dropping on womens conversations....

Its gotten so bad that the head of some of these departments call our supervisor and tell her to send anyone but him.

My supervisor even had to tell him to stop staring at her breast...THE BOSS is feeling creeped out by this guy!!


Hes even had husbands contact him to tell him to knock it off..including a Cop!!

He has NEVER been reprimanded for any of this stuff and the day is coming that one of these women are gonna have themselfs a HUGE lawsuit against this company for their complete and utter failure to take any action against this clown for his behavior.

Its a sad statement that in 2013 with all the time and money spent trying to avoid these situations that some people still dont get it and never will.

Id testify on anyones behalf in a heartbeat...This guys got it coming in a big way.

Yes, it is very sad. Thank you for sharing your experience. I think that it is a different scenario from what happened to my friend and I but you're right, sexual harassment is not taken very seriously in our society but that is thanks in part to how sexualized everything is these days.

I do hope that this young man at Epcot will be curving his mannerisms. He should be learning positive lessons from our culture not ones that reinforce his negative view of women.

 

[StarWarsGirl]

@aristo_cat I too thought that this was being blown out of proportion. I see that you're 28. I had to deal with similar behavior in high school, so I'm sure you're used to it having (I'm assuming) been through college and in the workplace. So as long as you felt no need to report it, I assume he was just being friendly as they tend to do over there. I agree with what you said 100%.

 

[aristo_cat]

I am so sorry for your DD.

If me, it would have resulted in lawsuits, police reports, and calls to local news stations. My guess is that this guy has done this before and will do it again. And creeps will always try to use some excuse to justify their behavior. They will do whatever they can get away with. I think somehow parents should be warned about him.

Yes, that is really weird that it didn't go further. I guess it depends on the state you live in. I think in Florida those kinds of things are addressed rather aggressively and that teacher would have been dismissed. I rather think that child molesters get off really easy in this country as a whole. I work in child advocacy and I would never stand for inappropriate interactions with young children--making no exceptions whatsoever for cultural discrepancies.

By the by, it is not a cultural tenant of the Hispanic community to touch young girls inappropriately! I hope you know this!

 

[aristo_cat]

Hello I really feel bad to hear that. First, our culture and also religion forbidden that. And just to let you know: Moroccan's (wish most of them are Muslims) they can't have sex nor a girlfriend, I’m not going to talk about it much but if any questions I'll be happy to answer. Second all those guys are in the age. Like everybody know 18 years to 26 you can't control theme and most time they don't follow either religion or a culture. Also we have to learn that a person is a person is not a country or a religion. I hear every day people killing others like the one killed people at that school and ...... but I will never say that American are bad cause I have the most beautiful women we are married for almost 2 years now. I love her and my family love her too. Please when a person do something blame him nor where he is coming from please that's the right thing to do. And I promise I'll report that myself to the Moroccan pavilion. Best regards from a Good Moroccan lol . I’m sorry my English is not that good but there is Some Moroccans they speak perfect English lol (just for fun thanks)

And I don't blame the whole country and I don't wish to single out Moroccans. I know it's a cultural disconnect. That's why we didn't report him. Thank you for your explanation you sure have a right to defend your nationality. I would do the same. I did offer that in Mexico I have experienced heavy flirting but it was never "creepy" in the sense that no one implied they wanted to meet me later. It's just an unfortunate incident.

 

[aristo_cat]

My husband contacted his friend who works management there. He wants the thread forwarded to him and he is asking for the name of the cashier if known. Like I said, this behavior is unacceptable, and everyone, including other Moroccan men, know it.

NO. Let it go. Thanks. Just please pass on that EVERYONE needs cultural sensitivity training. Firing someone isn't going to fix the real issue at hand. I hardly think that is going to help him and it defeats the purpose of the international program which I suspect is to have POSITIVE intercultural experiences. Let's just drop this "reporting" thing.

 

[EpcoTim]

So, you ask for peoples opinions, get them, then tell them to simmer down about their opinions. Very respectful.

Then, you blame the whole issue on "cultural disconnect" and hope he will be "curving his mannerisms" and even state that the "guys need special cultural sensitivity training" and state several times that you want them trained better.

But then, you tell people to simmer down and try to justify your reasoning for not reporting him, which makes no sense and goes against what you were just saying about wanting Disney to train them better. How is Disney going to know theres "cultura disconnect" happening on the front lines if no one tells them? How do they know they need to re-evaluate their training program if they don't know there's a problem? You mention DISNEY LAWYERS and the guys in UK not being flirty, both of which have nothing to do with the problem you originally posted and would in no way be involved in any part of this situation.

Whatever, not my dog, not my problem, but your mindset justification and reasoning flip-flop really struck me as odd.

 

[aristo_cat]

So, you ask for peoples opinions, get them, then tell them to simmer down about their opinions. Very respectful.

Then, you blame the whole issue on "cultural disconnect" and hope he will be "curving his mannerisms" and even state that the "guys need special cultural sensitivity training" and state several times that you want them trained better.

But then, you tell people to simmer down and try to justify your reasoning for not reporting him, which makes no sense and goes against what you were just saying about wanting Disney to train them better. How is Disney going to know theres "cultura disconnect" happening on the front lines if no one tells them? How do they know they need to re-evaluate their training program if they don't know there's a problem? You mention DISNEY LAWYERS and the guys in UK not being flirty, both of which have nothing to do with the problem you originally posted and would in no way be involved in any part of this situation.

Whatever, not my dog, not my problem, but your mindset justification and reasoning flip-flop really struck me as odd.

I did not mention Disney lawyers. Someone else on this thread mentioned litigation and Disney lawyers and getting this thread to Disney lawyers. If you read through the entire post you will see that. My mistake was that in my original post I was expecting people to share their similar experiences and did not expect everyone to start telling me to sue Disney and to get the upper echelons of management involved. Have you read some of the replies on here? We went from a creepy guy being weird to allegations of rape to allegations of guys looking for women to marry them into the country. Now I'm very sorry I ever started this topic because people shared their opinions and I appreciated them and then others are messaging me privately about wanting to take this to lawyers and sending the thread and my personal information to Disney. That's not called for here.

I mention the British guys and the flirting because there's a context here and others brought it up when they started commenting about how they wish certain members of the showcase community would flirt with them. I was simply pointing out that it does go both ways.

 

[aristo_cat]

^This is what disturbs me the most about this story...it seems to be a repeating occurrence overlooked by mgmt. rather than a rare incident.

I see your point, it does seem to be a theme but I've experienced the flirting in Mexico and some others mentioned it elsewhere.

The cultural sensitivity training simply isn't happening. It seems like others have reported to be met with little to no action.

 

[aristo_cat]

Ok I gave my serious response. Now please allow me to add some levity to this thread:

THANK YOU for the levity.

 

[experiment624]

I am a mother of an American woman married to a Moroccan man. I can only say that you can't judge all Moroccans by the behavior of a few. The one thing that impressed about my daughter's husband is that he was so respectful to me. Before he started dating my daughter he asked if it would be alright, since I am Jewish and he is Muslim. The one thing I noticed right away about him is how he is so different from a lot of American men I have seen, he holds the door for women, stands up for women on a bus, never drinks or smokes. I just hate how it seems on this website that everyone is piling on, telling their "horror" story about a Moroccan person. Well here is a good story. I know several Moroccans through my daughter who are very kind, and nice. So please don't think everyone is like that CM.

I am very pleased to hear that you appreciate your son-in-law. I hope that he and your daughter have all the blessings a marriage deserves. Thank you for sharing that with us. I don't believe for a moment that Moroccan men are this way, however, I am concerned that the handful working at the EPCOT pavilion, have gotten some misinformation or wrong ideas. I hope that the comments I'm reading here are directed at the few individuals rather than the whole.

 

[mousehockey37]

I work in child advocacy and I would never stand for inappropriate interactions with young children--making no exceptions whatsoever for cultural discrepancies.

I know this dealt with the teacher, but now lets put a twist on it.

The CMs that are in the college program who are behaving irresponsibly on the job don't know most of these girls they approach. You say you are in child advocacy. A child is a child until the age of 18 when they legally become an adult. So you say you would never stand for inappropriate interactions with young children (it should be ANY child, for that matter), well, girls are developing earlier and earlier in life now. Who is to say these CMs aren't doing this flirting to girls that are 14 or 15 years old but look older? Is it still ok now for them to be doing this? Look at it from your child advocate standpoint.

As I stated earlier in the thread, when you're in a sit down restaurant and your server is playing the table to increase their tip, that's one thing. When you're at a stand, where no tip is involved, and the CM refuses to hand over the drink until you answer personal questions, that's completely crossing the line.

 

[Todd L]

My husband worked in a small drafting department at a Monsanto facility years back. One of the people who worked in the room with 4 guys was a woman. She was actually related by marriage to one of the guys there. Anywhoo, she had a train-wreck of a drama-filled life outside of work. One of the other guys was forever flirting with her. He even gave her a card once when she was down that he had written in it "Penny for your thoughts, quarter for your (underwear)." Duuuuumb guy. The senior guy there asked her all the time if she wanted him to step in and reprimand the creepy flirty guy. (I met him once. He was an odd fellow.) She always declined. Well, she ditched work one too many times and her poor attendance ended up getting her fired. Within a week there was a lawsuit filed for sexual harrassment. She had saved emails, the card, other little notes, even recorded conversations she instigated with the guy. In the end, she got the creepy guy's job and walked away with a high 6-digit sum of money. Was she wrong in what she did? I think she baited a lot of it and played along entirely too much to make it entirely what she made it out to be in the end. Had she not been canned she would've been perfectly happy to stay and not file suit against the company. But, how stupid was the creepy guy??? My husband and the other guys told him all the time he needed to knock it off even if she was the one starting a lot of the inappropriate interactions. He was just too dense to listen.

Reminded me so much about the situation you described. It's going to take 1 chick ready to cash-in and there's gonna be an implosion of monumental proportions here. It only takes ONE. For this to be so widely known and even documented, it's only a matter of time. The supervisors need to wise-up. The only saving grace for the senior/supervisor guy above was the several emails he saved asking the girl if she wanted him to intervene and she replied with "No, I don't mind." He almost lost his job, too. The company still shelled out a big settlement. All those supervisors who know need to have documentation that they've tried everything they can to do the right thing. It's the only thing that could save their jobs when the inevitable happens.

Well sounds like she was smart enough to walk away with a job and a nice settlement...No judge is ever gonna side with the company in these cases ...sound like she got what she asked for...TROUBLE with a capital T!!


You would think people would learn how to behave ....I went to work at my company when I was 20 years old...in an enviorment that was loaded with newly divorced women in their late 20s early 30s.

It was an odd workplace situation being that it was the 80's and that our office was located in one of the biggest party towns in the world. Very laid back and very loose. We all went out EVERY night and there was a Ton of craziness that went on in and out of the office But man...I wouldnt dare try any of that stuff in todays workplace.

Beside the fact that Im home and on my couch half asleep by 10p.m. most nights!!

 

[aristo_cat]

I know this dealt with the teacher, but now lets put a twist on it.

The CMs that are in the college program who are behaving irresponsibly on the job don't know most of these girls they approach. You say you are in child advocacy. A child is a child until the age of 18 when they legally become an adult. So you say you would never stand for inappropriate interactions with young children (it should be ANY child, for that matter), well, girls are developing earlier and earlier in life now. Who is to say these CMs aren't doing this flirting to girls that are 14 or 15 years old but look older? Is it still ok now for them to be doing this? Look at it from your child advocate standpoint.

As I stated earlier in the thread, when you're in a sit down restaurant and your server is playing the table to increase their tip, that's one thing. When you're at a stand, where no tip is involved, and the CM refuses to hand over the drink until you answer personal questions, that's completely crossing the line.

I actually am talking to someone right now privately who has an inroad and we are discussing things and how to delicately approach it. It is someone close to the community who has a connection in management at the pavilion. We're handling it as diplomatically as humanly possible. Thanks!

 

[Alexis]

Just reading "meet up with you tonight" was where I'd draw the line. At first, it was friendly, sparking conversation when you're were leaving. But after that, forget it. Inappropriate. He works at Disney, not at a pick up bar. Thank gosh you and your friend walked away and left. I wish you two would have reported the "strange" behavior...Yet again, won't be too long before he strikes another pair of females, he'll get in trouble eventually.
He definitely crossed the line.