Members Only: A chapter on the professional good old boys club

I have no doubt that long before my awakening to feminist consciousness, I encountered the term "a man's world." Likely, the refrain echoed in the background of tv commercials and sitcoms in the ever-present way that American idioms shape the soundtrack of our popular lives. I first confronted the fact that I had been educated, socialized and brought up in a man's world during college, and it wasn't until I possessed the tools of critical consciousness that the retrospective analysis of my life came to be shaped by an understanding of patriarchy and the value of masculine identity.

As I contemplate the foreboding future of what I can only describe as becoming a grown-up, I find myself frequently analyzing the potential changing nature of my gendered experience, particularly the dynamics that govern professional interaction. The professional sphere is a unique political space. It is one of those areas in our culture defined by assumed equity. The combined exposure of our education and socialization has created a myth of equal opportunity, treatment and respect in the workplace, courtesy of the women's movement, the civil rights acts and the combined accomplishments of a few powerful females and a prominent person of color or two. We more or less exist under the pretense that your race, gender, sexual orientation, etc. is absent in the workplace and that none of our defining characteristics of identity make a difference in our employment experience. Unfortunately, I beg to differ.

My position as an upper-middle class, hetero-sexual, white woman has made it incredibly easy for me to understand the language and behavior patterns of the elitist realms of affluent culture. I can remember being eleven years old and finding great ease and comfort in conversation with educated adults. The way I was socialized to communicate eloquently manifested itself at an early age, and I have since benefitted from the ability to negotiate just about any sphere of interaction. When I was twenty years old I had my first pivotal encounter with grown men in a professional environment. I was serving on the board of trustees for a non-profit organization and as I sat in my innaguaral meeting, an unfamiliar sensation crept over me. It was both subtle and palpable, an ambiguous combination of isolation and objectification. I would come to label it much later as the experience of a young woman amidst the distinctive (and exclusive) language and behavior patterns of the professional good-old-boys club, but in the moment of my first encounter, I could only describe it as uncomfortable and alienating.

In the spirit of white privilege and other social invisibilities, the rules of engagement that govern the good-old boys club are unspoken, unwritten and for all intents and purposes, unseen from the perspective of your average, every day participant. How does something so pervasive exist without any detection and analysis, let alone objection? It's a simple function of normative expectations and socialization. We come to regard certain practices and interactions as inevitable, natural or automatic and we are not equipped with the tools to deconstruct these elements of our existence. The gender dynamics of the workplace represent a classic example of this phenomenon.

It turns out that one of the worst things about the conclusion (or at least postponement) of my student lifestyle and my (somewhat delayed) entrance into the capitalist workforce is the drastic reduction in my leisure time. Given that I have a limited amount of it, I choose to spend it in ways that enrich my mind, restore my spirit and provide me clarity, stimulation and sanity. It just so happens that fantasy sports doesn't make the cut on my free-time priority list. And although I devote zero hours a week to the digital world of imaginary athletics, I find that they have crept into my life experience through some process of information diffusion that occurs as a product of a male-dominated employment environment.

I've been in more than one professional meeting in my life that has opened with and/or included a discussion of the following: collegiate athletics, fantasy football or last week's golf match. And while one could argue that these may be relevant or even significant topics of discussion for members of corporations and industries that depend on, include, or otherwise are associated with college sports, "fantasy" anything or your office co-worker's golf score, I assure you, I have yet to venture into any of those professions. I have, however, worked in and around men who perceive these aspects of their personal lives as somehow intersecting with their careers to such an extent that they are not only fodder for lunch hour banter, but practically woven into the fiber of the conference room agenda.

Occassionally, when my time is involuntarily consumed by such crucial elements of popular existence, I entertain myself with an intellectual visualization of a public discussion of culturally defined female pastimes. Perhaps I poll my co-workers about their asssesment of the underwear selection at the Victoria's Secret Semi-annual sale? Or maybe we could evaluate the latest evolutions in birth control, tampons or body lotion? I am certainly not an advocate of affirming, validating or participating in the construction of this type of gendered distinction, but for the sake of the argument I'm going to have to accept the social prescriptions of this particular case.

It's not so much that I feel offended or inconvenienced by the office banter that includes all sorts of characteristically masculine interests and hobbies, it's that this particular workplace phenomenon is representative of a more significant, broader, more insidious epidemic that both reflects and creates gender employment inequity. At the center of this issue is inclusivity. Anyone who has walked in the world of office politics know that being on the inside of everything from client relationships and committee meetings to office golf rounds and workplace scandal are crucial to securing a preeminent position in any company or organization. It is within these spaces and from these places that impressions, evaluations and decisions are ultimately made, and as result, it arguably becomes a better career investment to spend your weekends watching the boss' favorite football team than putting in extra hours at the office.

Language and behavior patterns are indisputably two of the most powerful elements of any cultural formation. It would follow then, that if the language and behavior patterns of a particular office culture favor certain interests or individuals, it is professionally advantageous to adhere to these prescriptions. Those of us who may not fit into this category of belonging are alienated, marginalized or otherwise disadvantaged. When the social atmosphere of a professional environment is outlined, defined and dominated by masculinity, divisive lines are drawn.

The truth is, if the great office equalizer rested in our ability to adapt to or adopt certain characteristics that ensured inclusive representation, most of us who are accustomed to making cultural adjustments based on the narrow normative expectations of the white-male- upper middle class- heterosexual world, would just shut up and do it, the same way we have our entire lives. Unfortunately, the nature and function of the good old boys club has a depth of greater subtlety that is much more difficult to infiltrate.

The first and most obvious barrier to membership in the good old boys club is, of course, appearance. There is a certain image that is remarkably prominent among those who gain admittance and/or acceptance into the club, and those of us who fail to visibly resemble the standard suffer from practically immediate and permanent exclusion. Perhaps you've seen them around your office: a middle-aged-middle to upper middle class white man who defines his personal style by a polo shirt and khaki slacks. Maybe you know him as the younger well dressed man who celebrates each casual friday with a backwards hat and some sort of athletic paraphanelia. The truth is, as much as I amuse myself with vivid, specific, narrow stereotypes, the image of the good-old-boys club spans the spectrum of white male normative appearances. Beyond that, an individual has to pursue all sorts of alternative avenues to both seek and obtain a sense of belonging, not to mention the benefits, that accompany the position. Among them, the type of solidarity and inclusive identity that produce a wide variety of favorable workplace results. With limited exposure, I have already witnessed the perils of exclusion and the rampant rewards of ranking highly in the good-old-boys' favor.

It had always been my assumption that a capitalist market that values, emphasizes and reproduces individual rigor and personal achievement would commend the accomplishments of over-achieving, ambitious and otherwise self-motivated young women. My real-life experience has served to contradict this assumption in about every way imaginable. So while myself and the women around me in the workplace set exceptional standards for ourselves and aspire to all sorts of professional greatness, the men I've worked with seem to skate by on charm, mediocrity and of course, membership. I have endured countless staff meetings characterized by the subtle exchange of winks, nudges and other affirmations of solidarity among the men in the room. In an almost equal percentage, I have glanced around the room at the responsive expressions men make to the assertion of a woman's voice or opinion. I certainly don't mean to suggest that women are the only individuals who are marginalized by the deprivation of the good old boy rewards card, but this observation serves to underscore the type of us/them dichotomy that so often develops in the workplace, as well as the consequences that emerge as a result.

For those of us who are consistently eluded by the covet of membership, the struggle to situate ourselves in the workplace becomes more than an issue of fitting in, and serves to produce a barrier to advancement, recognition and ultimately, equality. Despite having just about every imaginable social privilege available other than my gender, I have outperformed men in the same position only to be met with, at the very least, apathy and at its worst, scorn and discrimination. My best friend (who also happens to serve as my professional partner during the summer day camp season) and I have jokingly labeled ourselves the over-achieving- annoyances of our office. In an environment that relishes the status-quo and rejects such radical phenomena as overtime and innovation, we continue to put up with rolling eyes, sexist humor and blanket praise that reduces our superior quality performance to the category of acceptable that is occupied by our (athletic, good-looking, white, hetero-sexual) male counterparts.

I think I struggle most with the existence of the good-old boys' club because of what it means to people who suffer from all sorts of other sources of social and professional adversity. If I am consistently frustrated with the difficulties that emerge from trying to navigate "a man's world", what hope is there for people who aren't equipped automatically (as I more or less find myself to be) with the skills, identity and education to succeed in it? How will corporations, the government, academia, and all the other spheres of power and privilege that we have come to regard as prestigious and influential, ever look any different than they have for the last 300 years if there is no challenge to the systems that serve to maintain their image. Both for myself and others whose membership status remains "rejected," I represent solidarity, and a continued commitment to dismantling, and at the very least questioning, the good old boys club (and other mechanisms like it) in all the professional environments I encounter.