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Since 1964, discrimination in employment has been illegal in this country. Unfortunately, however, some employers still haven’t gotten the message. In every year since the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) began tracking discrimination charges filed with the agency, more charges have alleged race discrimination than any other type. Almost 100,000 charges of race discrimination were filed in the U.S. in 2010, and again in 2011.

Harassment is any unwelcome advance or conduct on the job that creates an intimidating, hostile, or offensive working environment. In real life, workplace sexual harassment ranges from repeated offensive or belittling jokes to a workplace full of offensive pornography (creating a hostile work environment) to an outright sexual assault. Although sexual harassment most often takes the form of men harassing women, it can happen to men and women, gay and straight — in other words, sexual harassment is an equal opportunity offense.

Fortunately, state and federal laws protect workers from sexual harassment on the job — the same laws that protect workers from discrimination based on gender. At the federal level, Title VII of the Civil Rights Act forbids harassment. In addition, most states have their own fair employment practices laws that prohibit sexual harassment, many of them more strict than the federal law.

If you are being harassed at work, there are a number of things that you should do to protect yourself.

Preventing employment discrimination from occurring in the workplace in the first place is preferable to remedying the consequences of discrimination. EEOC is committed to providing training and technical assistance, outreach and education programs to assist employers, employees and stakeholder groups understand and prevent discrimination. We believe that discrimination can be averted if companies, federal agencies and individuals know their legal rights and responsibilities.

No-Cost Outreach and Education Programs: EEOC representatives are available on a limited basis at no cost to make presentations and participate in meetings with employees and employers, and their representative groups, as well as community organizations and other members of the general public.

Through the EEOC Training Institute, EEOC provides fee-based training and technical assistance programs throughout the country, and has training and technical assistance materials available for sale.

Federal Sector Training: EEOC provides a variety of training programs geared specifically for federal employees through the Training Institute.