To ask if this happened at your work....

[Ifimight]

If someone made a sexist/rape joke in a meeting mainly involving junior staff but also with senior managers in it, what do you think would happen at your work place? Would anyone complain? Would anyone call them out as it being inappropriate in the meeting itself?

Just curious. This comes on the back of years of inappropriate behaviour and harassment, I'm wondering how other work places would/should deal with it.

I need to know what the joke was to comment sensibly, tbh

I'm not going to say what the joke was as then it'll open up the conversation to whether people think i was right to be upset by it and that's not what I'm asking.

This thread is quite the eye opener though so i appreciate people taking the time to respond.

Probably nothing would happen in my workplace unfortunately.
I doubt anyone would raise it and managers would probably pretend they didn't hear

I’d call it out myself.

Need to know what was actually said to comment properly

Plc.

It would go down like a lead balloon and people would immediately go into "managing the situation". Someone senior would say something along the lines of "perhaps I've misheard something, but it sounded like you said something that's completely inappropriate. Let's discuss this after the meeting."

There would be a lot of mutters from around the room from both men & women "that's disgusting", "for Pete's sake Nicky you cannot be serious".

After the meeting "Nicky" would disappear,
not to return that day, there would doubtless be water cooler gossip. One or two people might weakly remain neutral "nicky's had a tough time lately, maybe we misunderstood what they said", "nicky's English has always been ropy, idiot probably didn't know what they were saying" etc. Everyone else would loudly make it clear "Nicky" had crossed the line.

There would be a lot of complaints, a serious disciplinary procedure etc. I'd imagine the person involved would resign incredibly fast (in all likelihood that day) simply to escape the shitstorm.

As a Senior Director I’d have said “Bob that is grossly inappropriate”. I might close the meeting immediately to discuss further with Bob in private or would do so immediately after the meeting. I’d also inform HR for their advice.

From your last comment it would totally depend on what was being said.

It wouldn't happen. The kind of people that think that kind of joke would be appropriate don't do the kind of work I do.

Would depend who was in the room tbh.

It wouldn't automatically be dealt with I don't think.

It would depend on what it was (not that I'm asking).

In the NHS they would be told in the meeting it was offensive and to stop. Outside the meeting, it would an informal bollocking straight afterwards and then an investigation followed by disciplinary

"I'm not going to say what the joke was as then it'll open up the conversation to whether people think i was right to be upset by it and that's not what I'm asking. "

I think I'd need to hear exactly what was said as your comment implies that it's not a straightforward case of someone making a rape joke...

If someone did make a rape joke, that's obviously horrendous and unacceptable - but your comments suggest that it might not actually have been a rape joke and that it's just your interpretation. There's a difference in a poor choice of words that could be misinterpreted and making a clear rape joke which is wildly inappropriate.

This ^^

OP said in 3rd post Nothing happened at all. A few people laughed along and then they just moved along with the meeting.

I can't comment on how that response compares to what would happen in my work environments -- without knowing what was said.

tbh, the 'joke' in isolation might seem far worse than in context of what else was happening in the conversation just beforehand. So still difficult to judge, maybe.

Working as a civil servant, this is pretty typically ignored if made by the in crowd.

The jist of the joke was about a strange man invading a woman's home while she's naked and "taking advantage" of her.

The same person a couple of days later in another meeting, when i started sharing my screen to do a presentation asked me if i was going to show them my pornhub account.

Probably, yes, and it would probably be me who expressed it as the most senior female in my dept and the one who is known for keeping us honest and ‘compliant’. I don’t know if anyone else would if I weren’t there either pulling a face or chipping in.

If it wasn’t challenged at the time but a more junior member of staff mentioned it to me after the meeting, I would follow it up with the person making the joke if I felt it was appropriate so I would recommend you say something tomorrow to someone who you think might care. It’s not too late.

Both of the situations in your update are completely inappropriate, OP.

I can't imagine anyone making a "joke" like that where I work, but if they did, it would be called out immediately by a number of people (including my male colleagues) with a request to see the head of department after the meeting. I would definitely. be a written warning and possibly dismissal depending on its terms.

Would have been totally different when I worked as a lawyer in private practice where sexism was the name of the game.

100% someone would object. Almost 0% chance of it ever happening fortunately.

Nothing would happen in my workplace, its quite hierarchical and the senior managers would probably say something like 'I dont think you're supposed to say anything like that any more' and awkwardly laugh. The junior staff would stay silent. If someone reported it though and it became official, then there would be a formal warning

I can not imagine this happening at my work, and if it did there would be formal complaints.

I just can't picturing it happening.

Years ago I've worked with this but in the last 20 years no where I've worked would this be something I can imagine.

To be honest it would be so wrong and off there'd probably just be tumbleweed and awkwardness. Followed up by sword from the manager. I don't know if it'd be called out or just everyone so shocked and appalled there'd be nothing. Or maybe we'd all assume we'd misunderstood or the comment hadn't been meant as it came out.

But in the hierarchy above me (fortune 100 company) my boss, bosses boss, bosses bosses boss are all female, then there's a guy but his boss, the big CEO is a woman.

@Fearnecuptea

Yes happened to me in a meeting, maybe 3 years ago with my boss (senior manager), me (coordinator at the time) and a client.

Our client said something about being raped by the rates. Literally used the words "raped". I felt completely weird as suddenly dynamic shifted. I'm female, boss and client were male.

I didn't say anything at the time as my boss made no reaction to the wording. Still makes me feel crap now remembering it as totally out of place in a professional meeting.

That’s an overreaction.

best I can predict of my most recent 2 workplaces:

the Pornhub comment would have attracted some WTAF stares from others, awkward silence, move on.

"Taking Advantage" != Rape to my ears. It sounds rather inappropriate comment in a work meeting, regardless. Is the colleague sex-obsessed? Creep Alert.

Not really about "woke" - just thoroughly unprofessional.
I can't think of a work place in the last 20+ years or so where it would have happened, let alone been considered acceptable.
Banking in the 80's maybe.