Bizarre, Society

Are Handshakes Soon To Be Barred In The Workplace?

For lawyers and other professionals, a good firm handshakes is a practiced art. It may however soon be declared inappropriate with all other forms of physical contact according to a recent survey on business seeking to combat inappropriate touching in the workplace. A survey by TotalJobs found that three out of four people want all physical contact banned at work. Other employment experts have also discussed the possible ban on any contact of any kind to combat sexual harassment. Companies are considering a total ban on contact, including handshakes.

While I would think most people would object to the ban on handshakes, some argue that it would eliminate any confusion on what is appropriate and create a bright-line rule protecting employees from sexual harassment. There are also those who view handshakes as increasing the risk of contamination from germs. President Donald Trump notably did not shake hands for this reason until he ran for president.

We have already discussed how activists in various schools have banned clapping as threatening and marginalizing. However, a ban on handshakes would constitute a fundamental change in what is consider appropriate or preferred professional demeanor.

There are images of handshakes going back to Ancient Greece in the 5th Century. Some argue that the handshakes was meant to show a counterpart that you did not have a weapon in your hand.

There are even instructional videos on proper handshaking and psychological studies. There are dangers of the “probing handshakes” and the wet handshake. About 2.8% of the population suffers from hyperhidrosis – wet hands, excessive sweating — which can lead to the dreaded soaked-hand handshake.

Of course, movies would have to lose what is an array of handshaking approaches:

40 thoughts on “Are Handshakes Soon To Be Barred In The Workplace?”

  1. i find it ironic that in China the communists have mostly dispensed with the custom of bowing in favor of handshaking (see Mao’s war on the “four olds’), contrasting to the capitalistic koreans and Apennines who still favor bowing;

    but the communists in America now want us not to shake hands due to these spurious concerns.

  2. another dumb idea from pc apparatchiks who have failed in other settings and found their way into HR jobs

  3. “some argue that it would eliminate any confusion on what is appropriate and create a bright-line rule protecting employees from sexual harassment. There are also those who view handshakes as increasing the risk of contamination from germs. ”

    In other words, we have to capitulate to the needs of the willfully idiotic, the control freaks, or the anxiety-ridden.

  4. JT, here’s another handshake video. No deal. Just shake hands & that will be it

  5. Off topic, Darren, but I wanted to know if you had good seats at the Bill & Hillary comedy act when they were in Seattle.
    When Hillary said “they think the same set of rules don’t apply to them as they do to other people” ( evidently meaning Trump and Barr)……that’s when I realized Bill and Hillary were doing a comedy act.

      1. Thanks for the link, Darren. I knew that the Clinton’s were not getting big crowds, but I thought Seattle would have had one of their bigger audiences.
        Also, I was surprised that anything in Seattle still had the WaMu name attached to it. That last CEO of Washington Mutual managed to run a c.120 bank right into the ground.

      2. Go make an appointment to meet your new Archbishop. Seems like you got a good one

        —-

        Midnight Sun” to “Emerald City” – From Alaska, Pope Launches Etienne To Space (Needle)

        As it turns out, the Vatican can indeed handle “Prime” shipping. Less than 72 hours after Whispers’ broke news of a coadjutor in the works for the million-member archdiocese of Seattle, at Roman Noon this Monday, the Pope appointed Paul Etienne – the 59 year-old archbishop of Anchorage, long seen as one of the US bench’s key rising figures

        http://whispersintheloggia.blogspot.com/2019/04/from-midnight-sun-to-emerald-city-pope.html

  6. This reminds me of that scene in Gene Wilder’s Young Frankenstein where he wants to kiss his fiancé off at the train station, but she doesn’t want to muss her lipstick or hair, so they bump elbows.

    Sorry, but if a professional handshake makes anyone nervous, they are not cut out for the rigors of the workplace. How in the world would they handle any serious problems on the job?

  7. If applying for a job there or about to close a deal with a handshake, if they refuse, claiming “we don’t shake hands around here” one is best served to turn around and leave thereby prophylactically saving themselves a great many future headaches.

    1. Yeah, mespo, high fives! And what about chest bumps?! Do you think the secretarial pool would mind mind too much?

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