I believe comunication is a good way to confront sexual discrimination and that we, women, are capable of expresing our thoughts, opinions and feelings very well -when the person listening is another woman- but, what about with a man? With an antagonistic man? A man who has just told you that your place is in the kitchen?

    When the issue is sexual discrimination, it is extremely important to be able to communicate effectively with males. I know it is a confusing subject, even for lawyers, so there is no "universal" manual and determining what is and is not considered sexual discrimination, and that despite the recent media frenzy, there is a misconception about what sexual harassment is and is not. However, approaching and dealing with the issue on a personal level in our daily life is largely common sense and logic.

    First of all, we should learn the legal definitions and penalties for this kind of discrimination, since "fear of the unknown is too often the cause of avoiding the fight for equality". We must eliminate the unknown by arming ourself with the facts.
    Our first action should be to speak to the offender, approaching him among witnesses, but if the problem continues we must carry out our threats. We should follow the procedures that are outlined in our company policy. It must be clear that we will not tolerate inaction.
    It is important to be realistic since not every comment or action made by a man that strikes a note of sexual discrimination is intentional, often he is unaware of our interpretation of his action or statement. Simply we have to informe the offender. We must always avoid sending mixed messages to the men in our workplace, university or school. If a comment or action is unacceptable from one particular man, it must be equally unacceptable from all the men.
 
 

This insidious form of sex discrimination impacts women's personal and professional lives, as we are going to see with these brief women confessions´ extracts:

                                        REAL CASES
Sonia Q.
    I was working at a big publishing company in New York. I came back from lunch one day and spread out on my desk was a pornographic newspaper with disturbing images. No note. It was just lying there. I had a suspicion who left it, because there was this man who kept leering at me. I asked several people who it was. Most said they didn't know.
    I went into his office and threw the newspaper in his face. I said, "If you ever do this again, you jerk, I'm going to call your wife and tell her what you're up to." His jaw dropped and he never bothered me again. I was shaking the rest of the day and the rest of the week that I was on this job. Even though I confronted this man, I was terrified of him.

 Jane D.
    My employer fired me while I was on medical leave, even though I went through the proper procedure to take individual leave. At first I thought this was the typical behavior of a male -dominated office -- there were less than 10 women work in a company of 100 employees! But the more I thought about it, the angrier I got.
    There is a federal law that provides me the right to take medical leave and keep my job and my employer denied my rights.
     After I was fired, I took action to remedy my situation. Things got worse for me physically and emotionally. It was a downward spiral. My doctor said, "more rest,perpetrators. less stress." My medical benefits went out the window and the longer I was out of work the more worried I became about being less marketable.
     Then when I started looking for new jobs, I felt stigmatized. Because I had spoken up for my rights,prospective employers viewed me as a potential problem employee. It was so hard...being a victim of discrimination, trying to regain control of my life and then being labeled a troublemaker. I had to start temping to make ends meet.
    But I didn't give up my fight and I won. My employer and I reached a mutually satisfactory settlement out of court. Fighting this job discrimination affected me in a larger, positive way. I will no longer put up with any kind of gender discrimination.
    In fact, I recently left a job that had me pigeonholed in limited administrative work. I decided it was time to move in a new direction. I'm now looking into buying my own business. I want the opportunity to have a business and treat my employees the
way I always wanted to be treated, with fairness and respect.
 

    Sadly, this kind of discrimination does not only affect in the workplace; studies show that an astounding 40 to 90% of U.S. working women have encountered some form of sexual harassment during their careers, and as we are going to see now, it is common in school:

                    Facts About Sexual Harassment in Schools

Four in 5 students say they have experienced some form of sexual harassment during their school lives.

Nearly 1 in 3 girls who have been harassed have experienced unwanted advances "often", compared with fewer than 1 in 5 boys.

For girls, 87% of whites report having experienced sexual harassment, compared with 84% of African Americans and 82% of Hispanics.

Two in 3 of all students surveyed have been targets of sexual comments, touching, grabbing or pinching in a sexual way at school.

Nearly 4 in 5 students who have been harassed have been targeted by peers; current or former students.

Among girls who have been harassed, 81% report having been harassed by a male acting alone, 57% by a group of males.

Fewer than 1 in 10 students who have been sexually harassed say they have told a teacher, although girls are twice as likely to have done so as boys.

23% of harassed students say they told no one.

All statistics from Hostile Hallways: Key Findings of the American Association of University Women's Survey on Sexual Harassment in America's Schools.