Yesterday, I was writing about culture and how those who are outside it. Today at Ask A Manager, Alison reran a question about what topics you should not talk about at work. She gave a pretty standard response, and commenters in the commentariat ran with it. The very first commenter said something about avoiding G.R.A.P.E.S. at work. It stands for, ah, Guns, Religion, Abortion, Politics, Economics, and Sexuality. The first one threw me off because I would not lump that in with other–never mind. I’ll leave that for later. What stoood out to me about this list was that the inclusion of more than one of them had the assumption that there was a neutral stance–which wasn’t true. Let’s take the last one.
Sigh.
This is such an old one, but it persists. Sexuality–what do we mean by that? I can’t believe I have to point it out in the year of 2023, but ‘no mention of sexuality’ is much more harmful to queer people than hets. A man has a picture of his wife on his desk? No problem. A man has a picture of his husband? Problem! A man says he and his girlfriend went to a movie over the weekend? Cool. What did you see? A man says he and his boyfriend went to a movie over the weekend? Why does he have to shove his sexuality in other people’s faces?
To a lesser extent, it also happens to people with different lifestyles like being a vegan or being into Crossfit. People like to say joke about how obnoxious vegans and Crossfit people are, but it’s really that the tiny fraction who are obnoxious, and I would bet–at least in the case of the vegans–they have more people being mean to them than vice-versa. Vegans talk about how people who eat meat will mock them or make a big show of eating meat in front of them. Or mooing or whatever. In other words, vegans are much more the brunt of abuse than the ones dishing it out.
Are their asshole vegans? Of course there are. There are assholes in every group. Being an asshole truly is egalitarian. But no one group has more assholes than any other (except, perhaps….). It’s also because you don’t notice the non-assholes. In other words, people who are vegans but not assholes, aren’t going to shove their veganism in your face. So you might not know that they were vegans.
Anyway. In the post about things you should not talk about at work, there were several people pointing out that those who set the rules of what is acceptable to talk about at work aren’t necessarily the ones who should be in charge of that. One person commented that when you say religion, you’re talking about minority religion. Mention that you’re taking off for Christmas and no one will blink an eye. Say it’s for Yom Kippur or Samhain, and suddnely, you’re bringing religion into the workplace.
One person lamented that we couldn’t just talk about things and trust people to set boundaries and limits any longer. Someone else asked pointedly, “When was it that we could actually do that?” Meaning, only certain people were allowed that freedom.
When I worked for the counnty, I was on the floor with the heads of different divisions within the department. One of them was a known sexual harasser and ended up sleeping with an intern. Another was rightwinger who listened to Rush Limbaugh in his office. It was the first time I had heard the show, and I cannot tell you how many times I heard the word ‘feminazi’ while working there. I was a lowly admin assistant to one of the directors–she was the lowliest of the directors. Black woman heading the Diversity Training department? Yeah, no. She was not getting any respect.
This was during the time when President Clinton was being impeached. The rightwinger in my office stomped over to my desk with a big shit-eating grin on his face. I don’t know how he knew I was a Democrat because I did not talk about politics at work, but I supposed me being a young Asian American female-presenting person was enough for him to presume. He said, ‘What do you think of your boy now?” Meaning Clinton.
I snapped back, “He’s not my boy. I did not vote for him.” Which was the truth, but I like to think I would have said it regardless. He was so surprised, but I didn’t elaborate. The reason I didn’t vote for Clinton, male, is beacuse I was out of the country for his first election (and the first time I could vote) and did not get my shit together in order to vote by proxy. The second time, I did not like him or what he stood for, so I waited until the last possible minute to make sure Clinton would carry the state (8 p.m., I think) and voted for Nader in protest.
I am have always voted Democratic, but I have many issues with my party. One being that they hew to the center and are willing to throw the lefties and the minorities under the bus to get a few of those mythical central votes.
In any case, the head of that one division had no qualms gloating to me, a n administrative assistant about politics. I am sure that I would not have fared as well had I done the same to him. That’s what I mean about being wary of who sets the standard of normal. But then again, as I said, another department head was fucking an intern, so there’s that. They eventually moved in together.
It’s interesting because she and I chatted on occasion and before she ended up with this guy, she mentioned how she could understand why Monica Lewinsky fell for Clinton–power-fucking, basically. I replied and said I could not. I did not find him remotely charming. In fact, I find him repellant. But then again, I hate narcissistic charmers, so….
Yes, I could be called an anarchist. I don’t think I would argue with that very strenously. You always have to question the power structures that be.