Giving Compass' Take:

• The author describes how sexual assault and abuse are still prevalent in the restaurant industry and workers must address the power structures that currently exist which keep perpetrators safe from retribution.

• How can men in the restaurant industry hold each other accountable for improving their behavior? 

• Read about the #MeToo movement's implications for the nonprofit sector. 

I want the men who have the power in the plagued restaurant business (with the highest claims of sexual harassment in any industry) to not only be more responsible about how they wield that power but to also explain how they’re now going to share and distribute it. I want them to hold themselves accountable for behavior that has, even if unknowingly, strengthened the power dynamics that created this culture of abuse in the first place.

The conversation we should be having, alongside the one about individual trespasses, is about mechanisms far larger than any one perpetrator. It’s about the kind of power structures that enable powerful individuals and then shield them from resistance or retribution.

The #MeToo movement calls into question how we’ll define abuse and harassment in an industry with appalling norms. Chefs appear fearful to speak because even if they haven’t assaulted anyone, the means through which they’ve expressed their power could now get called into question.

One restaurant owner defended screaming at cooks, saying it’s necessary to make them better at their jobs. Another admitted, “I’ve certainly gotten drunk, flirted, all the usual stupid behavior.” A third questioned his tendency to make raunchy jokes, which one woman later told me were far from funny.

Read the full article on the food industry by Sierra Tishgart at The New Food Economy