February 20, 2008

Eliminating Professors - Necessary Harm

...Given the social dynamic in this workplace, it is easy to see why the higher-ups did nothing to rein in the Jerk in. Addressing PITA's complaints would have meant taking on not just an individual harassing male but a cohesive group of male and female workers that was functioning productively in the overall organizational context. Each successive higher level of union or management authority to which PITA appealed was faced with challenging, disrupting, and overruling an even larger part of the organization. How much damage to morale and productivity can a senior official reasonably be expected to risk, for the sake of shielding one partially disaled woman from jokes other women laught at?

"Even so," you may say, "somebody should have done something." This comment has been made in every case I know of Dr. PITA's elimination from a uniersity faculty. It is a common exhoration of kind-hearted people working somewhere else
...

From: Eliminating Professors, a guide to the dismissal process, by Kenneth Westhues

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