# Ouch, what an uncomfortable office situation . . . **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [December 20, 2005, 11:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ouch-what-an-uncomfortable-office-situation/336536 "2005-12-20T23:46:56Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 18\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![teela\_brown](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/d9b06d/32.png) [@teela\_brown](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/teela_brown)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2005, 7:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ouch-what-an-uncomfortable-office-situation/336536/41 "2005-12-21T19:10:50Z")
Yeesh, I can’t imagine anyone where I work making the most mild of stereotype jokes. Here, we all must attend a harassment seminar once a year and it’s _hammered_ into us to lay off this kind of insensitive behavior. It must work, because I have never once heard any offensive joshing here, either publicly or privately. **Eve** , maybe your HR people could schedule one of these seminars if they were manipulated by fear of a “hostile workplace” suit? ---
**Author:** ![Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spectre_of_pithecanthropus/32/12343_2.png) [@Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spectre_of_Pithecanthropus)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2005, 7:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ouch-what-an-uncomfortable-office-situation/336536/42 "2005-12-21T19:48:34Z")
> [@Otto](#): > > (they fired someone last week for _looking_ at his cell phone), . Jeebus! If you don’t mind my asking, what kind of a job is it? ---
**Author:** ![Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spectre_of_pithecanthropus/32/12343_2.png) [@Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spectre_of_Pithecanthropus)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2005, 7:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ouch-what-an-uncomfortable-office-situation/336536/43 "2005-12-21T19:55:16Z")
> [@Patty O'Furniture](#): > > I thought tranny was short for transmission, like in a car. But even now that I know (guessing from the context of this thread only) that it’s also short for transgendered person, how does picking up a couple of them help you get to work during a transit strike? > > 😕 IIRC you need to have four people in your car to be allowed into Manhattan; so I presume the idea behind this ‘joke’ is that each transgenered person counts as two–a man and a woman–so he could say he had five including himself. I’m lucky I guess, I"ve never heard any sort of exploitive humor anyplace I’ve worked. I guess the anti-harrassment seminars work pretty well here, too. ---
**Author:** ![FriarTed](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/friarted/32/1052_2.png) [@FriarTed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FriarTed)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2005, 8:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ouch-what-an-uncomfortable-office-situation/336536/44 "2005-12-21T20:04:02Z")
> [@Miss Creant](#): > > My first week, he told me to go talk to someone and he was trying to tell me what cube she was in. Finally, he just said “she’s the colored girl” > > I didn’t know what to do, but I just bust out laughing and said “who SAYS that?!?” The NAACP. Re other posts- - “that’s so gay”- both my gay friends (a guy & a girl) say that all the time. - for some reason, I thought “tranny” was also old slang for a tram or a trolley, as well as modern slang for anyone of T-orientation (TV, TG or TS) ---
**Author:** ![Trunk](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/87869e/32.png) [@Trunk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trunk)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2005, 8:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ouch-what-an-uncomfortable-office-situation/336536/45 "2005-12-21T20:04:32Z")
I didn’t know that about **Eve**. It clears up a joke she made about 2 years ago that’s puzzled me ever since. I guess in my office, I can’t say we’re not guilty of that kind of stuff. I wouldn’t call it a culture here, but for instance, these two guys share an office and I started calling it “Brokeback Office” just to bust their nuts a little. I should probably be more sensitive. ---
**Author:** ![MaxTheVool](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/9fc29f/32.png) [@MaxTheVool](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MaxTheVool)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2005, 8:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ouch-what-an-uncomfortable-office-situation/336536/46 "2005-12-21T20:07:34Z")
> [@Apricot](#): > > I hear a lot of racial jokes because I “pass”. I cringe every single time. You must live/work somewhere with a very different culture than I do, but that baffles me. Is it automatically the case that there’s a constant state of racial jokes being made, which decreases when a (presumably black) person enters the room, and increases again as soon as that person leaves the room? EVERYONE should live in California. We’d all be a lot happier. ---
**Author:** ![Trunk](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/87869e/32.png) [@Trunk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trunk)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2005, 8:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ouch-what-an-uncomfortable-office-situation/336536/47 "2005-12-21T20:18:16Z")
> [@MaxTheVool](#): > > You must live/work somewhere with a very different culture than I do, but that baffles me. Is it automatically the case that there’s a constant state of racial jokes being made, which decreases when a (presumably black) person enters the room, and increases again as soon as that person leaves the room? I doubt that that’s often the case. I work with several doofus guys, none of whom are too sensitive to sensitivity issues. Occasionally, someone makes a gay joke. Occasionally, someone says something about the Chinese that is best not repeated. Using some kind of speaking joke, but not racism of the variety “they should go back where they came from” or anything remotely like that. In my 4+ years here, I’ve can’t recall ever hearing a black joke, and there are only about 2 black people who work here and they’re on different floors. ---
**Author:** ![Trunk](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/87869e/32.png) [@Trunk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trunk)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2005, 8:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ouch-what-an-uncomfortable-office-situation/336536/48 "2005-12-21T20:20:03Z")
using = usually ---
**Author:** ![DocCathode](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/doccathode/32/18773_2.png) [@DocCathode](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DocCathode)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2005, 8:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ouch-what-an-uncomfortable-office-situation/336536/49 "2005-12-21T20:44:24Z")
**MaxTheVool** Could it be that you’re not hearing them because they aren’t blatantly loud and your mind doesn’t constantly scan background noise for these racial epithets?. Having grown up as a Jew in an area with very few Jews, my mind constantly scans for any insulting term for a Jew, and in some situations “beanie”. This has come in handy and does keep me safer. On a trip with a friend who is medium brownish with red undertones, I found out that she could detect slurs about Latinos, arabs, and black people from much farther away and at much lower volumes than I could. Having early warnings that bigots were in the area had high survival value for her. If your subconscious doesn’t scan for certain terms, they can easily be ignored as irrelevant background noise. ---
**Author:** ![Scribble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/scribble/32/3317_2.png) [@Scribble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scribble)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2005, 8:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ouch-what-an-uncomfortable-office-situation/336536/50 "2005-12-21T20:56:24Z")
> [@FriarTed](#): > > - for some reason, I thought “tranny” was also old slang for a tram or a trolley, as well as modern slang for anyone of T-orientation (TV, TG or TS) I learned the word “tranny” as short for “transmission.” It was used in sentences like, “You’re gonna _buy_ that wreck?! Doesn’t it have a tranny problem?” If someone told me that a car had “a couple of trannies” in it, I’d wonder how on Earth the shifting could ever go right. ---
**Author:** ![ryobserver](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/b2d939/32.png) [@ryobserver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ryobserver)\ **Post date:** [December 21, 2005, 10:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ouch-what-an-uncomfortable-office-situation/336536/51 "2005-12-21T22:26:31Z")
> [@Oy!](#): > > **King** is absolutely right - when going to college in Halifax, Nova Scotia, I heard exactly the same jokes I grew up hearing in school in New Jersey about Poles and Italians, only there they were about Newfies and Cape Breton Islanders. In California, it was the Mexicans. I gather in Minnesota, the Swedes tell them about the Norwegians and vice versa. > > I suggest we nominate an extremely obscure and rare nationality/race/religion/culture as our “designated other.” How about Etruscans? > > What has four wheels and flies? An Etruscan garbage truck. > > For some reason, that’s the only one-liner “other” joke I can think of right now, although I’ve certainly heard dozens, if not hundreds, in my life time. According to a French-Canadian friend of mine, French-Canadians tell such jokes about “Anglos”, or English-speaking Canadians. I’m sure “Anglos” return the favor. I used to work with a guy who would say “ethnic” when he felt like telling such a joke, which was seldom. The only one I remember is “Why do ethnic dogs have flat noses? From chasing parked cars.” ---
**Author:** ![Eve](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/9e8a1a/32.png) [@Eve](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eve)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2005, 12:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ouch-what-an-uncomfortable-office-situation/336536/52 "2005-12-22T00:14:29Z")
I’ll probably just keep my trap shut; they’ve been at this company for years and I’m the new fish. I’m one step from saying, “Why’ncha lay off the trannies and make fun of the niggers and fags?” Which would _no_t be a good idea. (We have no HR department. We have “the boss,” and “the rest of us.” And if I brought this up to the boss, he’d go, “Aw fer chrissakes, handle it yourself, or quit if you don’t like it.”) ---
**Author:** ![Nawth\_Chucka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/c57346/32.png) [@Nawth\_Chucka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nawth_Chucka)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2005, 3:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ouch-what-an-uncomfortable-office-situation/336536/53 "2005-12-22T03:13:22Z")
So, let him tell you just those things… Now, what sort of changes do you think you’d make to the place after the boss loses it to you in a discrimination suit? Would you have a major bloodletting or let them all stay there, working for you, feeling their shame burning in their faces day after day while they clung tenously to their paychecks? ---
**Author:** ![Askia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/96bed5/32.png) [@Askia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Askia)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2005, 3:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ouch-what-an-uncomfortable-office-situation/336536/54 "2005-12-22T03:37:30Z")
> [@Eve](#): > > Anyone else have this go on at their office? Any black Dopers hear “nigger” jokes, Jewish Dopers hear cracks about “kikes?” What do you do, other than cringe inside and feel a little depressed? The thing about being a black man is that bigots generally are a \*lot \* more circumspect revealing their “humor” around you. But I _do_ have a younger white co-worker who has the disconcerting habit of calling me “boy” playfully, especially when he’s putting me down for being a newbie. EXAMPLES: “Boy, what’re you doing?” “Boy, you’re crazy.” “You didn’t finish pulling the signs in division 71 yet, boy?” That’s South Carolina for ya. Grates on my nerves, boy. NOW— I have chosen, rather painfully, and quite against my will and ordinary responses, to ignore him. Also, to spend less time with him at work. Because in the back of my mind I can’t help but feel I’m being deliberately and clumsily provoked into responding, and while I’m blessed with rhythm, I don’t dance just because you’re playing my tune. I am not a monkey. He’s otherwise a good ol’ boy, and if I were spending any time here I would have said something by now, or set him up for a practical joke in retaliation. But fortunately he is, and I won’t waste my breath, and I won’t waste my time. I guess one sign of growing up is picking your fights. I pass. Otherwise, **Eve** , you should consider documenting the times, dates and substance of these comments to use in a civil lawsuit some time from now… ---
**Author:** ![DocCathode](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/doccathode/32/18773_2.png) [@DocCathode](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DocCathode)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2005, 3:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ouch-what-an-uncomfortable-office-situation/336536/55 "2005-12-22T03:45:17Z")
**Portia** in Pennsylvania, transexuals are not a protected class and can legally be discriminated against. I don’t know if they are a protected class in New York. ---
**Author:** ![elbows](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/b3f665/32.png) [@elbows](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elbows)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2005, 6:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ouch-what-an-uncomfortable-office-situation/336536/56 "2005-12-22T06:32:38Z")
I’m still unsure if they know about Eve or not? Since that greatly affects my take on these remarks, I’d need that cleared up as well. As for Tranny meaning whores, I don’t get that either. It sounds like maybe they’re ignorant and think tranny means only transexual, I know that would be my take, because that’s what it means where I live. ---
**Author:** ![Ashes\_Ashes](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/db5fbb/32.png) [@Ashes\_Ashes](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ashes_Ashes)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2005, 8:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ouch-what-an-uncomfortable-office-situation/336536/57 "2005-12-22T08:01:41Z")
If it were me, I’d look them straight in the eye and tell them I \*will not \* tolerate hate language being used in my presence and they \*will \* stop immediately. Of course I’m a teacher and I work with teenagers who think I’m a psycho with the power to royally screw up their lives (they think correctly btw). An adult co-worker is another story. Generally I just wince and/or look appalled at what they’ve said. There’s only been one man who doesn’t get the message and he’s a world-class jackass no one’s been able influence in the thirty years I’ve had the displeasure of knowing him. Him we all just avoid while mentally calculating the months till his retirement. Often I hear negative comments about overweight people, but they’re incredibly varied, so my answers vary as well. Anywhere from calling them a hateful asshole and telling them to knock it off, to a faux-piteous request to contemplate their words in light that I used to be heavy myself. In **Eve’s** situation, I’d pretend to give them a head’s up about how some people might be terribly offended by the use of the term. It wouldn’t be a wise career move to inadvertantly upset someone. Even if they poo-poo the notion, it’ll hopefully get them thinking, without having to reveal any personal info. Uncomfortable indeed-- good luck. ---
**Author:** ![Trunk](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/87869e/32.png) [@Trunk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trunk)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2005, 12:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ouch-what-an-uncomfortable-office-situation/336536/58 "2005-12-22T12:26:14Z")
> [@elbows](#): > > As for Tranny meaning whores, I don’t get that either. It sounds like maybe they’re ignorant and think tranny means only transexual, I know that would be my take, because that’s what it means where I live. If anyone makes a joke about “trannies” around here, as in “What are you doing tonight?” “Getting a six pack then rolling through Calvert street for a nice looking tranny.” They mean a transvestite hooker like Eddie Murphy picked up. Not, a transexual or trans-gendered person. I don’t know the terms. To me, transvestite means cross-dresser. Transsexual means “had a sex change”. And, actually I don’t think the problem of confusing the two has ever come up in my 33 years. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ouch-what-an-uncomfortable-office-situation/336536.md?page=2)