A café-owner has called into Kyle & Jackie O with the idea of getting his staff to wear red stickers while on their period. This story makes me very angry so bear with me while I try and do the objective journalistic thing.
We don’t know which café it is. We don’t even really know much about the caller other than his name is Anthony. But what we do know is that he wants his employees to wear red stickers while menstruating so that he knows if they’re experiencing “women issues” and can give them “extra space”.
Jackie O was not having a bar of it: “That’s not genius, that’s humiliating.”
He likened dealing with women on their period to dealing with learner drivers. Seriously.
“If someone’s learning to drive a car, they stick an L plate on the car right? That’s not for their benefit, it’s so people around them can give them some space and not toot the horn and stress the person out,” he attempted to explain.
“So it’s the same idea, just for women’s issues.”
Apparently the idea came to him when a male manager had a disagreement with a female waitress, who told HR that her agitation was due to her period. “Her reaction was due to women’s issues and she was emotionally stressed and hormonal and all of that,” Anthony said.
His solution? Red stickers! But with “a little smiley face on it or something to keep it looking friendly”. Anthony even suggested putting a sign up in the venue to communicate the red-sticker policy to customers. So they can know too!
“How else am I meant to solve the problem, I’m running a business here,” he had the audacity to say.
Anthony has floated the idea with his female staff and shock-fucking-horror, they’re not so keen on it. Much like Jackie O, who reminded Anthony not all women experience Premenstrual Syndrome and that men are also assholes with or without a period.
“We’re not as hormonal as women,” Anthony said, before suggesting an alternative solution in the way of a… staff period calendar! Obviously this dumb-as-fuck idea was also shut down by Jackie O, before the audience had a chance to call in and offer their thoughts.
He was called everything from a “hardcore misogynist with mummy issues” to “the most insensitive dickwad ever” and I love it when people do my job for me.
You can listen to the full recording here, if you so wish.
