Taliba

I’m a middle-aged mature student with three degrees. I made a decision to start doing what I love: writing, so I went back to school one last time. My internship instructor at college has decided that my expressions of concern and anxiety about getting a job after graduation is not because a middle-aged woman in a digital media field is going to face both sexism and ageism. No. It’s because I have a ‘self-esteem’ problem. And he was going to rescue me from it. Not ensure that I was treated fairly in the internship, and get opportunities in-line with my background and skills. Both of my internships were with prestigious organizations. Both treated me like shite. So I would bring to him an example of said sexism and ageism from my internships, like: I received little to no constructive criticism. What little I got was saved for the last day, when I couldn’t implement and learn from it. When I pitched ideas, they were stolen. I was promised work I had pitched and worked on would be completed ‘after I left.’ It wasn’t. Here’s what my middle-aged, white male instructor who’s been gainfully employed since the age of 22 said: “Are you paranoid?” “Did you hear the nice thing someone just said about you, right there?” “There a lot of positive things about you on this evaluation.” (They just won’t give me a public recommendation on my LinkedIn page, meaning they covered their asses.) “I’ve had other students have a much more difficult time at an internship than you.” For her, he tells me they fixed it after she LEFT — not during. He lied about how another student got an internship at a prestigious magazine, both to look good and to ‘encourage’ me to apply, saying the magazine had called him looking for students. In fact, his student got it because his friend worked for the company. I had no chance of getting it. When I had my ideas stolen by my female mentor at the internship I eventually got, nothing was done to protect my intellectual property. And after the internship? “You know, maybe I should have just come down there.” Do do to rescue me from the abuse he ignored, apparently. He was so unsupportive during the first internship, than I saw no point in complaining about the second one, which was even worse. “You told me you didn’t want to work in that field anyways.” I had never said that. My mentor a the internship was telling me everyday that I everything I did was wrong, basically. So, I had wondered aloud at one point, maybe I should look at another area, given that I was getting so much negative feedback and already had experience in another field. (Then she stole my ideas, and all the hate made a little more sense, but that’s another story.) “I just want to you to be able to see your own accomplishments.” Middle-aged women don’t get shit on because they don’t recognized their own accomplishments – it’s because they DO recognize them. “People were probably threatened by you.” No shit — what are you going to do to help is the point of the conversation. I don’t need you to explain that to me. To cap it all off, he would remind me in every meeting about all the connections that he has, while never actually putting my name forward for an ACTUAL JOB. “I can get you in front of someone for an interview for (fill in the blank).” Because you’re so connected an important, meaning, you better not complain about me and my chauvinistic, demeaning behaviour. I figured out quickly that this guy was not going to help me get a job, unless I put up with being demeaned. And even then, probably not. He wants to keep this going, he loves it. So I found myself another mentor: another middle-aged woman in my field who also happens to earn 6-figures. When she gave me some overflow work, he said, “Good for you! Good job!” And the practically patted me on the head. Because his lack of support had nothing to do with my lack of employment. This woman had more work than she could handle, had read my stuff, and knew I would make her look good. So she did what a mentor actually does: put my name forward for a PAYING JOB, and one that paid well for that matter. It’s possible to share the wealth, when you have it. Unless you’re a sexist asshole who’s threatened by strong women who aren’t going to take your shit. Sharing the doesn’t make you poorer. I’ll be in her debt for hooking me up with a good client (who put my on their list of permanent vendors, BTW), and she looks good for sending them someone who delivered. Finally, I managed to network my way into job at the second internship company anyways. I asked around and found another middle-aged man who gave me a shot and after a week told me he’d give me a reference for any other job in the company. Because I’m good at what I do. The best part? The look on the face of my internship mentor when I waltzed into work.

The same as you…

The saddest thing is, there are too many to count. So many that it becomes normalized. Sometimes I don’t even realise until after. The worst is when men assume that I’m not as intelligent as them. When I challenge them, they often fabricate some lame excuse that makes no sense and brush me off. I work in marketing and I get paid significantly less than my male co-workers, even though I’ve never missed a deadline, all of my work has brought in significantly more leads and since I was hired (4 months ago), the traffic on our website, click rate for our email marketing, and successful inbound lead numbers have tripled. My ideas are frequently dismissed and then stolen, not just by co-workers but also by management. Men often talk over me, as if what I have to say doesn’t matter. I know I’m not the only women who experiences this. I was blessed with an amazing husband who has been able to recognize the fact that there is no possible way a man could understand. He always says that until he met me he had no idea that this stuff happened to women regularly and thought “equality” between genders was not an issue. Our current society is hopeless. We HAVE to teach our future sons how to be equally accepting and understanding of these very real struggles women face, and teach them to push for change. We need to teach them to not use terms like, “you hit like a girl” or “cry like a girl” . Women have to stop being portrayed as weaker, or less intelligent, or less important to society. And we need to teach our daughters to be strong and confident in who they are.

Anonymous

I am a summer employee at a very large museum/tourist attraction, and this is my first professional workplace. I’m 19, and most of my coworkers are legit adults- they are done school and range from ‘young professional’ twenty somethings to older people with kids looking for something a little more flexible. The sexism I witness is appalling. My department is very much the ‘face’ of the company, so most of that is what I put up with from guests on the floor. Customer service is a tough gig. But the part I hate the most even though I kind of understand, is the hiring imbalance of more women in student (lower) positions, and men in the fulltime (upper) ones. It’s a cultural thing. I want it to be rectified, but right now people assume women are better at being social and making guests feel valued and making sure everyone’s visits go smoothly. And I hate to say it, but based on what I’m seeing, they are correct. I’m sure it’s just how we’ve been socialized, but all of my female coworkers are better than the men at being polite and accommodating and basically taking abuse and massaging the situation to make the customer happy. (Note: I don’t mean to say men cannot be good at communications or customer service, but when you take a group of students fresh out of high school without an special training, the female students are often socialized to know how to appease people and smooth things over.) The female core workers have stayed on from graduation, whereas the men have gotten into the job later in life. The full time workers don’t deal with people as often, and instead do shows and demonstrations, which put them in a position of respect rather than service. I wish our organization would fix this, but it is working for them so far, so I understand why they haven’t stopped. There is also the classic tactic of hiring a bunch of young women for decorative purposes, but I’m choosing to believe we haven’t stooped that low yet.

anon

No, older male coworker. I was not acting ‘high strung’. I was angry because you were not respecting my belongings, and quite sexist for thinking I would want to hear your lavacious remarks about the young mum playing with her toddler. Thank you for insinutating to the rest of the staff that I was acting emotional, when in reality you were just being an ass.

Kelly

When I was 18 my father died very suddenly and unexpectedly. I didn’t open up about it for close to 3 days. On that evening, I went to the park near my house with some friends and as we walked back to my house I finally started to talk about what I was feeling. While we were walking, we passed by a house with some men sitting on a porch who tried to get our attention, but we ignored them. As we passed by, one of the men remarked that we should have compassion (and not ignore them). Now, I’m not one to yell or raise my voice, but something in me just snapped. I yelled back at them, “You want compassion?!? My dad just died!!” The man responded back saying, “If that’s true I’m sorry, but if not, you’re a bitch.” It’s been over 10 years now and I still think about it sometimes when I pass by that house. No, you are not entitled to my conversation or my company. No, I didn’t lie about my father, and no, I wasn’t a bitch I was in emotional shock.

Lynette

This happened at a boat dock in Canada–Muskoka. I had pulled in my boat to a gas dock and was tying it up at either end. It was summer, and I was wearing shorts and a tank top. I’m OLD so the shorts were not too short nor the top too tight. I stand maybe 5’5″ and am slim. With my long hair and sunglasses I suspect age is hard to determine. However, I was bending over tying the stern when I heard a boat behind me, and turned to look. 3 men. Ogling my hind end. Their tongues were about hanging out. Disgusting. I was so put out. This has happened before in other circumstances. And it happens ALL the time to my daughter (age 24). It’s intimidating. Infuriating. Makes me so angry. It’s like being a poster or something, and not a person.

Nessa

Yesterday, I was driving down the highway with my sister and we were stuck in traffic. I feel like someone was staring at me, so I looked at my driver seat window and saw a man. I thought he wanted to pull his car ahead of mine, so as I was about to gesture him to go ahead of me, he instead kissed the air in my direction. I was so turned off by the situation, I literally yelled, “EW” and stuck I finger. I know I was wrong, but my sister saw the whole thing and she also thought it was disgusting. What did he think was going to happen? I was going to get out of my car and jump into his arms?

Anon

A week after I told my work I was pregnant my contract was suddenly terminated early. They said they couldn’t keep me for budget reasons, but they kept the guy doing the same job on contract they hired after me.

Morgan

I experience sexism every day that I go out. I can not go to concerts or bars. Why? Because I have breasts, Large big breasts. 52 inches round, bra size 36 J or K. Men will make loud lewd comments and treat me as if I am a stripper. They assume I must be for sale. I am not spared this treatment for women either. They instantly dislike me, assuming I must have had implants and who do I think I am. Parents don’t like me holding their children as they children will naturally rest their arms on my breasts. This has lead to isolation, extreme isolation. I have rarely dated as the men who did ask me out didn’t like having to defend me against comments everywhere we went. Women didn’t want to have coffee with me as I attracted undue attention that they feel was wrong of me. I am not sure why they felt that way or what they thought I could do about how God made me. Female Doctors would immediately ask if I wanted them cut off. As if I would want to maim myself and could take two years off work to heal from it. Bras are over 100.00, shirts are out of the question as they pop open unless they are tees. Very few dresses fit as they are way too large at the shoulders and too tight across the chest. Nope, I have spent my life in isolation because of sexism, just cause God made me with breasts.

Sophie

Copy from Monarch airlines in flight magazine where they are selling branded teddy bears – ‘George pilot bear and princess Charlotte bear. Captain George and elegantly dressed princess Charlotte love to travel.’ Cause people named George fly planes and people called Charlotte look like pretty princesses obviously.