I am not often in such establishments where one is greeted with the salutation of “Madam”, but recently I was.
“Can I help you, Madam?” I was asked as I lined up at the bank. I immediately looked behind me, half expecting to see the Queen standing there. It is not a saying that you hear much these days, and one that I believe should be brought back into fashion, and only used on us more mature ladies.
“Can I help you, love?” is the line that I get at my local butchery. Practically a flirt if you ask me. But when I get together with a group (or should that be a gaggle) of female friends in a service type scenario, we can be greeted with any of the following.
“How are we today, ladies?”
“Lovely! A girly get together!”
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“Do you guys want coffee to start with?”
A simple greeting is not something that I have really thought about until now, most of the time I am just delighted at the notion that someone is going to bring me sustenance that I have not had to prepare myself.
But recently General David Morrison, our Australian of the Year, launched The Diversity Council’s #WordsAtWork campaign, which is anchored around a video promoting how we should be addressing our colleagues in the workplace.
When speaking the ABC News Breakfast show, Morrison tells us: “Exclusive language, gender-based language or inappropriate language, has as much a deleterious or disadvantaged effect as something where you’re saying something blatantly inappropriate to another human being,”
In plain speak, David Morrison means that saying “Hey gals!” to a group of your female colleagues is akin to using such words as fag, dyke or retard, all of which are completely unacceptable in any civilised conversation, let alone at the office.
The first thing that I think about is the screaming siren of the Politically Correct Police as it yet again finds another thing to bitch and moan about. Why can’t we all just pull our heads in, and get on with it?
But then again, I do recall being really annoyed when I shared a cubicle with three other women, and the General Manager would drop in and greet us with “Hello Girls!”
We found it patronising, especially my 55-yearold workmate who would use some offensive language of her own, once he had departed our grey cubicle.
Morrison also wants you to stop using the term “Guys” to both your male and female colleagues, testing the lexicon of Generation Y service workers the world over. Imagine shopping with a friend and entering, for example, an Apple Store.
How would you be greeted? I think a simple “Top of the morning to you!” should suffice.
David Morrison has said that he did not expect the #WordsatWork campaign would be controversial, but he didn’t say that it wouldn’t be confusing. So what should we be saying to our colleagues? When you take the gender out of it, it can become a difficult task. Which proves the Diversity Councils point perfectly.
From a young age, our culture has always defined the difference between boys and girls. Even recently, my Dad was trying to explain to my niece that girls were made of sugar and spice, and that boys were made of grosser stuff, when I had to have a word about stereotypes.
It is from this young age that you are programmed with expectations on everything – your behaviour, what you should be playing with, how you should simply just be – all based on your gender.
Morrison says that culture is dependent on language, and it is this point that the message became clearer to me. The culture of a workplace, such as mine was, was full of cringe worthy moments. The “gals” worked in customer service while the “guys” worked in the warehouse, despite the fact that this was not always the case.
So maybe David Morrison does have a point. And I hope youse all can see it.
Mrs Woog is an author, columnist, blogger and professional washing machine attendant. Please follow her mundane adventures at www.woogsworld.com.
