Happy International Women's Day!I didn't always consider myself a feminist. But I'm proud to call myself one ever since May 27, 2006—the day my daughter was born.
It wasn't that I was hostile to the issue; I just never engaged in any active thought about it. Now that I have a female life for which I am responsible, I fully embrace the term.
I worry about the world in which she lives, and how that world may treat her because of her sex.
❔ Will she have the same opportunities?
❔ Will she earn the same money for the same work?
❔ Will she face harassment or mistreatment because of her gender?
❔ Will she have to worry about walking to her car at night, or about the intentions of person she just met, or about being prayed upon or assaulted?
(For the record, the answers are I hope so but maybe not, I hope so but maybe not, yes, and yes.)
As a result, I take seriously my job as a dad to make the world more equal for her.
❤ I encourage her that she can be whatever she wants to be.
❤ I remind her that she can achieve whatever she wants to achieve as long as she puts in the effort.
❤ I embolden her to stand up for herself, to be her own advocate, and not to let anyone treat her differently because she's a girl.
❤ And I teach her and her younger brother about treating all people as equals, regardless of anything that makes them different (including gender).
As trite as it sounds, the children really are our future, and we absolutely need to teach them well and let them lead the way. I look forward to the day when we don't need an International Women's Day (or any International Fill-in-the-Blank Day), when we are all just people, defined only be the fact that we happen to share the same rock hurdling through space at the same moment in history.
Until then, however, let's all strive to be better, to treat others as they want to be treated, and celebrate not only that which makes us that same but also that which makes us different. Because it's in the differences that we truly find that which makes us human.
Here's what I read this week:
Discrimination
- The Impact of Ban-the-Box and Salary History Prohibitions on Employers — via HR Hero Line
- Does Title VII Prohibit LGBT Bias? — via The L•E•Jer
- Age Discrimination Can Include Acts Before 40 Years of Age — via San Antonio Employment Law Blog
- Research: When People See More Women at the Top, They’re Less Concerned About Gender Inequality Elsewhere — via Harvard Business Review
- Discrimination, A Hairy Situation. — via Fistful of Talent
- Opposition and Retaliation—Key Components of Laws Like Title VII and the ADA — via FisherBroyles
HR & Employee Relations
- Employee Privacy When Your Employee Needs Help — via Evil HR Lady, Suzanne Lucas
- Three Employment Law Tips for Startups and New Business Ventures — via Dan Schwartz's Connecticut Employment Law Blog
- Employee Separation - the Postmortem and What it Teaches Us — via Next Blog
- Corporate boards step in to address dysfunctional cultures — via HR Dive
- Employers Face Hurdles in Enforcing Non-Competes Against Lower-Wage Workers — via Trade Secret / Noncompete Blog
Technology
- Me & You Metrics — via Kate Bischoff's tHRive Law & Consulting Blog
- AI: Making Sense of all the claims — via HR Examiner with John Sumser
- Hey Eric! Can I spy on my former employee’s Facebook messenger account? — via Eric Meyer's The Employer Handbook Blog
- Have You Read Your Social Media Policy Lately? Much Has Changed — via EntertainHR
- Cyber Attacks Costly For Small And Midsize Firms — via Accellis Technology Group
- Cybersecurity Is Putting Customer Trust at the Center of Competition — via Harvard Business Review
- To Improve Security, We Must Focus on Its People — via Dark Reading
- Why 'ji32k7au4a83' Is a Remarkably Common Password — via Lifehacker
Wage & Hour
- Chicken v Egg, Overtime v Immigration Violations — via The Emplawyerologist
- A lesson in overtime pay — via Mike Haberman's Omega HR Solutions
- $15 Minimum Wage Proposals are Alive and Well — via CUE, Inc.
- We’ve Got Baby Steps Toward a New Definition of Joint Employment Under the FLSA. — via Who Is My Employee?
- This is the Day I Look Forward to Every Year: Arrival of the ABA’s Summary of 2018 FMLA Court Decisions — via Jeff Nowak's FMLA Insights
- Increments of FMLA leave for intermittent or reduced schedule — via Michigan Employment Law
Labor
- NLRB ruling a win for the gig economy — via Robin Shea's Employment & Labor Insider
- I’m Not Paying for That! National Labor Relations Board Increases Rights of Beck Objectors and Further Limits the Activities Unions Can Fund Through Dues Collections — via Labor & Employment Law Blog
OSHA & Safety
- Trenching safety: OSHA training institute produces free video — via Safety + Health
- Another Update from the 2019 ABA Occupational Safety and Health Law Committee Midwinter Meeting — via Workplace Safety and Environmental Law Alert Blog