More men suing men for sexual harassment 07-10-01
- By Julie Crane, California Attorney at Law

A male employee comes to you, his manager, and says that his male co-workers use vulgar language constantly, make lewd jokes and sometimes teasingly grab at his genitals. To you it sounds like the horseplay that goes on in a typical high school locker room, and you tell him to just ignore it.

He could file a claim for sexual harassment with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, and if he is as successful as the claimants in one case recently, he could receive a settlement of $500,000.

According to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC), men filed 13.5 percent of all sexual harassment claims in 2000, twice as many as they filed in 1992. The majority of these charges involve harassment by other men.

The U. S. Supreme Court ruled a few years ago that men can sue men for sexual harassment. Some federal courts have dismissed male-on-male harassment suits because the victim was gay and the courts found the harassment was based on sexual orientation, which is not protected under federal law. However, where the victim is heterosexual, the federal courts have had no problem in finding illegal harassment occurred.

Some states also prohibit harassment based on sexual orientation, and men are now bringing and winning claims for same-sex harassment under those laws. In May, 2001, Alex Valdez won his claim in the California Court of Appeals. Valdez alleged that for nearly two years his supervisor sexually harassed him by constantly requesting sexual favors. Although he complained to the Human Resources Department nothing was done.

One month after his complaint he was terminated for lack of work. He sued. The employer argued that Valdez couldnt show he was harassed because of his sex since almost all the employees in the work area were male, the use of profanity was common, and employees often told jokes with a sexual theme. The court rejected these arguments finding that state law was intended to end sexual harassment in all cases including same-sex harassment.

Valdez v. Clayton Industries, 88 Cal.App.4th 1162, 107 Cal.Rptr.2d 15 (2001)

What You Should Do
To avoid claims of same-sex harassment, managers can do the following:

	Review company policies to ensure they are written broadly enough to include same-sex harassment;
	Ensure that training contains examples and/or discussions of same-sex harassment;
	Take claims of same-sex harassment seriously and investigate them thoroughly; and
	Ensure that punishment for same-sex harassment is equivalent to that imposed for harassment between genders.

For more information about sexual harassment, click here.

Information here is correct at the time it is posted. Case decisions cited here may be reversed. Please do not rely on this information without consulting an attorney first.