The Supreme Court Ruling on Workplace Harassment That Got Buried

A supervisor could, for example, require the worker to put in longer hours, work outside or pick up unwanted duties on the job.

“Exposed to a fellow employee’s harassment, one can walk away or tell the offender to ‘buzz off,'” Ginsburg wrote. “A supervisor’s slings and arrows, however, are not so easily avoided. An employee who confronts her harassing supervisor risks, for example, receiving an undesirable or unsafe work assignment or an unwanted transfer. She may be saddled with an excessive workload or with placement on a shift spanning hours disruptive of her family life. And she may be demoted or fired. Facing such dangers, she may be reluctant to blow the whistle on her superior, whose ‘power and authority invests his or her harassing conduct with a particular threatening character.'”