00:00Not him!
00:02Ugh, I cannot believe it.
00:04Finally, I knew it.
00:05Can we just get one news alert to end all news alerts?
00:09Something like, I don't know, men are scum.
00:11Oh, look at that.
00:13If you think I'm overreacting, just ask any woman.
00:17There are too many times to count how many creepy and unwanted passes I've received from men in my industry.
00:23I have definitely experienced douchey behavior from men.
00:26There was one experience where there was a department head who got very handsy with all of the women in
00:32the office.
00:32And then I was harassed for being a tattletale.
00:35I've totally experienced sexual harassment from male colleagues.
00:40I have been told that my jeans weren't tight enough and that I needed to unbutton a few buttons on
00:44my shirt.
00:45In 2015, I had so many incidences with male colleagues and bosses, I just felt disgusted.
00:53Fuck off funds are essentially savings accounts that allow you to escape jobs or relationships with scummy men.
00:59I saved my money and I decided I will only work for companies where women were at the center.
01:05Hence why I work at Refinery29.
01:07I think fuck off funds are more relevant than ever.
01:09This is Paulette Perchat.
01:10She's a writer and she coined the term fuck off fund two years ago.
01:14I mean, we say you need a rainy day fund.
01:16Well, what does that mean?
01:17No, you need to be able to tell someone to fuck off.
01:20Whether the system protects you or fails you, you'll be able to take care of yourself.
01:25And I think so many women know what it's like to go to a system that's supposed to protect them.
01:31And sometimes it works, but often it doesn't.
01:33I've had the creepy boss.
01:35I've signed an NDA.
01:35I have trapped myself in those situations.
01:39And all you need are those doorways that you could have provided yourself with a few thousand dollars.
01:44And suddenly when there's someone standing in the way, I have enough money.
01:49Everyone's going to know what a dirtbag you are.
01:51But in this new reality where men are actually held accountable for their actions,
01:55maybe we don't need fuck off funds anymore.
01:57No, we always need to fuck off funds.
01:59You always do.
02:00Even if people are being held accountable for their actions,
02:02you want to be able to take the actions that you want to take.
02:05This is Tonya Rapley.
02:07She founded My Fab Finance.
02:09It's a company that helps young women break the cycle of living paycheck to paycheck.
02:14I ended up finding myself in a compromising situation in a bad relationship.
02:19And I stayed in that relationship partly because I didn't have the money to leave,
02:22because it was a financially abusive relationship.
02:25It wasn't work related, but I've seen that where people are like,
02:27I want to leave, but I can't afford to leave.
02:30And there was a point in my life where I was, it wasn't a male boss,
02:34but it was still a toxic situation and I couldn't afford to leave.
02:37And I was like, I don't want to be stuck somewhere anymore.
02:40And so that was really important for me to get my financial situation together.
02:43So when I resigned from my last job, I was like, no, I can do this.
02:45Like, I'm done.
02:46It's so important for women to have fuck off funds because it gives you control.
02:51It helps you own your power.
02:52I mean, in the absence of money, you're still powerful,
02:55but I think it just gives you that much more confidence to be like,
02:57no, I can really do whatever the hell I want to and I don't have to take this.
03:01When you aren't financially secure, you don't have financial stability,
03:04you tolerate more because you feel like, well, I need this opportunity.
03:07I need this income.
03:09And in the absence of that, when people can't leverage that or hold that over your head,
03:13like, well, I know you need this job.
03:14So what are you going to do for it?
03:16Then you'd be like, no, fuck you.
03:17Like, I don't want to deal with any of your mess.
03:19And I'm just going to go ahead and take myself out of this equation.
03:22Fuck off fund isn't just about avoiding harassment.
03:25It really is about living the life that you want to live.
03:29The thing is, the women who are most vulnerable to workplace sexual harassment
03:32are often the ones who can't afford to save for a fuck off fund
03:36because they're living paycheck to paycheck.
03:38A fuck off fund is a great idea in theory, but it's just not viable for a lot of women.
03:43This is Jillian White.
03:45She's a senior associate editor at The Atlantic.
03:47That would require the ability to save.
03:49And that's just not feasible for a lot of women,
03:51particularly women of color and lower income women
03:54who are often the most vulnerable to these types of attacks.
03:57When you look at who this reckoning with sexual assault has galvanized around,
04:01it has been white women.
04:03And not just white women, but wealthy, well-connected, affluent white women.
04:07This has largely left out a lot of the women that you're talking about,
04:10women who are vulnerable, women who are of color,
04:13women who do not have the means to, you know, stop going to a job
04:17because they're being harassed or they've been assaulted.
04:20They don't have the options here.
04:22And to then have the conversation render them largely invisible
04:26kind of re-victimizes them.
04:28Not surprisingly, financial instability affects black and brown people the most,
04:32especially when it comes to building wealth.
04:35And that's a key point because it happens over centuries.
04:38You can't talk about money without talking about race,
04:41because in this country there's a huge wealth inequality gap.
04:43The average white family has about 13 times as much wealth as the average black family.
04:48It's not a secret that people of color, particularly blacks and Latinos,
04:53are under-earning their peers, men and women.
04:55And when you think about what that means, it means that you don't have as many resources available to you.
05:01It means that potentially your future generations might not have as many resources available to them
05:06and your parents didn't have as many resources available to them because this is generational.
05:10It's not like just the millennials are dealing with this, like our parents dealt with it, baby boomers dealt with
05:14it.
05:14And unless we fix our financial situation and start becoming more financially independent and secure,
05:21then the next generation is going to also inherit this wealth inequality gap.
05:25And so money isn't everything, but money gives you options.
05:27And if you don't have options, you're not able to act on your best interests necessarily.
