We often hear about how academia, Hollywood, and the press are all in for pushing the woke transgender agenda. But actually, the corporations and government agencies, through their human resources (HR) departments, are pretty awful, too.

I work for a state agency with an HR department and have seen some amazing wokesterism from that quarter. My friends in the corporate world have seen the same.

HR clerks are proficient at memorizing pedantic rules and legalistic policies that protect their organization, rather than advocating for employees in real life.  The policies they contrive include expansive sexual harassment and gender neutrality which in the end confuse human “resources” with machine parts, becoming detrimental to both morale and productivity. 

Many employees don’t trust their HR departments, including 70% in this study.  In fact, most employees despise HR. Rather than serve sentient humans with creative problem solving, they mold “human resources” into obedient automatons to reimagine gender as non-binary and, in the end, make it all counterproductive.

Let's start with one of their main missions, which is to guard against sexual harassment: Now, there are two main types of sexual harassment:  quid pro quo and hostile work environment.  Curiously, HR directives tend to prioritize LGBTQ sensibilities -- such as allowing employees to choose which bathrooms to use irrespective of their biological sex. That in itself can create an insidiously hostile work environment.

When my employer created gender-neutral bathrooms (complete with dispensers that bump into one’s knee in the “men’s” room) there was absolute uproar amongst employees.  HR was elevating the “rights” of a tiny minority over the general will, and at quite a cost.  Consider the confusion wrought by transgender imperatives that conflict with sexual harassment policies that forbid unwanted peering and peeping, and which undermine employees’ sense of well-being in this most private sanctuary. Again, it's an internal contradiction.

My employer’s internal blog was overwhelmed with angry statements from usually compliant employees who otherwise operate in a very liberal ethos. Several employees hastened their exit, some others requested a layoff. The prevailing sentiment was that women don’t want men in the women’s bathroom – and vice versa.  

In that instance, HR, while pretending to “be an employer of choice” fostered a hostile work environment in deference to PC.  They foisted upon everyone a hastily conjured transgender policy encouraging employees to use any bathroom -- irrespective of nature.  Irrespective of their biological sex. Even our docile workforce (state government employees) rebelled; after all, they are accustomed to zero tolerance directives that promote an “if I feel it, it must be true” sense of victimhood. 

A growing number of traditional feminists are also rebelling against the woke orthodoxy that abolishes biological sex.  They insist it is counterproductive to the assertion of women’s rights. Lifelong Democrat Kara Dansky, author of The Abolition of Sex:  How the ‘Transgender’ Agenda Harms Women and Girls, asks:  “How many women …have to be subjected to men walking around [excited] in bathrooms and spas before our society comes to grips with the reality of what is going on? 

That reality is that we are either female or male – it really is binary, so arguing with nature will only lead to cognitive dissonance.  That doesn’t mean someone can’t be contentedly effeminate, or a happy “Girly Man.”  Live and let live.  However, many HR departments distort reality with all-encompassing sexual harassment policies that in the end are contradicted by their transgender agenda.

Now let's move on to another issue: pertinent to H.R.

Prevailing definitions of sexual harassment include verbal, non-verbal, and physical forms—that about covers it.  Not only the supposed objects of the harassment but even bystanders are covered under these best HR practices.   Throw verbal conduct that is “unwelcome,” and vaguely defined “inappropriate behavior,” into the HR hodgepodge and you’ve got employees treading on eggshells.  In this prevailing angst, natural discourse becomes robotic.  But if a confused fella traipses into the women’s bathroom, or shower, for many bystanders that’s both unwelcome and inappropriate.

Just about every HR email (usually proliferated by unhappy liberal Dems) in my organization has a signature block that includes some awkward gender-neutral pronoun.  Really?

While that seems to be a compelled abolition of biological sex, note that they also discourage workplace courtship by forbidding workers from asking co-workers out more than once.  Again, it's a matter of contradictory policies.

How can one respectfully woo (the object of one’s desire being outside the line of command, of course) if forced to give up after the first rebuff?   

The obnoxious behavior continues in other ways, too. In what constitutes a double standard, the LGBTQ minority gets a whole Pride Month, with gaudy festoons and sexual innuendo overpowering a captured audience. Now, I'm not anti-gay. I believe that, of course, we need to protect our gay friends and co-workers, from discrimination, but not by fomenting a hostile work environment for the vast majority.   

In response to the repurposing of my employer’s bathrooms, a character I'll call anonymous captured the general sentiment in our employee blog:  “Please consider the safety and dignity of us women who do not [want] a man in the restroom with us. Why not make a couple of "gender friendly" restrooms and leave the rest alone [rather than covert all]? Respect and dignity for ALL employees should be considered.”  

If it is impossible to treat all employees with respect and dignity all the time, surely the next best thing is to protect the minority, per anonymous, while ensuring the majority remains comfortable and content.   Rather than kowtow to a tiny but vociferous minority, this will uphold the very purpose of sexual harassment policies to protect employees from unwanted sexual overtones in a woke milieu where perception is reality.  It will also foster a hospitable workplace.

The COVID-19 pandemic has prompted a reassessment of careerist values and work-life balance.  If politicized HR preferences propagate prejudiced policies where non-binaries wield influence greatly disproportionate to their numbers, then home seems a lot cozier and safer.  The Great Resignation will only accelerate.  So too will staffing shortages and inflation. All this, in part, because HR is against natural sex. 

Image: Pixabay / Pixabay License

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