Workplace Misogyny

It's sad, in a way, that so many men feel so uncomfortably embattled by the struggle of women to attain commensurate employment opportunities with men. And to be paid equally for the fruits of their labour. In a truly egalitarian society there should be few professions where women might not, alongside men, dedicate themselves to their life's work in employment. Some few exceptions where sheer physical strength and endurance make men solely equipped to handle physically arduous work may apply, but not too many.

So when the news highlights a situation which should have become a rarity in western democracies it's interesting to know how society handles it. There are many occupations which men consider to be outside of a woman's ability to handle. Logging, fire-fighting, iron-smelting works, heavy-machinery construction come to mind. But one might not think that management might be among them. Delorie Walsh, an Alberta woman with a B.Sc. in agriculture, applied for a position as a land agent with Canadian Superior (Mobil Oil), in 1984.

The position was one that necessitated an agent be capable of negotiating contracts between landowners and oil companies. She was hired, but not in the position she wanted to perform in. She worked for seven years on mapping and clerical work in the company's surface department. Reasoning that if she demonstrated her capability and was sufficiently patient, an opportunity to achieve success in landing the job she really wanted would surface.

She was informed by her superior at the company that "no damn woman will be a land man (agent) in the surface department". She filed a gender discrimination complaint, fed up with having been passed over repeatedly for promotions. Based, obviously, not on her competence and ability, but simply on the fact that it was not in the company tradition to give a woman a job that men coveted. And the men that the company hired were of the shared mind-set that resented a woman even considering the position.

Her job with Exxon Mobil turned out in the end to be a learning experience of a type she never felt she would encounter in the modern working world. She had chosen a profession that simply was not amenable to the presence of a woman in what was considered to be a man's occupation. She watched men brought into the company straight out of school being hired to do the job she wanted. She kept filing complaints, arguing she was the victim of discriminatory practises.

The company fired her in 1995, in evident retaliation against her incessant complaints. At no time did they appear concerned that they were in error in refusing her entreaties to give her the opportunity to perform in a position she was qualified for, and eager to do. After her firing she continued to perform similar work for other companies. And she also taught land agency and land administration classes at Olds College in Alberta. In other words, she was eminently qualified, but consistently overlooked.

Finally, Court of Queen's Bench Justice Marina Paperny released her judgement in the case, fully 17 years after Ms. Walsh had launched her first complaint against Mobil Oil Canada. Over the years a series of decisions, dismissals, appeals and other proceedings had taken place. Justice Paperny wrote: "Ms. Walsh's termination from employment came after she had already spent four years seeking redress for the discriminatory treatment to which she was subjected...

"A complainant of less fortitude may well have abandoned the complaint, not because it lacked merit, but because Mobil had decided to play hardball in its response to the complaints. That approach is not one that should be encouraged." (How's that for restrained understatement?) "Despite her ongoing efforts to gain a position in the field and, in spite of her consistently good performance evaluations, Walsh was held back from a field position, where similarly situated men were not."

The Alberta court judges also found that Ms. Walsh's remuneration was inadequate, consistently at the low end of Mobil's compensation grid, despite her performance throughout her career at the company located at the high end. And once she had launched her initial complaint, her work life at the company was fraught with aggressive monitoring of her work in an obvious effort to find cause for complaint on the company's part.

Now the woman awaits a hearing to determine the amount of her damages. For her part she anticipates equal pay to what males earned in her position, along with compensation for lost wages, post-termination. It's a Pyrrhic victory though, since so many years of her life were tied up in a frustrating attempt to achieve rightful parity with men in the workplace.

A seriously stupid waste of time for everyone involved, but most importantly for one dissatisfied and undervalued woman who did her utmost to be accepted for what she was truly worth.