"Double Standard"

This week has been a rough week at my office. About a month ago, I found out that another supervisor in a different department had his staff tracking my arrival and departure times. I was made aware of the issue by someone in his department that didn't think it was right, and that also felt I was being targeted because I'm African American. (It's important to note that I am one of the highest ranking African Americans in my organization.) In any event, I decided to take my complaint to my managers. At first, I felt that I had their support; however, upon speaking with them after they had a chance to confront this other supervisor, I realized that they were scared of this other supervisor because of what they perceived as his "influence" on other high ranking members of our organization.

They met and they discussed my arrival and departure times in my office; he then showed them a log of my time. It was evident that my actual times didn't match my office hours. This was no surprise to me, nor should it have been a surprise to my manager as I told her that I had adjusted my schedule during the week to accommodate my morning drop-off schedule for my children. I had no excuse for the weekend hours; I was just being sloppy. I had fallen into a valley of tardiness per my weekday schedule that I had unjustly applied to my weekend schedule. Somehow, my manager did not recall this conversation, nor did I have anything in writing to substantiate our exchange. (Folks, always Document! Document! Document!)

I continued to listen as my meeting become less about the unlawful targeted tracking of me, and more about my not adhering to my office hours. At this point, I pointed out how no other supervisor on my level was held accountable for keeping their office hours exactly the same, including my managers. I then began to show them documentation I had to support my statements; they then became very defensive and tense. The next statement they made was that I should not try to police anybody esle's office; however, as I stated, policing of my office by another office is exactly why we're here having this discussion. I went on to state that I believed it was unfair to have a rolling standard on what's expected of offices throughout our organization with the same function based on their location.

I continued with my protest and stated that by being targeted to be tracked exclusively, the aforementioned offending supervisor had created a hostile work environment for me, violating EEOE mandates, and Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 by creating a discriminatory effect in the tracking itself, as the only difference between my office and other offices with the same function in our organization is that my office is ran by an African American, me. This lends itself to establish the validity of my complaints for the above reasons mention on the basis of my race.

At the end of the meeting, I was broken, though not visibly. I was just tired of fighting for equal treatment and respect. I was tired of having to justify actions exhibited by me that mirrored their on actions that needed no explanation. I was tired of trying to prove my point, and accepted the fact that we are not in a post-racial Obama nation society; race still mattered very much, and double standards will always exist between white and black folk because some folk still have a sense of entitlement that their skin has given them, and a superiority complex falsely formed by a series of societal missteps. It angered me to my core; my soul shuttered as I thought of my own sons growing up having to deal with this bull. I decided to do my best not to give them a reason, and start arriving at my scheduled office time on the weekends, and arrive consistently during the weekdays after my drop-offs are complete. I accept responsibility for my faults in this situation; however, I don't accept the acceptance of such a despicable showing of bigotry or of it being embraced and covered by my managers. I don't accept the double standard, and have vowed to do everything in my power to initiate its demise. I strongly suggest you all do the same.