No Comment: “Equal Opportunity” Employer Seeks “Males Only”

In what would appear to be bold defiance of federal laws prohibiting employment discrimination on the basis of sex, the Pennsylvania-based hospitality company Hershey Entertainment and Resorts (which calls itself an “equal opportunity employer”) is seeking “males only” for a housekeeping position.

According to online job postings, guests feel more comfortable when their carpets are vacuumed by a man. Ironic, isn’t it? Given the typical sexist belief in women’s “hard-wired propensity” for domestic tasks?

Legally, the only way around anti-sex-discrimination laws is if gender is a “Bona Fide Occupational Qualification“. And that’s an “extremely narrow exception” for when the “essence of business operations” is at stake. Any guesses as to how breasts might threaten the essence of floor-mopping?

About

Stephanie hails from Toronto, Canada. She is a Ms. writer, a master of journalism candidate and a hip hop dancer/instructor/choreographer. She got her start in feminist journalism at the age of 16 when she was a member of the first editorial collective at Shameless magazine—and she has never looked back.