It’s our skill, not our skirt or shirt

Women’s Football, 1951: made up of women from Werribee and the Metropolitan Sewerage Farm, coaches Bill Collins and Charlie Sutton, and umpire Ted Whitten Snr. Photo courtesy of the Hassett family.

It’s still happening. The grope, the undermining comment. The sleazy innuendo that lurks as the insidious menace in a dark corner of the workplace.

Whether it’s the boss smirking as the Cheshire cat through greying moustache while commenting on her nice legs when wearing a knee-length skirt to work for the first time, or the candid remark that she looks good wearing pinstripe straight trousers and soft heels, the comment again coming from her superior in a look of wistful delight. They’re the kind of remarks that come quietly spoken while she’s performing her job, in shady, unsettling whispers that suddenly cause her to squirm grubby in her own skin.

Why is it that women in the workplace continue to be seen for their physical façade alone and not their substance or intellect. Why are women judged by what they wear, the long fingernails painted and polished, the bouffant hair do or soft curl, their level of ‘pleasing to the eye’. Pleasing to the male viewer and in some circumstances and even more disturbing, to the chastising judgement of a female.

Why is it that a woman’s skill and expertise, her thinking and ability to rationalise and conceptualise to solve complexities, to research and innovate, can be undermined by her ‘pleasing to the eye’ physical appearance.

She only got the job because she’s a woman, with no regard of her 30-plus years of experience she brings to the job.

To be in a meeting with her male manager across the table, speaking directly to him to observe him clearly shift his eyes from her face down her neck and into her shirt opening, to land on her breasts. Unmoved and unperturbed by his lowly regard, she continues to speak, louder and in uplifted chin.

To be groped when working out in the field with a man, by said man, simply because he wants a cuddle.

To be repeatedly told by a man at an official work engagement that she’s beautiful, invoking a profound need for her to want to flee the engagement while also forcing herself to let it wash over as boring given it’s happened before. Even when later told that he wasn’t being malicious, she knows he premised his comments that he was about to discredit himself. That standard of integrity and respect at such a function of officialdom shot out the prestigious room’s window as a canon firing from a bastion.

For a man in his 40s to tower over a woman in her 20s while she escorts him to the lift after their first work meeting, through her kindness and respect for the working relationship, only to have him comment on how wonderful it is to be escorted by such a beautiful woman. FFS.

What’s even more disconcerting is that it’s older men who are the perpetrators of these workplace transgressions. Most in advanced or upper positions of management, a senior, leader or boss, and almost most with the ability to physically over power her with his greater physical strength.

That’s blindingly apparent when said groping man wanting a cuddle won’t let her go until she uses all her might to pull away and force him off her. The sense of being powerless is frightening, as a nightmare of drowning in a dark river, unable to breathe. Said groping man was only made to apologise back 25 years ago. He’d be escorted off the premises today.

Sadly, all these instances are real occurrences. Including an occasion on the way to her workplace, on a crowded tram in peak hour. The tram stopping and starting abruptly, navigating bends at a speed that apparently warrants a man standing behind her to enjoy pressing his groin into her backside. She uses all her strength to stand upright until finally she turns behind and realises the tram isn’t as crowded as she thought. She faces her defiler in scowls of f%$k off.

It begs the question — why doesn’t she say something aloud? Embarrass him. Make him accountable for his obscene actions.

Is it because she doesn’t want to make a scene. She thinks it’s no big deal as men’s advances and comments on her appearance happen often. That she’s embarrassed or perhaps she believes she’s done something to draw his attention, should’ve said something sooner, is responsible in some way. That perhaps he may retaliate or tarnish her reputation, refute her claims as lies. Her sense of feeling powerless. Fearful.

That perhaps she should wear track pants to the next work function instead of another knee-length dress.

It’s not male bashing and instead, a sharing of experiences, real incidences as seen, heard and experienced by women around me, experienced by me. I’m fortunate to work with some uniquely beautiful and supportive men. Gentle men who are considerate and respectful and repulsed by such abuses of privilege.

Alarmingly and according to the Human Rights Commission, over the past five years, ‘More than 40% of women and 26% of men have experienced workplace sexual harassment’, the rate increasing significantly ‘for Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander (56%), LGBTIQA+ (46%) or younger workers (46% of 15-29 year-olds)’ (Our Watch, January 2025).

So it’s not just women experiencing workplace sexual harassment — men are too. Respect Victoria’s Work related sexual harassment summary of evidence outlines that men are ‘the predominant perpetrators of all workplace sexual harassment’, with 77% of reported cases revealing ‘one or more of the perpetrators was male. Women are the main victims of sexual harassment; however, men also experience sexual harassment, primarily from other men and less frequently by women’ (Respect Victoria, 2022).

The thing is us ‘pretty little things’ are resilient, hardworking, intelligent, innovative and resourceful women. We work hard for what we have, balance our personal and home life with work and can do those dirty jobs that women were once prohibited from doing, such as shovelling shit on a sewerage farm.

We play sports once considered only for men, as she who played Australian rules football in the 1950s long before it was considered appropriate or equitable, to not only enjoy playing as a team of 18 with reserve players on the bench, to crowds cheering three deep along the fence boundary and in the pavilion, but to raise much needed funds to build local hospitals and donate a portion of game takings to children’s causes. Of course there were some upturned noses to the women playing in those 1950s games yet by far, was the great admiration for these women who were having a go, some playing and kicking better than some of the men they were training with.

That’s what’s special about us humans  — our ability to rise above adversity and it’s often those who are on the outer that rise the highest, whether they’re acknowledged for that or not.

Individuals on the outer, abjected for their difference, come together to find solace in that difference. They’re accepted and bond in ways that the mainstream often does not have the opportunity to understand, as a cohesive community of individuals where individuality can grow. Italian philosopher Giorgio Agamben, says to affirm ‘an identity, that humans co-belong without any representable condition of belonging’ to become a ‘whatever identity’ (The Coming Community, 2013, p. 85).

And in that grows a humanity within humanity, where there is care and consideration, kindness, empathy and acceptance of people and life in their entirety. A social cohesion where care and support extend to families, friends and our wider community. Extend into the workplace.

According to Agamben, a being-together and belonging existence of individuals with no identity is one of a new, emerging community. His ideal is an acceptance of all that is. It’s not a false notion of life being pretty and perfect, free from negativity, but a new coming community where all needs are met, where people get to live free to experience the whole spectrum of life, in its full humanity and as the individuals we are (The Coming Community, 2013, p. 105).

That’s Agamben’s ideal. That’s my ideal. Which some may say is an idea and not real. Albeit it’s an ideal that perhaps more need to understand, to not only accept difference but to respect it, that individuals of difference are more than their façade.

She who only got the job because she’s a woman, works hard at her purported unearned job to be promoted in several positions over subsequent years, and turns her foe into friend.

She and he who rise against adversity, are far greater than ‘pleasing to the eye’ and ‘pretty little things’.

Call out the arrogant, entitled and sordid harassment so it’s understood that the behaviour is far from okay.

Call out that it’s our experience and intelligence that matters. Our kindness and compassion. Care. Humanity. Our skill. Not our skirt or shirt.