Are the vast majority of sexual harassment suits lies by disgruntled employees?

Question

I worked at a well known not for profit in DC. There, during sensitivity training, the general council of the organization (female) mentioned to me that 95% of sexual harassment suits were contrived and intended to harm a boss or an organization. What do you think?

Answer 1

Think a lot of the time...someone wont file a sexual harassment suit until after they are fired. They wait b/c they need the job. After you lost the job...well what else have you got to lose?

Might as well file then.

As to harming the boss/organization isnt that what ANY law suit does?  You dont file a law suit hoping that nothing will happen...you want to harm them by lost of there position or funds.  

Edit: Fine...I'll explain

Your Q and the statistic given doesnt add up.  That was my point.

It doesn't say that 95% of the suits filed are lies...it says they are file with the intent to harm the boss or organization...which being the whole point of a lawsuit.  It's kinda a NO duh.

Answer 2

Aren't all lawsuits intended to (financially) harm someone?  The word punative says it all.

On an interesting side note, the number of sexual harrasment lawsuits filed by men is rising - I believe it is around 1 in 4 or 5 at the moment  :-)

Answer 3

I think it's nonsense. I can't dispute that someone on the internet knows someone who considers this to be the case in her organization, but is not my observation in academia.  Where, as in most organizations, we fear the lawsuits enough to put rules in place to deal with sexual harassment internally.

I haven't sat on committees who deal with this, that are relatively inactive because the complaints are rare. But in 30 years, the vast majority of sexual harassment incidents I've personally observed involved men who harassed women to the point that the women resigned without ever complaining.  This makes me tend to agree with Baba Yaga and wendy g above.

The two cases that got as far as an official internal complaint, though not as far as a lawsuit went both ways.  In one case, my ex-wife made a complaint against her supervisor.  I believe the complaint was based on facts in that 4 other women employed in the same laboratory over the previous 10 years came forward with similar accusations.  The professor in question got a slap on the wrist to avoid a lawsuit and eventually wound up with a promotion (employers are afraid of lawsuits from either side). If there'd been a lawsuit, it would not have been based on lies by disgruntled employees.

In the other case, a lab technician made a complaint against my postdoctoral supervisor, claiming she was fired because she refused to have s*x with him and others in the lab.  I knew this to be false, because he was on sabbatical 500 miles away at the time, and because I was in charge of the lab while he was gone and knew exactly why she'd been fired.  She had screaming violent (throwing large objects) fits at anyone who was assigned to supervise her because "they have no right to tell me what to do".  I was given a choice of supervising her or letting her be fired, because no one else would work with her and because I seemed to get along with anyone.  On day 1, she ignored my instructions in several bizarre ways, one of which resulted in her setting her hands on fire.  I told my supervisor I could not work with her, and he let her go.  She applied to medical school, got a bad letter of recommendation from my supervisor, and made her fake complaint.  She is now a practicing physician.

Answer 4

Chris Rock said its' only sexual harassment when a ugly man does it. I think their are serious sexual harassment cases that need to be addressed, but the frivilous ones ones filed by self serving drama queens ruin the credibility of women who have been seriously harrased.

Answer 5

Laws(espc women) laws are essentially meant to prevent people from being exploited and not for settling scores.

Better alternative would that once victim leaves organization the company fires that person because that person was cause of lost revenue(important resource) to the company and that it resulted in tarnished image of  company as a result of which other good employes would hesitate to join.

Using baised laws to curb such behaviour is coercive and counter productive in the long run.

Answer 6

I think that statistic is contrived.

Most women I know that have experienced sexual harassment in the workplace did not want to report because they thought it would negatively impact their jobs.

Did the "General Council" provide any source for this statistic? Perhaps in a booklet, or PowerPoint? I would be interested to know where this stat originated, IF it has any origination at all, other than her imagination.

I will add, though, that from what I've observed many may wait until they are about to be fired. Meaning that the harassment is REAL, but they were afraid to complain before (b/c they didn't want to risk losing their jobs). Then, because they were not compliant with the advances/behavior, they realize they are going to be fired. THEN they complain, but it's months since the harassment started, and person in the position of power has dotted the I's and crossed the T's. This can give the impression of "fabrication," because the complainant waited until they were about to be fired...when they had nothing left to lose. I've seen this happen several times. In each case, the harassment was real.

Answer 7

I disagree.  Do you have any idea what it takes to actually file a sexual harassment lawsuit?  You can't file on a whim, just because you're mad at someone.  Defense COUNSEL won't touch it unless there's proof.  I think what your general COUNSEL meant was that most charges are contrived and intended to harm someone.  I'll meet you halfway and acknowledge that some harassment lawsuits are contrived if you acknowledge that some contrived harassment lawsuits are filed by disgruntled male employees.

What I believe are 95% contrived are the lawsuits filed against big pharma companies.  Some idiots f**t to the right instead of the left after they start a new prescription and they file a lawsuit against a deep-pocket pharm manufacturer.  Unless they're part of a group action settlement, they usually lose.  Of course, there are exceptions to that, but this isn't what your question is about.

Answer 8

The vast majority?

I seriously doubt it.

There's no real way of knowing.

95%? Where does she think she got that info?

Of course, the other relevant statistic is how many cases go unreported.

I'd also be keen to know how far most bogus claims get. That is, if someone starts the process, and it's clearly bogus and doesn't go further, compared to those that result in, well, results.

She sounds like a corporate tool to me.

95%? No way.

Heck, it's not worth the grief, even when there's a legit complaint.

Answer 9

Here's a similar situation:  I worked in Labor Law at Brooks Air Force Base from 1997-2000, and I helped our legal office handle over 30 racial discrimination cases for the civilian personnel office.  All of them were found to be without merit.  Wouldn't that lead you to believe that the vast majority of racial discrimination suits are being filed by minority members with chips on their shoulders trying to play the race card?  It sucks because the system is designed to help people, but there is no question in my mind that it's being abused by women filing baseless charges of sexual harassment and minority members filing baseless charges of racial discrimination.  It doesn't take long when you see that many cases that are found to be without merit that you start thinking that most complainants are just gaming the system.

P.S.:  People who say it's difficult to file charges of sexual harassment or racial discrimination may be correct when it comes to the private sector, but it's the opposite when dealing with local, state or Federal Government.  ANY complaint of sexual harassment or racial discrimination has to be processed, and instead of the burden being on the accuser to prove harassment or discrimination, the burden of proof is on the government to show that the accuser was not harassed or discriminated against.