Conclusion: “It Sounds Bad — But You Just Get Used to it. It’s Just ‘Boys Being Boys’...”

Our research confirms that the tendency to make sexual harassment invisible, or if not invisible a mere shadow of the targets’ reality, appears fairly widespread in rural workplaces.

A disturbing proportion of respondents — two thirds — believed that the women’s behaviour, including how they respond to these types of incidents, contributes at least in part to their victimisation. Not surprisingly such attitudes were more common in workplaces that were more masculinised — those with a low ratio of women. Participants from these workplaces were also more likely to believe that sexual harassment is about “boys being boys”, with those employed as horticulturalist/agriculturalists or in mining and staff from workplaces with few women most likely to ascribe to this viewpoint. This is unsurprising because we know that in male-dominated workplaces, the affirmation of men as “mates” occurs “through bonding and rituals within homosocial (white, heterosexual) groups”^[471]) In occupations (such as those from which our participants were likely to accept sexual harassment as “boys being boys”) this masculine bonding may involve the elements of “physical effort” and “shared dangers”^[472] referred to above, as well as the enforcement of male power “in talk and workplace jokes”.^[473] Regardless of the manifestation of the male bonding, it is widely acknowledged that “one of the obvious exclusionary characteristics of the concept is that women tend not to be included in most understandings of mateship and what it means to be a mate”.^[474] For this reason, women in male dominated occupations were likely to accept sexual harassment as part of the workplace norm.

Although 60 per cent of respondents identified that sexual harassment had “serious” effects, two thirds had minimising responses to the question about why people sexually harass. Professionals were most likely to see power at the core and were also the occupation most apt to identify pornography as a type of sexual harassment. It is possible that through ongoing education, professionals may have developed a higher order, moral understanding of pornography as an assertion of male power in the workplace, rather than viewing it as a mere form of “naughty entertainment”. The professional values associated with elite positions may also create a heightened awareness of potentially destructive workplace problems such as the blatant (or even subtle) display of pornographic material at work. It has been suggested that professionalism means “being productive and maintaining social distance with colleagues at work”.^[475]

The majority of respondents, however, did not appear to understand the dynamics of sexual harassment and its aetiology. Not surprisingly there was a correlation between these people and those who possessed victim­blaming beliefs.

Perhaps our most disturbing finding concerned the attitudes of employers/managers. A troubling proportion — more than four fifths of employers — believed that the women’s behaviour, including how they respond to these types of incidents, contributes at least in part to their victimisation. Of some alarm too, employers appear significantly less knowledgeable about the dynamics/causes of sexual harassment. Employers were also more likely than their staff to deny that sexual harassment takes place with less than one quarter considering banter to be harassment. In this context, Joan Acker discusses the phenomenon that “the willingness to tolerate sexual harassment is often a condition of the job, both as a consequence and a cause of gender hierarchy”.^[476]

Given that the rural workplace is deeply entrenched in tradition, it is unsurprising that workplace norms — such as the establishment of sexually harassing culture — are fixed and are not easily transformed.

One potentially optimistic finding — an indication that these attitudes could in fact be changing — came from the seven of eight employees under the age of 20 who did not apportion any responsibility onto the targets. However, we must note that three quarters of those in their early- to mid-20s did express victim-blaming beliefs and so the other data may be an anomaly and not a significant harbinger of change.

The other finding that could bode well for tomorrow’s targets: the three quarters of respondents who identified sexual harassment as an issue for rural Australia. The recognition of the issue as a general proposition is indeed very good at least in theory, but problematically, the same participants were often reluctant to identify “sexual harassment” with their own negative workplace experiences. It may be that the combination of the intensely “male” tradition in the rural workplace with women’s gradual acquisition of “a kind of gut knowledge that they are outsiders”^[477] leads to personal disempowerment which makes it easier for women to identify sexual harassment as a real threat in the general rural community. This may be compounded by the participants’ awareness of the difficulties associated with “making a fuss” about harassment issues in their own workplace.

Coping strategies that manage the cognitions and emotions associated with the event are generally more common; such strategies include simply tolerating the harassment, denying that it is happening or that it has any effect, reinterpreting the behaviour as benign, trying to forget about it and (less commonly) blaming oneself.^[479]

It is evident then that people in the rural workplace need to learn more about what constitutes sexual harassment and its effects and remedies. This was shown by the huge majority of respondents who expressed the view that it is best to ignore sexual harassment behaviours. It was also evident in the way that some respondents expressed “confused” understanding about the experience of sexual harassment and who is at fault.

The National Guidelines^[480] explain that there is “no uniform standard expected of employers in taking all reasonable steps” to prevent sexual harassment, although at “minimum” employers should “have an appropriate sexual harassment policy which is effectively implemented, monitored and communicated to all workplace participants”. The design and implantation of appropriate workplace policy in rural Australia first requires that employers understand prescribed legislative requirements.

This might then have a flow-on effect permeating the workplace culture. Employers would become equipped to communicate comprehensive policies to their employees, either with the ongoing assistance of a “sexual harassment consultant” or independently. “Sexual harassment consultants” would also offer tailored services to rural employees. These might include seminars, workshops and consultations focused on: identifying sexual harassment in the workplace; reporting that harassment with confidence; examining the legislative rights of the employee through that process; and emphasising the importance of supporting other employees who have experienced sexual harassment.

In the context of “supporting other employees”, our findings show that there is a tendency in the male-dominated rural workplace for women to exhibit what they refer to as “narky” or “bitchy” behaviours — that is resenting the “attitudes” of their female colleagues or the way that they dress or present themselves to men in the workplace. It is perhaps ironic that in the anxious quest for “mateship”, “men hunger for the kinds of friendships they believe women have with each other”,^[481] yet in the context of the sexual harassment experience “women can resent other women and perceive women as deceitful and untrustworthy”.^[482] Educating women in rural workplaces about supporting female colleagues may be particularly important in view of the finding that women tend to engage in behaviour which “blames” other women for their experience of sexual harassment. This type of revitalised understanding of other women is a critical component in shattering the myths that underpin the sexual harassment experience for rural women and stripping away the layers of denial, thereby making this type of gendered harm far more visible.