Well…..if you cannot stand my obnoxious behaviour, you have my permission not to read this. If you do, don’t rant. Is that clear?
Ok, so there was this one time when LGE terus terang told me, “Lilian, you are such a feminist….” and he asked me if I had read some book on feminism. I was like wtf, eh, Mr. CM, how you know I am a feminist ah? I myself don’t even realise it geh? (geh is a Cantonese expression that means nothing at all, just like lah) Of course, I didn’t say anything, just grinned my way through.
So, my fate is sealed. I am either a tomboy, a feminist (the kind who burns bra, declare that we women don’t need men, only batteries, lots of them) or I am one blardy confused feminine woman. Maybe I am all three.
Whatever it is, the other day, I was chatting on MSN with a guy. He was showing me some photos of these so-called defender of women’s rights group. He was going, omg, omg, you look at their faces…you just look. Sometimes, I can be so crazy, males treat me as part of their species. So, he went on and on about how ugly they were and how men wouldn’t even want to have a second look, what more, molest them.
And when it is my male brain working at that time, I joined in. Yayayaya, sure lah, they cannot have sex, so they also want to deny other women, right? So, they come up with all these rules and regulations, and champion them to make lives difficult, right?
So, my point is….we women ought to take charge of our own dignity, our own preference, our own rights. So what if we like to ‘hiao’ a bit with our employers for easier life? Flash a bit of boobs come appraisal time? Come on, what’s wrong with that right? Wear shorter skirts and make sure the boss notices it? (ok, ok, my ex-colleagues do read my blog and they can swear that I am not hiao like that, can?)
When we take charge of our own body, we can easily get those wolves off our back. Long time ago, when I was growing up, I am not like given any proper lessons on all these mumbo-jumbo women’s rights lah, how to be miss prude lah, what not to do before marriage lah yadda yadda yadda. All I ever want to learn, I learned from the USA Cosmopolitan. (ahem)
There was this very old, retired, super horny En. Kamil in my ex-company. He was probably late 50s and he always wore so suave and stylish. He plays the guitar. He talks like some mat romeo. He is super ugly. I was married, in my late twenties and still qualified in the sexy-tary category.
My job was to write letters for my boss. I would then, pass it to En. Kamil to fine tune the Bahasa because we dealt a lot with the Government. So, this horny old man would always asked me to sit down in his office while he babbled on about himself.
Initially, I thought, nice pak cik who is helping me, good rite? But as it goes on, this horny old man started to tell me how lonely he was at night but day time, with me, it is not so bad etc etc. (Malam-malam, sunyi lah saya, siang siang ada Lilian teman juga…) Then, he started to test the boundary and told me he would think of me at night. That’s when the ewwwws come in. So, I 360 degree changed.
I no longer seek his help. Die also die, I can write my own letter to Tun M, Sami Bulu, Kak Pidah, Leo Moggie and etc. When I am forced to see him, I wouldn’t enter his office. But if I stand, he would be staring straight to the boobs. You see what lecherous old men are? Finally, I couldn’t stand it anymore, I told him in the coldest voice, “En Kamil..if you ever do that again, I am going to report you for sexual harrassment.” I slammed his office door and that’s the end of his humsup-ness.
So, moral of the story is – we women shouldn’t compromise our comfort zone to lecherous men. But…if a little bit of boobs can get you somewhere, who are they, the women’s group to tell us what is right and wrong, right? End of story, take charge of your own dignity. No one can make you feel proud or ashame, except you yourself. Set your own limit, stick with your moral principles and be firm with your decision. Maybe it could potentially kill a job prospect, maybe you will lose a boyfriend or whatever. So long as you are happy with that decision and are able to stand tall. That’s what counts.
(In summary, “Don’t be afraid to tell a male to fuck off and eat shit when you mean it.”)
sexual harassment is a strong word that can scared the hell out of your male colleagues. it is so usual to have “en kamil” person in a office. every guy has its own way to express their sexuality. some keep it only in their bedroom and some don’t mind letting other people know. i think CM LGE mistakenly label you as a feminist. i don’t think you are one at all.. many people confused with the meaning of feminist in malaysia. when a women talk about politics, they just be labeled as feminist. that it! .. end story.
sexual harassment in office happens because most time most woman let people like “en kamil” was free to do it so. its true with a little bit of control of the situation, it will make a lots of differences. most woman tend to keep it quite until it become bad and ugly. man in an office with lots of female are like a horse in a bard with lots of mare.. hehe.. our natural instinct always pump out some chemical in our brain telling us that we need to spread out seeds what ever it takes. thou, most can keep it to their bedroom but some find it hard to do so.
in another thought, some women purposely exploit their own sexuality to get attention from their boss to climb high on the work office. it is okay to do that while it is bad in the opposite direction. for that, it is hard to define which is which in work place as most people man or female will do anything to make sure that their survival guaranteed as its written in your post.
…………… but you sounded so kinky in FB. LOL.
boundaries are very important. we set our own sets of rules.
(In summary, “Don’t be afraid to tell a male to fuck off and eat shit when you mean it.”) – i like this
Like the last bit… *thumbs up*
My former business partner once ranted how difficult her marketing job was to get work into the firm from the banks. She was sometiimes dissapointed at the staff who did not know that she sometimes in her words had to jual Tetek and Pooky (not literally) just to put food on everybodies table. She was a pretty lady so bankers never took her seriously as a professional and used to flirt with her. So she had to use that to her advantage and flirt back but nothing serious that couldn’t be done in the Branch Manager’s office in full view of the bank staff.
I like what you write!