Sexual harassment does not exist in the restaurant industry. At least not in the traditional sense. When you're waiting tables, you make all your simply by pleasing people. And everyone is please by attractive (and sexually attractive) people.

So sex is always in the air.

Among your fellow workers, there is always sex drama. Someone is sleeping with someone else, or someone WANTS to sleep with someone else, and most often someone already slept with someone else and now those two someones aren't speaking to each other anymore.

The most blatantly sexual position is the hostess who is usually hired just because she is cute or sexy. Really, there are no job skills involved in standing by a door, smiling, and then seating people. Although I have encountered some young girls who apparently found this job challenging...And then there is always the predatory manager or owner who sometimes swoops in to nail, harass, and sometimes date a member of the staff.

So for the most part, restaurants operate like institutions from the 1950's when it comes to sexual issues in the work place. But I don't think I've even seen something quite like this article that appeared in the "New York Daily News." The same story was picked up by the "Washington Times," although it was a UPI wire service story which means the whole incident was has been beamed all across the globe. It is so far over the top that I wonder if it's even true.

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New York Daily News - http://www.nydailynews.com

2 ex-waiters dish restaurant in suit

Wednesday, April 14th, 2004 Two ex-waiters slapped the chichi restaurant Town with a federal lawsuit yesterday, claiming managers served up a bizarre menu of anti-gay harassment.

Andre Butler and Kevin O'Brien charge that behind the soaring walls and crystal waterfalls of the dining room, they were taunted and assaulted by colleagues and bosses.

The plaintiffs, who quit the W. 56th St. restaurant in August, said a cadre of food runners would pelt them with slurs and twist their nipples when they passed.

In court papers filed in Manhattan Federal Court, they also accused manager and sommelier Sean Rawlinson of spanking them with serving trays and jabbing wine bottles into the seats of their pants.

Butler further claimed that another manager, Warren Anker, subjected him to sexual advances, telling him once: "I still love you even though you're a slut."

Mark Shey, Town general manager, said neither the five restaurant owners named in the suit nor Rawlinson could comment until they had seen the complaint.

Anker, who no longer works at the hot spot, did not return a phone call left at his Manhattan home last night.

Butler and O'Brien, who also claim the restaurant shortchanged them on tips, are seeking unspecified damages.

Robert Gearty and Tracy Connor

8:05:35 AM     comment []