‘I was unashamed’: Yumi Ishikawa on fighting sexism in Japan

It was meant to be just one of her regular, mundane musings about life as a woman in Japan. But Yumi Ishikawa’s life changed with a tweet she posted on January 24 this year: “Someday I want to get rid of the practice of women having to wear heels and pumps at work.”

The 32-year-old actor was working as an usher in a funeral parlour at the time, a job that involved eight-hour shifts in heels measuring 5cm-7cm. Her comment went viral; it has been retweeted 29,000 times, helping her become the face of the #KuToo movement — a play on the Japanese words for shoes (kutsu), pain (kutsuu) and #MeToo.

Encouraged by the response, Ishikawa, who is also a freelance writer, launched a petition for a ban on high-heel stipulations by employers in Japan. When she submitted her petition to the health ministry in June, it had been signed by nearly 19,000 people and has now collected more than 31,500 signatures.

Help! I'm a Perfect Genius, but This Potential Employer Asked Me a Boring Interview Question!

Ask A Manager, 13 Feb 2024:

I was rejected from a role for not answering an interview question. I had all the skills they asked for, and the recruiter and hiring manager loved me. I had a final round of interviews — a peer on the hiring team, a peer from another team that I would work closely with, the director of both teams (so my would-be grandboss, which I thought was weird), and then finally a technical test with the hiring manager I had already spoken to. (I don’t know if it matters but I’m male and everyone I interviewed with was female.) The interviews went great, except the grandboss. I asked why she was interviewing me since it was a technical position and she was clearly some kind of middle manager. She told me she had a technical background (although she had been in management 10 years so it’s not like her experience was even relevant), but that she was interviewing for things like communication, ability to prioritize, and soft skills. I still thought it was weird to interview with my boss’s boss. She asked pretty standard (and boring) questions, which I aced. But then she asked me to tell her about the biggest mistake I’ve made in my career and how I handled it. I told her I’m a professional and I don’t make mistakes, and she argued with me! She said everyone makes mistakes, but what matters is how you handle them and prevent the same mistake from happening in the future. I told her maybe she made mistakes as a developer but since I actually went to school for it, I didn’t have that problem. She seemed fine with it and we moved on with the interview. A couple days later, the recruiter emailed me to say they had decided to go with someone else. I asked for feedback on why I wasn’t chosen and she said there were other candidates who were stronger. I wrote back and asked if the grandboss had been the reason I didn’t get the job, and she just told me again that the hiring panel made the decision to hire someone else. I looked the grandboss up on LinkedIn after the rejection and she was a developer at two industry leaders and then an executive at a third. She was also connected to a number of well-known C-level people in our city and industry. I’m thinking of mailing her on LinkedIn to explain why her question was wrong and asking if she’ll consider me for future positions at her company but my wife says it’s a bad idea. What do you think about me mailing her to try to explain?

Sir,

You have been wronged in the most grievous of ways by a coven of retaliatory, self-aggrandizing women who have failed in the extreme to recognize your brilliance, your talent, and above all, your general superiority.

Of course you should mail this mediocre "grandboss" on LinkedIn to inform her of the deep offense she caused you by interviewing you in the first place, let alone doing so using a boring question — indeed, you have a moral and professional obligation to do so in order to preserve your honor and the honor of scores of men like you who have never done a single solitary thing wrong in their lives, ever.

But I beg you to consider doing more. A single, private message to one incompetent bitch may not convey to the necessary parties the depth and breadth of the situation. Many, many people have important lessons to learn from your experience, and I encourage you to share it widely. Consider making a public LinkedIn post, and ensure that it is shareable across platforms. Depending on your financial resources, a billboard with your name, professional headshot, and contact information could go a long way toward ensuring that everyone in your industry who needs to know just how you handled the way these women treated you, does know about it. I hope that in your continuing job search, you are able to connect with potential employers who have a much better grasp of all you bring to the table.

The Office.

The Addams Family owned and worked at a pizzeria. One of their new workers was being bullied by another worker, so Gomez adopted the new guy and helped him get the bully fired. The bully got a job at another pizzeria but had to do all his deliveries on foot.

15.12.2023—having this problem where i desperately want to finish but have no motivation 💀

yandere!coworker when you’re out sick

cw: yandere behavior, stalking, mention of kidnapping, mentions of being sick, mention of murder.

a/n: first time actually finishing something and posting it, i have no idea how to start doing this shit.

yandere!coworker . . . who just can’t help but wonder if you won’t bother coming into work today when he catches a glimpse of your heavy panting and a chilled towel placed on your pretty forehead from the camera he managed to discreetly place in the aquarium facing your bed, which is just below the window-the exact one he’s learned to expertly open and shut hundreds of times by now without so much as an offbeat breath from your sleeping form.

yandere!coworker . . . who is already hyperventilating at the thought of not being able to see the way your hips move side-to-side while walking up to greet those disgusting customers who recognize-like him-just how intoxicating you are and hope for the chance to get the cute girl’s number. he’s replaying the incident from a couple days ago in his head like a loop. you squeamishly made your way over to him from across the room that night when you knew you wouldn’t be able to get the annoying regular who insists he can "treat you right" off your tail. he’s got it handled really! he’s glad you can trust him to deal with these pesky animals. a princess like you needs to be taken care of, you just need.…him (even if you don’t see that yet), not some greasy-fingered 40-something clinging to the hem of your shorts like a child. you don’t even notice the news headline proclaiming his tragic "suicide" the following week!

yandere!coworker . . .  who wonders if he should call out from work and bring you some warm soup? would it be too weird if he showed up on your doorstep? maybe just leaving a small note that reads, "feel better my love<;3 you look divine in your sleep" beside the steaming pot of chicken noodle soup and leaving it at your doorstep would suffice. crouched down on the neighbor's front lawn to ensure you got your meal, he can’t help but notice the way you still look stunning as your limping form appeared behind the keypad-locked door (he’s made sure to get the code just in case you need his help!), the ruffles on your pajama shorts just barely exposing the color of your underwear, you went with red that day. my favorite color, he thought, whether or not you made that choice knowingly, it already had a tent forming in his pants and he took mental note to snatch the pair you had on now, the next morning.

yandere!coworker . . . who can’t handle knowing whether or not your extremely high fever has gone down and spends the entirety of his lunch break monitoring you from the dozens of hidden cameras he’s managed to put in your home during his little "visits." from the way your breath quickens, to the way you mumble silly nothings in your sleep, he’s entranced (but still keeping a worried face). he records everything, not only in his mind, but on his spare flash drive while being squeezed into the bathroom stall. a so-called private moment, to be replayed only by him later on. he can’t help but think about how good he’s going to treat you the next time you’re sick. . . because you’ll be with him! his own wellbeing is of no concern to him, but just think of how much easier it would be to know you were around him 24/7. it’s much less stressful for him to know you’ll always be nearby instead of staying up for nights on end peeled behind bright monitors in a poorly lit room, which is what his routine consisted of for the past couple of months. 

yandere!coworker . . . who once he manages to get your nails to stop clawing at his arms and reassures you that you’re only in his basement for your own health (which he’s lined up with all your favorites and everything you may need down there), swears no one knows how to treat their darling better than he does, even if he’s just the dead-eyed coworker that manages to scare off most of the new customers and seems to be around you just a little too much. he can be more than your coworker. . . you'll see that soon!

wc: 711

Taped this to my desk at work so everyone can see it and be aware. I'm not hiding. It's not worth it.

I love to have a little chat with nice customers and helping them.

But I hate wasting time.

New law protecting pregnant workers set to take effect — and it's a big deal

A new federal law protecting the rights of pregnant workers is poised to take effect on June 27.

Why it matters: The Pregnant Workers Fairness Act is a major advancement for the rights of pregnant workers — the first such breakthrough in more than four decades — and has the potential to increase women's labor force participation over the long term.

Context: It's taking effect almost exactly a year after the Supreme Court curtailed the rights of pregnant people with its Dobbs decision.

Details: The law, signed by President Biden at the end of 2022, requires employers with more than 15 employees to provide reasonable accommodations to pregnant workers, as well as those recovering from childbirth and those who need to pump breast milk at work.

For example, a pregnant warehouse worker might need light duty if a doctor has restricted the amount of weight the employee can lift. A retail worker may need extra bathroom breaks or to carry a bottle of water on the store floor; a cashier might ask to sit on a stool while working.

Pregnant workers typically need time off to go to the doctor — or, if they wear uniforms at work, they'll need new clothes.

Employers can claim a "hardship" exemption if they truly can't make anything work.

Whenever I feel like I’ve done a good job at work I print out a new photo of my wife to keep in my wallet and on my wall.

Today I answered all the office emails and redesigned/updated some of our handouts. :3

Danny Gonzales reached some huge subscriber milestone so as a thank you gift he announced that for the span of a month he'd be driving his viewers to their schools and workplaces.

if you were a employee on my company i would make you wear your badge in your pussy, push the whole string inside your hole and leave the badge with your name and picture hanging from between your legs

Oh that's cruel... You just made me imagine the most demeaning ritual of getting to work every morning, sitting on my desk chair, spreading my legs and shoving the badge string inch by inch inside my pvssy with my fingers... Trying to act normal walking around with that thing dangling down my thighs and needing to reajust from time to time because it keeps sliding out, totally wet.

You are awful for that, are you hiring? Where can I apply?