Why not suggest a diversity seminar to your boss? You said that the office setting was diverse. Wouldn’t this be a sensible, constructive forum to air any possible issues that others, besides yourself, might have? You might be surprised that some of the others in your office–that might even be participating in the jokes–may also be offended, but may have some of your same fears with regard to approaching the offenders.
The city’s response to the TWU strike entails that any car must be carrying at least four passengers (or was it persons, total?) to be admitted into the tunnels or south of 96th St. I think the joke suggests that a transsexual still counts as both a man and a woman, so picking up two fills your strike-mandated carpooling quota.
It’s still hateful and crude, though, and you’d be right to call them on it.
I think that 's probably ascribing more thought to the remark than went into it.
As confirmed by the Stupid Bastid Extreme Descriptivist Semi-literate Dictionary of American English, a significant number of people feel that it is acceptable to use the word “couple” to mean “an indefinite but relatively small number.”
Such simultaneous abuse of human dignity and the English language. How people like this walk around without being stabbed in the eye is quite beyond me.
I think you could say to them (in sort of a smartass-y kind of way) “you guys DO know that ‘tranny’ is STILL only one person, right?”
Then you wouldn’t have to make it personal, just that they’re stupid.
My direct supervisor drives me nuts with that stuff.
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?!?”
which I think shamed him a bit. It’s not like he’s that old. He’s in his early 40’s.
I work in a small conference room with 3 men. They’ve made cracks about every group I can think of and I call them on it EVERY time. It pisses me off. I’m Jewish, but not at all religious. My maiden name is VERY Jewish, so I like to let people who only know me by my married name that I am Jewish and sometimes, not in the most subtle way. I guess it’s my way of saying “Hi, I’m Jewish and I dare you to be an asshole.”
I assumed it was referring to the infamous bust of Eddie Murphy who claimed to just be giving a transvestite (?) prostitute a ride, not soliciting sex.
Person #1, in elementary school: Hey, Kyth, when’re you joining Weight Watchers?
Me: Quit it. That’s not funny.
Person #2: Jeez, it was just a joke. Take it easy…
Yeah, thanks, buddy. Didn’t hurt any less.
Eve, I agree that this is a tough one – and almost entirely because you’re so new to the office (so you don’t know how well “I’m a ‘tranny,’ bitch, you want to make something of it?” might go over). But I’m sure that you’ll find a graceful way to handle the situation. 
Yeah, and jokes are supposed to be funny. Calling an insulting remark a joke doesn’t make it any less insulting – nor does saying “come on, I didn’t mean anything by it!” I had to listen to that stupid rationalization every time a former “friend” of mine would make a racist joke and I’d call him on it.
(I’m white, by the way: I don’t believe you have to be a member of the group in question in order to find such things distasteful and rude. I just love it when someone assumes that I’ll appreciate a racist, homophobic, or male-bashing “joke” just because I’m a straight, white woman … fucking morons.)
Sometimes people really don’t mean any harm, but what the hell is wrong with people who think that insulting generalizations are ever funny?
There is no “should”: whether such statements are offensive depends on variables like who is making the remark, what their history with the subject of the joke is, their tone of voice, etc. But even if they meant it in the nastiest way possible, no one can tell you whether to be offended or not.
So the jury may be out on whether such comments are offensive, but they’re certainly not funny (in a strictly comedic sense).
Again, it depends on the context. But what kind of tension exists that is best eliminated by making fun of someone? I don’t see jokes about black people doing anything to ease the racial tension in DC…
It depends.
Well, many times people don’t communicate that they’ve been offended or insulted. But it might not even be that dramatic: it could just be that someone has found your comments rude, or in poor taste, but not said anything to you about it.
If you can’t tell the difference between a joke that you can seriously expect the other person to laugh at and a joke that might be offensive, I can’t explain it to you. You should probably play it safe by not making any jokes at someone else’s expense.
Could they be meaning inept transvestite and not transgendered? I’ve known people who think that guys are clueless and have no fashion sense, so of course they’d look funny and clownish if they tried to dress as a woman. (I don’t agree, there are some guys who’d be gorgeous dressed as femmes because they know how to dress.) Maybe it’s a bit of both depending on the person? Or maybe they are ignorant and think that transvestite and transgendered are the same thing? 
In any case, that’s a tough situation. I might ask one or two of them what the meaning is, and go from there. I hope things get better for you. You should let those words be like water off a duck’s back though. Don’t let them “stick”, don’t give them your energy.
For what it’s worth, your co-workers sound “nice,” as in “careful to channel their bigotry in apparently safe directions.” One wonders what jokes each member of this small, diverse group might have to share if any of them were not present.
There may not be an actual anthropological need for any group to identify an “other,” but it sure happens with depressing frequency. Your office seems to have evolved to the point where they can be satisfied by marginalizing a poorly-understood abstraction, but not quite reached the stage where they can dispense with the behavior entirely. It sounds as if they’re not especially critical of or opposed to or knowledgeable about transsexuality – “tranny” is just a word that fills in the “other” blank and that your co-workers think is safe to use. They think it’s safe because – well, because they’re not thinking very well (people often don’t when they’re engaging in irrational behavior to begin with). It hasn’t occurred to them that this is a case where there might be an “other” among them without their knowledge, they don’t realize that even non-"other"s can be offended by such casual slurs, and it certainly hasn’t dawned that such marginalizing behaviors are wrong even if they take place on the far side of the moon outside the presence of anyone who could object. And I agree with you that that’s more education for more people than you probably want to undertake.
On the (sort of) plus side, they sound like the sort of people who would bend over backwards to be accepting of any “other” that they could see. That’s far from ideal, certainly. But it doesn’t seem as though there’s hatred there, and that’s good. Whether you want to share enough information with them to change their behavior is up to you: the potential disadvantage is that doing so might trigger enough shame and embarrassment at their ignorance to make the office atmosphere unpleasant in a different way.
But you know all this; heck, you’ve said all this. Were I in your situation (not as you, as myself), I might try this out on the co-worker I judged to be most sympathetic or influential: “You know, whenever I hear one of these “tranny” jokes flying through the office, I cringe, because I can’t help hearing the words “" or "" or "_" or "" or "” instead,* and it makes me feel like a bigot just for listening.”
It would be doing something without sacrificing your privacy, and if your co-workers are nice enough, it’ll even work.
*Yes, I’d pick the words most likely to affect the particular co-worker I was talking to. I’m a manipulative son-of-a-nurse.
Myself, I’d club them and eat their bones. But I’m touchy like that.
I believe the official Miss Manners-sanctioned response is to sweetly ask, “What was that?” and pretend you don’t hear or don’t understand until they’re forced to either shout “I was MAKING A JOKE about TRANSSEXUALS” across the office or retreat in embarrassment.
I’ve pondered, Eve, and I don’t see much middle ground between grinning and bearing it–which can taste awful sour, as I’m sure you know I know, and I know you know–and “coming out.”
Anything oblique you say will “cast suspicion” on you, so you’ll likely be outing yourself without the added position-of-strength of ACTUALLY outing yourself, if you get what I mean.
If you plan to work there for a long time, I think you may have to just choose your moment. Might be better not to do it defensively; in reaction to a negative. Maybe find a “positive” way to do it, without explicitly admonishing them for their past trans(!)gressions. Let them shame themselves when the light dawns. Although I do realize that’s it’s a shame that such things that most people take for granted should be private are sometimes almost impossible to keep private for us exceptional people.
It’s late, I make little sense. Will attempt to clarify if you wish, though I suspect you’ll choose the best course without any of my advice necessary.
Eve Do they have any real understanding of the transgendered, or are they using them (as King Of Soup said) as a generic other? If they are ignorant, education usually works. Facts and information can transform trannies from a comedic group, to a collection of actual human beings. Have they stopped to think why so many transexuals seem to be prostitutes? Have they ever heard the names Gwen Arujo and Brandon Tina?
If they do know these things, then their bigotry must be much deeper and more vicious. Can you make an anonymous complaint to management? Will the cow-orkers have any reason to suspect you?
Do you think you could redirect the jokes from genuine bigotry at the transgendered, to good-natured humor aimed at the many groups openly represented in your office?
Alternately, do you think you could knock them out with laudanum and perform SRS on them?
“I’m sorry, what did you say?”
“Why did you say that?”
“But…I don’t get it. What do you mean?”
“That’s supposed to be funny?”
“I don’t get it. Why?”
Jokes aren’t funny if they have to be explained. Make the perpetrators explain. In detail. Bonus points for twirling your hair with your fingers. May take more than one application. If the joke teller falls back on “BUT IT’S JUST FUNNY!” retell the joke, word for word, with an obviously incorrect ethnicity/gender/color and ask if it’s still funny. Repeat as necessary.
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.
Stupid and offensive people can usually back themselves into a corner fairly nicely with just a touch of assistance. All you need is a blank face and a bit of persistence.
“I’m sorry, but I don’t understand,” you say after an offensive ‘joke’.
They attempt to explain it.
“I still don’t get it,” you say. They’ll attempt to explain it further, usually by stating that the group (Jews, Gays, whomever) is ‘inferior’ in some sort or fashion.
“oh,” you say, “So what you’re attempting to poke fun at a stereotype…I’m sorry but obviously my humor is above attacking someone else. Please don’t be so offensive again.”
And, if they do it again, just look them straight in the eye and say, “Shut the fuck up, asshole.”
Difficult working environment? Maybe a bit.
–Actually, usually asking them to explain the ‘joke’ the first time gets the message across that what they said was offensive, and they usually back down.
You’re damned if you do, damned if you don’t. You’d have to make a judgement call and guess what the response would be if you were to say anything. I mean, they might stop, but the antagonistic undertone could remain. There are definite disadvantages to working in small offices. The established cliques are hard to break into. I can tell you from first-hand experience that it really sucks to be the odd man out and have to spend eight hours a day with people who give you the cold shoulder. I don’t know what I’d do.
I always understood the term to refer to “transvestites”. From my perspective as a straight white male, I guess I would have taken your coworkers’ comments to be a lame reference to prostitutes who are male, but dressed as females to surprise their johns. The joke being the fact that in New York City, it’s not too hard to find a hooker, who (in the joke) will most likely be a male (or a ‘trannie’), and give them $50 each to basically be seat fillers to allow the driver to follow the rule about having 4 people in the car, in order to get into the city. The joke would have worked just as well- or just as poorly- if they had said ‘hookers’ instead.
I’m not saying you shouldn’t have been offended- if you are, then you are, and their comments are inappropriate for the workplace regardless of what they intended by the term- but I don’t see how their “joke” makes any more sense if the term was intended to refer to a transgendered person.
Regardless, if your office/company has a human resources department, it should be enough for you to go to H.R. and mention that some coworkers are making offensive comments about ‘trannies’. Any H.R. department worth their salt won’t need to hear another word, and discipline should ensue. Nobody but the H.R. rep needs to know who lodged the complaint, and it’s the rep’s duty to keep it confidential.
This works wth most stereotypes, but doesn’t quite work with the stereotype that all transexuals are prostitutes. A disproportionately large number of pre-op mtf transexuals are prostitutes (and this. McNew is why the joke makes sense.). Of course, this is actually the result of prejudice. They come out to their families. Their families disown them (usually with considerable verbal abuse and sometimes with a beating). Employers don’t want to hire a transexual, and in most places transexuals are not a protected class. With no support group, and no job, many transexuals sell their bodies.
Telling these men that there aren’t a lot of transexual prostitutes won’t work, because a quick look in the back of any alternative newspaper and thirty seconds of math will prove that there are a lot of transexual prostitutes. Explaining to them that the large number of transexual prostitutes is the result of moronic attitudes like theirs might work.
His name was Brandon Teena, not Tina.
I try to educate my friends about why “that’s so gay” is not okay. I figure if I can get one or two people to stop saying it, maybe it’ll spread. I also try to get ‘retard’ out of the lexicon as an insult.
This is why I can’t read video game message boards, as much as I might like to.
Iowans or Wisconsinites (affectionately referred to as “Cheeseheads” - even by themselves on occation). Swedes and Norwegians know how to stick together in the face of the true threatening other - anyone in a Packers jersey.