As guys, sometimes we overstep our boundaries in our relationships with female colleagues. A typical example is addressing a married female teammate as ‘Baby’ or ‘Babe’ at the workplace.
I have witnessed situations where a male colleague would address a married female co-worker as ‘MY WIFE’. Another person’s wife oo. Just like our university days where some students had school boyfriends/girlfriends and serious partners back home, we now have ‘office wives/husbands’. How sad!
Calling her ‘Baby’, ‘Babe’ may look innocuous or an attempt to portray her as young and sexy but trust me, it is not right.
People say it happens only in the Civil Service but believe me when I say it takes place in the private sector as well. I’ve worked in both public and private sectors and witnessed similar scenarios to come to this conclusion.
Incidentally, I’m also a culprit. I used to call a married female colleague ‘Baby’, nicknamed another ‘Sexy’ until my encounter with a lady who was reporting her workmate to me.
“My teammate calls me ‘Babe’ at the office. I don’t find it funny. He is addressing me like I’m his girlfriend. I’m a mom of three. He has no modicum of respect for marriage as an institution”, she laments.
Unbeknownst to her, the person she was reporting to was/is equally an offender.
I tried to explain to her that he may not have sinister intentions but she insisted that it was ungentlemanly, indecent, disrespectful to address her that way.
“Only my husband has the right to call me ‘Baby’, ‘Babe” she adds.
Flowing from this encounter, I resolved to turn a new leaf. Office space should be office space and should be treated as such. No amount of familiarity with a female co-worker, especially the married ones, should make you address her as ‘Baby’, ‘Babe’.
