Teenage Employees at Fast Food Restaurants are Being Sexually Harassed

We’ve all seen it. You step up to the counter or drive up to the window of a fast-food restaurant and teenagers are everywhere. They are taking orders, filling bags with food, making soft serve cups, and, of course, they are interacting. They are interacting with each other. They are interacting with customers. They are also interacting with managers and shift supervisors who are older than them and have some degree of power over them. This is where a lot of sexual harassment happens. The line worker is young, inexperienced, and unsure of the rules of engagement at work. The manager or shift supervisor is older, has experience, and knows exactly how the rules work and what they can get away with. This is the perfect environment for a manager or shift supervisor to get away with grooming and sexually harassing a younger worker. First, there is already some degree of flirting happening between co-workers so the grooming can seem “normal”, at least initially. Second, the young worker does not know what is acceptable or not, and wants to please those with more power than them. Third, there are no real adults in the room. No one is paying attention to the subtle interactions than can make grooming so effective.

Teenagers at fast food restaurants are being sexually harassed. And this can impact them for years to come, including impacting how they show up at work forever.

Everyone should be looking out for this type of grooming behavior. Restaurants - and all employers - should be closely monitoring the interactions between their employees and checking in with young workers regularly. Parents can ask questions and check in on their teenage worker regularly. And sometimes contacting an attorney - to understand your options - can help. We cannot expect these young teenagers to handle these complex and ILLEGAL situations alone.