CONTENT WARNING: Sexual Harassment

I’m working at a big box store, wandering the aisles to adjust product placements and see what items need to be restocked. I turn the corner into one aisle and see two people: a young woman, in her late teens or early twenties, browsing, and a middle-aged man who is very obviously leering at her while rubbing his hand against his crotch through his jeans. The woman is not aware of the man’s presence.

Me: *Practically shouting* “Dude, that’s disgusting!”

The man laughs and disappears around the corner of the aisle.

Me: *To the young woman* “I’m sorry about that, miss.”

Woman: “What happened?”

Me: “Well… to be blunt, he was watching you and touching himself.”

Woman: *Rolling her eyes* “Gee, what else is new. Thanks for stopping him.”

Me: “You’re welcome. I’ll try to get him banned from the store, but I have to go through my manager for that. Anyway, enjoy your shopping. If you need any help, please ask me or any other employee.”

I headed straight to my manager to alert him of the creepy guy, but he claimed that since the guy never harassed the woman “directly” — basically, since he never did anything to get the woman’s attention — there was nothing he or the store could do about it.

As a middle-aged man myself, who was raised to respect women, this was the first time I realized just how prevalent this sort of casual harassment is. I expected the young woman to get upset or be embarrassed or something, but to see her pretty much blow the whole thing off as just another part of life was honestly kind of heartbreaking.

It is the supper rush, and a man pulls into the drive-thru. He states what he wants with no issue, but he is followed up by a muffled female voice. Our shift leader, who is taking the order, politely asks them to repeat what she said; people ordering from the passenger’s side don’t come through very well.

His response is to lay on the horn to bless the ears of every nearby car and the headsets of the employees, and yell:

Customer: “Can you hear her now?!”

The manager is instantly fed up and tells them to leave. The reaction?

Customer: “Well, fine, but I don’t think I did anything wrong.”

A group of workers in business attire has opened a tab on the bar on a company card, and they are really going for it. They’ve drunk plenty, but they seem to think because they’re spending money they can do anything they want, including harassing our waitstaff and other customers.

Finally, I have had enough of their behavior and I bring their card and bill over to them.

Me: “I’ve settled the bill on the card, and we’ve decided we won’t be serving you for the rest of the evening. Please feel free to finish your current drinks and then leave.”

Customer: “The f***?! You can’t do that.”

Me: “Actually, we can. You’re making our staff and other guests uncomfortable, so we would like for you to leave.”

Customer: “We’re spending so much money! You want us to stop spending?!”

Me: “No money is worth putting up with your behavior.”

Customer: “But we’re customers! The customer is always right!”

Me: “The customer is always right, but the bartender decides who is a customer. You’re all paid up and done here, so you’re no longer customers. Good night!”

Related:
Why Barkeeps Should Rule The World, Part 4
Why Barkeeps Should Rule The World, Part 3
Why Barkeeps Should Rule The World, Part 2
Why Barkeeps Should Rule The World

I work in a restaurant. We have a rule that if you make a reservation, we will hold the table for a half-hour. If you don’t show up within that time, we give the table to someone else. We only have six tables that are easy to push together for large groups; the rest are booths or high-tops.

One day, I get a reservation for a large party around lunchtime. The guy is pretty nice on the phone. I don’t really remember how many people, but it is probably around eight or ten.

The time of the reservation comes and goes, and the man and his group don’t show up. Sometime later, and after my manager has told me to pull apart the tables and give them to someone else, the party arrives.

Now, it is lunchtime, but we aren’t too busy; we have a lot of high-tops available and could pretty easily put the group at one of those. I tell the guy that it will just be a minute as we have to wait for a table to be cleaned so we can put a few more together.

All of his niceness just goes away. Standing at the door, in front of his entire group of people, this “businessman” starts YELLING at me for not having his table set up.

Me: “Sir, we only reserve tables for a half-hour after the reservation time. Your reservation was forty-five minutes ago.”

Businessman: “Well, you should have called me to ask if I was still coming.”

Me: “No, sir. We don’t do that.”

Naturally, this makes him yell for the manager. My manager finally comes up and, of course, the guy calms down because it’s easier to yell at a twenty-one-year-old woman than an older man.

We manage to seat him, he makes a bunch of comments about hiring smarter workers, and I walk away.

I’ve always been pretty emotional, and I end up crying in the bathroom.

One of the women in the guy’s group comes into the bathroom, looks at me, and gives me a hug.

Woman: “I’m his client. The fact that he acted like that in front of a bunch of clients was despicable; he was unbelievably rude. I’m actually ashamed to be seen with him, and when I go back to the office, I’m going to tell his manager how he acted. We won’t be doing business with him anymore.”

I end up killing the guy with kindness when he leaves as I smile sweetly and say:

Me: “Have a great day, sir.”

The client winked at me as she left.

My friend and I have a high-end wallpaper business. I quit my job as a speech therapist to start this crazy endeavor with her. We hang wallpaper in the craziest houses in my city — NFL, NBA legends, those types of places. They have all been so nice and respectful. I mean, they hired me to do what only I can do. It’s the everyday people with a ton of money that seem to be the most entitled.

I’m hanging Phillip Jeffries wallpaper in a 9,900-square-foot place. I’m up on scaffolding, hanging a ceiling, while the customer’s kid runs around like a maniac. This isn’t ideal for either myself or the kid; I have blades in my hand that sometimes drop, as well as other materials that could injure him or make him sick if consumed. I’ve consistently mentioned this to the customer, but it falls on deaf ears.

I call my friend, the hanger that recruited me in the first place. She shows up immediately because she especially has no tolerance for this nonsense, and she acts as though she came to assist me.

Twenty minutes in:

Friend: “[Customer], your kid can’t continue running around like this; it’s endangering everyone.”

The customer just brushes it off. My friend tries again, and the customer blows her off again.

So, my friend gets down and starts packing her tools.

Friend: “I won’t continue working and endangering us and your child.”

Customer: “But I have $40,000 worth of wallpaper here!”

Friend: “You’d better start hanging, then.”

We left.

Was it a good job? Yes, but we are booked months out, so it won’t hurt us. Self-respect is more important than money ever will be.