Sexual harassment editorial misses the mark

Writing with reference to the upcoming Supreme Court decision on constructive discharge as a tangible employment action [see this post] Guest columnist Gus Cochran writes in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution: “It’s employers’ job to stop it”

After discussing the background and issues in the case, Cochran concludes:

Employee advocates fear that not recognizing forced resignation as equivalent to being fired rewards employers who neglect hostile workplaces and look the other way when abusers simply hound victims into quitting.

How so? How could such an employer prove the affirmative defense, which requires proof the employer exercised reasonable care to prevent and correct promptly any sexually harassing behavior?

Whose job is it to eliminate sexual harassment from America’s workplaces? The court should not open the door to “victim blaming” by forcing harassment victims to use unworkable company complaint procedures.

Again, if the company’s complaint procedures are unworkable, it can’t prove the affirmative defense anyway.

Employers, who own and control America’s jobs and workplaces, have the power to eliminate sexual harassment from their places of employment. Employers who don’t should be legally liable. Read more

This is an extremist statement. Employers no more have the power to eliminate harassment than police have the power to eliminate crime. All that can be done in either case, given the human condition, is to use best practices to attempt to minimize the misconduct.

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