Women with Authority - Gasp!

The professor's got it all figured out.

Did that title make the little hairs on the back of your neck stand on end? If you are a male, the answer to this question is likely yes. If you are a female, the answer is probably a no--you're likely salivating right now.

I, (like many males, I'm sure) could write volumes on this topic. But in order to keep the ladies from turning away in disgust, I'll make this short, simple, and relatively easy to digest.

If you're a woman in a position of authority, don't try and give us men a high-heeled kick to the face on behalf of your sex. Acting in a vindictive manner will only cause you to crash through a few levels of glass ceilings, regardless of the title you have on your name tag. All of your male colleagues will whisper behind your back even if you hold one of them over the fire.

The reason for this is because the male ego cannot withstand such treatment from women. History has taught us that change comes slowly. Hell, women only got the right to vote eighty-odd years ago, and since some men (not including myself) are still steaming about that one, it's pretty naive to think that ordering them around will go over that well.

Why, I can recall working at a job a few years ago where just such an incident happened to me. A younger female co-worker with less seniority than I, thought her newly appointed "Supervisor" status gave her license to boss me around. I quickly made it clear that her behavior was unacceptable, but she would have nothing of it. Mad with power, she told me to go home and that she was going to call the big boss man about me. "Fine," I said, grabbing my coat to leave. "You do that." And by golly, she did! She called up the very man who had just given her her authority and explicitly detailed how she had abused it. A tactical error on her part.

The next day I came into work and the boss motioned me to come talk with him. "So," he said, giving me a slight smirk, "I hear we had a 'problem' between you and 'Karen' last night?"

I understood immediately that we were on the same wave length.

"Yeah," I responded. "Yeah, we had a little problem."

"Well, I'm sure we won't have any more problems like this, will we?" he said.

"I have a feeling we won't."

After this, "Karen's" behaviour was noticeably subdued. She maintained her Supervisor status, but if she wanted me to do something from then on in, she asked--and smiled politely when she did. And do you know what? I was almost always happy to oblige her.

See, that's the lesson here: men know that in today's society women can ascend to almost any station--and we're fine by that (*nervous cough*). What we don't like is when this authority is abused in order to harm us. The trick, which I alluded to above, is to deliver your bitter medicine with a spoonful of sugar. Remember, authority is relatively new to women, so in order to reach higher heights, you've got to act nicely. The day will come when no one will remember a time when women did not have authority, and on that day women everywhere will be perfectly within their rights to kick the shit out of any man who looks at her cockeyed. But because that won't happen for another, oh, hundred and fifty years or so, please be patient, mmkay?