yours truly,

What I have chosen to discuss here is something that is ubiquitous yet taboo. It is something I believe no one likes to talk about and avoids. This incessant topic is our problem of sexual harassment in the workplace.

It has been riding on the wings of pestilence, not only in the case of women, but also applicable to our male population. Victims have been on the rise, especially when women have been integrated into the working class some time ago. This calls for measures to be implemented, against perpetual affliction of such physical and psychological torment, and also a necessity for as such people are deprived of support from this continuum of abuse.

http://www.asiaone.com/Just%2BWoman/News/Women%2BIn%2BThe%2BNews/Story/A1Story20080709-75660.html


http://www.aware.org.sg/?page_id=61

http://209.85.175.132/search?q=cache:khZD0TJ2jv4J:www.aware.org.sg/download.php%3Ffile%3Dpressrelease/2008-Jul-09%2520AWARE%2520Report%2520on%2520Sexual%2520Harassment.pdf+sexual+harassment+in+workplace&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=sg

Plenty of organizational communication concepts and principles can be highlighted and I shall draw out some resonating details. Members or should I say victims, are subjected to organizational structures and positions. These people are mostly at the lower end of the hierarchal system where they can be less vocal and opinionated, and most importantly, they know the “what and what not’s”.

This particular topic can be cross referenced to formal organizational structure as well. The downward communication concept says it all. It is a message (harassment) sent from someone at the top to someone at the bottom, exploiting the ‘superior-subordinate’ position, blackmailing victims with performance reports, appraisals and even retrenchment. Upward communication channels are mostly sealed and such taboo subjects are best left in ethical and moral quandaries. Hence, the help required from sentinel policies.

Organizational culture provides a precise and succinct elaboration of ‘why’. Organizational cultures establish the rules on how to behave (suffer in silence), what attitudes to adopt (suffer in silence), and how to rank what is significant (work first, personal problems later). When new entrants realize such behaviors are perennial in the office, they will experience culture shock and surprise. Soon, these greenhorns will seek information from the insiders and anticipate surprise (victimization and how to deal with it). Rites and ceremonials (team building activities) will become hunting grounds for sexual predators in the workplace.

Societal banes like these should be banished and eradicated by law enforcement. Channels should be made available for victims to seek redress and for each day this problem persists, the issue will become harder to resolve.

Saturation

Plurk and Twitter are free social networking and micro-blogging services. Somewhat like a cross between Facebook and Blogspot. What these new services provide are simple blogging capabilities, limiting entries to less than 140 words. Similar to the Messenger, it displays updates of personal messages and grant friends of the user to post responses as if having an online conversation. These are examples of computer mediated communication (CMC).

CMC simply means communication using computers and computer networks, including e-mail, electronic conferences, newsgroups, and Web chats. It allows access and interaction between people and databases, all over the world. These social networking services are a form of CMC because they possess certain characteristics like for example using the computer as a medium, and transpire on a virtual platform known as ‘cyberspace’.

We cannot deny that the proliferation of CMC has influenced and permutated our lifestyles. Now our world revolves around it and I would dare say it is not an ephemeral addiction. Such individuals will plunge into abysmal disorientation once they are robbed of CMC. None of us ever experiences it because technology will not allow us to be deprived. The adhesive connection between personal identity and CMC ‘caused a shift in the basic definition of self’ and this concept opens new windows to which how people can lead lives, maintain or construct relationships etc.

For me, whether it is a necessity to have so many computer mediated ‘communicators’ remains an eternal conundrum.

Communication and the Mass Media

The first video shows George W. Bush and his top ten ‘bloopers’ on the David Letterman show. The clips are taken off during his eight year reign in the constitution and I believe this is what America remembers him by. Other than the infamous ‘shoe’ incident, these are examples of how the media sensationalize content to increase television network viewership ratings.

This talk show typifies certain characteristics of media messages like invisible receivers and interposed channels. It is as such because audience are large, heterogeneous and anonymous who can terminate communication at will. The channel it employs is obviously the television network and the way the information is encoded is for viewing pleasure more than anything else, but it requires some skill in decoding for the receivers to understand the media message. The four media functions identified by Charles Wright are also explicitly displayed in this way: surveillance (information), correlation (analysis and evaluation), cultural transmission (between USA and other parts of the world that had access) and entertainment.



The next video shows the finance minister for Japan, Shoichi Nakagawa, in a G7 conference in Rome. His responses and body language had people around the world debating on whether he was or was not intoxicated. It was splashed across the news and Mr. Nakagawa defended critics saying it was due to the slumberous effect of flu medication, but thereafter, he resigned from his post. This is an example of one media communication theory. This media theory explains the role of the mass media in shaping values and world views. The powerful effects theory might have been in play and contributed to Minister Nakagawa’s demise. This is so because it is based on the assumption that the mass media exerts tremendous influence on to the passive target audience. The conclusion should be that he (Shoichi Nakagawa) realized he has brought shame to his country (thanks to the media) and hopes that resignation would instil confidence back in the Japanese of their political leaders.