I bawled when i read that joke
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it stems from him being sensitive about it. it was a hurtful thing to say. if you’re ok with your baldness, as Sir Patrick Stewart is (or i am), maybe it seems frivolous. but i think he deserved to win if this was something they knew was hurtful and they deliberately used it to hurt him.
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But how is that sexual harassment, though? Seems more like bullying to me.
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Your comment pushed my giggle button snort
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This has me conflicted.
On the one hand, calling it sexual harassment would seem to trivialise actual sexual harassment.
On the other hand, I’m OK with the idea that you shouldn’t have to put up with being called a bald c*nt to earn a pay cheque.
Probably it’s an indictment of English employment law — that the only way he could be granted redress for his treatment was by forcing it into a category it doesn’t really fit.
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I think what makes this feel “silly” is largely a difference in what the harassment is perceived to be. That is, when most people (me, certainly) think of “sexual harassment”, we focus on the concept of sex pertaining to desire or the physical act. This judgement was more narrowly viewing it as harassment hinging on a sex-based characteristic. The baldness isn’t going to be considered “sexy” by most people (very likely not anybody involved in the case) but specifically calling it out was using an attribute of the guy that was specific and inherent to simply being male.
Maybe there should be a different term for “harassment that stems from attributes inherent to a particular sex but aren’t considered ‘sexual’”
Consider the difference between using “bald” and “fat” as insults. The latter wouldn’t be a protected state in this case because it’s not inherent to either sex and it’s something you can (typically) change. The former could be protected because it is inherent to being male and there’s nothing you can do about it.
All the above withstanding, I don’t think it’s much of a stretch that the plaintiff filed this way because he was mad he was fired and this was the one way he had that he might win. I can’t imagine he really actually cared a the time that “bald” was thrown in – it’s just a hail mary from his lawyer.
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Expect Karl Pilkington to take Ricky Gervais to the cleaners then.
Head like a fucking orange.
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I mean, they already went there. By making it clear they considered the problematic bit was “bald” rather than c*nt - or even the whole phrase - and by insisting that baldness was a male sexual characteristic (while also admitting it isn’t), they made it about calling someone “bald” rather than just being abusive.
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You DO realize that women CAN and DO go bald, too, right?
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They actually addressed that in the ruling. Women can go bald, certainly, but it’s overwhelmingly more common in men, so they are treating it like a male attribute.
Another similar example might be large breasts. There absolutely are men with large breasts but because they aren’t indicative of their sex (they are almost surely obese), large breasts are considered a female attribute.
This case is surely going to be appealed and the central question that will need to be resolved is specifically: “is baldness a male attribute even though a woman can be bald as well”. I suspect it won’t stand up in any higher court.
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I think what is causing most of the issue here is sloppy terminology in the article.
This has technically been held to be harassment under s.26(1) of the Equality Act, i.e. unwanted conduct related to a protected characteristic, in this case – sex (and plenty of people have rightly pointed why that is iffy).
Sexual harassment would be s. 26(2), i.e. unwanted conduct of a sexual nature.
Petty technical details, I know, but that’s the standard of legal reporting we get these days.
No, it’s still about the abusiveness. Bald is the ephithet chosen. If the abusiveness is lacking, then referring to someone being bald is A-OK.
Let’s not do the Daily Mail’s work for it.
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To be generous to the claim, going bald tends to be linked to levels of testosterone, so there is a degree of sex linkage (for the record I am a man who is experiencing pattern baldness and would not be offended if someone pointed out this although in general that would be considered a bit tactless)
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Her suit might be a hirsute law suit.
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What a silly bunt.
from here to 2:24
Because it was ribald…?
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Agreed. Reposted to Needs More Likes.
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I’d say so. From the guardian piece about it, it seems his employers were grade-A, full-spectrum arseholes.
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Is that like the proverbial clam before the storm, or am I thinking of something else entirely.
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Came here to post exactly this. You beat me to it.
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