Print

limiting those available to other citizens—specifically, to white male citi- zens. Critics refer to this situation as “reverse discrimination,” and they view it as an example of excessive government interference in business and the economy. Advocates of affirmative action, on the other hand, portray it as a valuable tool to help historically disadvantaged groups achieve equality. Further Reading Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. 2018. “EEOC Releases Fiscal Year 2017 Enforcement and Litigation Data.” https://www.eeoc.gov/eeoc/statistics/ enforcement/index.cfm Menand, Louis. 2014. “The Sex Amendment: How Women Got in on the Civil Rights Act.” New Yorker, July 21. https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/ 2014/07/21/sex-amendment Purdum, Todd S. 2014. An Idea Whose Time Has Come: Two Presidents, Two Parties, and the Battle for the Civil Rights Act of 1964. New York: Macmillan. Risen, Clay. 2014. The Bill of the Century: The Epic Battle for the Civil Rights Act. New York: Bloomsbury. Simmons, Linda. 2018. “The Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Equal Opportunity Employment Commission.” National Archives and Records Administration. https://www.archives.gov/education/lessons/civil-rights-act Thomas, Gillian. 2016. Because of Sex: One Law, Ten Cases, and Fifty Years That Changed American Women’s Lives at Work. New York: Picador. Sexual Harassment Enters the Lexicon (1975) Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 removed many barriers to equal participation in the workforce for American women. By prohibiting discrimination on the basis of sex in employment practices, it opened the door to new job opportunities. The percentage of women in professional positions nearly doubled within a few years of the law’s passage, from 14 percent in 1966 to 27 percent in 1972 (EEOC 2014). As women’s participation in the workforce grew, however, so did the number of women who experienced mistreatment on the job in the form of predatory sexual behavior by male supervisors, foremen, managers, and coworkers. In offices, factories, shops, restaurants, and other places of employment across the country, female workers were often subjected to sexual innuendo and lewd gestures, pinching and groping, or propositions and coercion during the late 1960s and early 1970s. Male dominance and female subordination characterized the gender dynamic in a typical workplace. Some male bosses leveraged their status to take liberties with their female employees. Many Landmark Events 13