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In a suburb of St. Louis, they chanted: "Hold your hamburgers, hold your fries. Keep your hands on my thighs. In Chicago, they had blue tape saying "MeToo" covering their mouths. And in Kansas City, Missouri, they held placards carrying the same anti-sexual harassment hashtag with the first letter of the same style as that of McDonald's golden arches.
In what the organizers said was the first strike in over 100 years to protest sexual harassment in the workplace, hundreds of McDonald's employees in these cities and seven others asked that the largest restaurant chain fast of the country
"We are protesting today and this is more important than the work," said Kimberly Lawson, explaining that she was skipping her watch to attend the Kansas City rally. Ms. Lawson told the crowd there that she had felt "trapped" when a manager had made unwanted advances.
"We have the strength to protect each other and demand the justice we deserve," she said.
Food service workers represent a very large part of the American workforce, with the fast food sector creating more jobs than almost any other in the last decade. But restaurants generally pay low wages and employ a disproportionate number of young people and women, making those working in this sector particularly vulnerable to sexual harassment.
Tuesday's protests were organized by Fight for $ 15, a subsidiary of the International Union of Service Employees, which is trying to organize fast food workers and advocates for better pay and working conditions. . In May, 10 McDonald's employees filed complaints with the Equal Employment Commission, alleging that male supervisors made unwelcome advances against them and retaliated against those complaining.
The purpose of the protests was to pressure McDonald to put in place tougher policies to protect workers from sexual harassment in more than 14,000 stores in the United States. Requests included better training programs for all workers, a more effective way of reporting complaints, and a committee to deal with sexual harassment issues.
"What McDonald's does on this topic, how they choose to treat it, how they act proactively, will influence other stores," said Mary Joyce Carlson, a lawyer for Fight-related workers for $ 15.
In a statement, McDonald's said it took the issue seriously and put in place additional measures to provide additional protections for workers. The company declined to comment on the complaints of the employment commission, citing "active litigation".
"We have put in place rigorous policies, procedures and training specifically designed to prevent sexual harassment," the statement said. "To make sure we do everything we can, we have hired experts in the areas of prevention and response."
Holding companies responsible for sexual harassment can be difficult. This is especially true in restaurants, where it can be particularly difficult for guests workers who depend on tips.
In fast food restaurants, the difficulties are aggravated by the fact that large companies do not consider themselves responsible for bad behavior in individual stores, often operated by franchisees who do not always have human resources services or complaints procedures. sexual harassment.
Employers can be held responsible for sexual harassment if victims can prove that they were forced to work in a hostile environment where their complaints were ignored or rejected. In previous labor disputes, fast food companies have generally argued that they did not share responsibility with franchisees who own and operate their stores independently.
Workers' advocates oppose the fact that companies like McDonald's dictate everything from menu boards to recruitment practices, and should be responsible for adopting effective policies to identify and prevent sexual harassment.
"The problem is this: how much control does the franchisor have over the franchisee's staffing practices?" Said Cynthia Calvert, a lawyer specializing in discrimination and a senior advisor at the Center for WorkLife Law in San Francisco. .
Ms. Carlson, the lawyer who works with Fight for $ 15, suggested that McDonald's had the power to make a big impact.
"McDonald's has a huge system, everything it wants to be effective is possible," she said. "Front-line workers, cooks, cashiers and members of the management structure should have a safe place to report a complaint."
In Chicago, three women working at a McDonald's in South Side attended the rally on Tuesday. One of them, 59-year-old Brenda Harris, said she had been working at McDonald's since 1995 and that she had been too often harassed and harassed to count.
"I hope and pray that it will change things," she said.
A McDonald's worker who participated in the Kansas City protest, Nakisha Eubanks, said she would not be working that night. "They said there would be training, but we did not receive any training," she said. "In fact, nothing is done."
Ms. Carlson stated that she believed that McDonald's only offered such training to supervisors and that it did not always reach hourly workers.
"When we met some of these workers," she said, "they did not even know that the conduct they tolerated was illegal and that they had no idea, after the failure of approaches to managers, all they could do about it. "
McDonald's said in its statement that it had hired experts like Rainn, the nonprofit organization to fight sexual assault, "to do everything in its power" to combat sexual harassment.
A spokesman for Rainn said the group had had a "preliminary" conversation with McDonald's several months ago, but had not yet started working with the company.
Ellen Durston, Traci Angel and Bill Bryan contributed to the report.
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