A former Facebook employee has revealed that women staffers at the social networking company Facebook are strongly advised not to wear “revealing” dresses that may “distract” co-workers. The allegations have surfaced in Antonio Garcia Martinez’s book titled ‘Chaos Monkeys’. Martinez used to work at Facebook prior to his dismissal.
“Our male HR authority, with occasional backup from his female counterpart, launched into a speech about avoiding clothing that 'distracted' coworkers. I'd later learn that managers did in fact occasionally pull aside female employees and read them the riot act,” Martinez claimed, according to a report published in the Telegraph.
Facebook, which comprises around 10,082 employees, has only one per cent more women as a share of all employees than a year ago in spite of a 40 per cent increase in head count. Martinez also claimed that sexism is rampant in his former office and complaints are not taken seriously. “One such example happened in [the advertising department], with an intern who looked about sixteen coming in regularly in booty shorts. It was almost laughably inappropriate, but such was our disinhibited age," Martinez wrote in his book.
