newest entry
contact
quien es nico?
a links page
Antes:
2005
2004
2003
2002
2001
2000
I also do stuff over at livejournal:
the insufficient blog
otro lugares:
absorbacon
abstractnixon
aiyah
amateur gourmet
amazing adventures of bill
appetites
archerr
bill and kent
blockade boy
center of gravitas
cheap blue guitar
chocolate and zucchini
comics 212
designer blog
dogpoet
edwin
how to learn swedish
hungry tiger
i make things
i was just really very hungry
insequence
island of misfit toys
lady, that's my skull
mysterysteps
news from me
old grey poet
once upon a tart
postmodernbarney
precocious curmudgeon
pretty, fizzy, paradise
roar of comics
something old, nothing new
stop touching my food
strange maps
super underwear perverts
there are some who call me tim
tinman
tmb
ultrasparky
diaryland
diaryland profile
ringsurf gay diary
previous next random list join
Stories from a man who fails to meet media expectations of what it means to be gay:
white, frivolous, over sexed yet sexless, shrill, single, stylish, a clown, unimportant, et al.
Mon 07/22/2002
Why should anyone care?
Work has been borderline annoying lately and in the case of one specific individual on one specific day, it was very aggravating as well.
A couple of Thursdays ago, I had a hearing with well, lets call him Mr. Prejudiced Aggravating Guy. What usually happens before each hearing, is that I will go out to the waiting area, say good morning, introduce myself and walk the person back to my office. When I asked Mr. PAG to follow me back to my office, he started yelling at me that I was wasting his time, he had other appointments, and did I even speak English, because he was not going to waste his time talking to me If I only spoke Spanish.
Considering that we had been speaking English, I thought that the answer would have been self evident.
Considering that he was yelling at me and accusing me of inadequate English speaking skills, I believe that I showed an amazing amount of self control in merely telling him that yes I spoke English and that if time was a concern, then the sooner we started the hearing, the sooner we would finish.
My initial reaction was to tell him to leave the office. I did not do this because I realized that he was intentionally trying to get me angry. At some point in his life, Mr. PAG had learned that if you get your opponent angry and off balanced, you can win the fight. Except our meeting wasn't a fight and we weren't opponents. At least, we weren't supposed to have been.
Mr. PAG continued to yell at me and I continued to not get angry. Or more specifically, I did not yell back. After all, I was a representative of a government agency. I can get angry, I just can't show it. I'm not allowed to yell back. That would be unprofessional.
Half way through the meeting he stopped the yelling and started accusing my department of racism. He didn't exactly call me racist, but he came pretty close to it. He also made a point of ignoring my statement that the actions of the department were not based on race.
I'm not sure if he really did believe that he was the victim of institutionalized racism, or if it was just another tactic in not accepting responsibility for his actions. If it was the former, then in this specific instance he was incorrect. Until we met that morning, no one in my office knew what his race was. Not very efficient behavior for people who supposedly made a point of singling out _______-Americans, while making every attempt to ignore similar actions from folks of every other race/ethnicity.
If it was the latter, then his tactics trouble me. I believe in the story of the boy who cries wolf. I believe that inventing prejudice where there is none lessons the impact of when injustice does occur. If everyone "knows" that claiming racism is what you do when you don't get your way, why would anyone believe that it actually does happen? Why should anyone care?
more later,
nico
Music:
the Y tu mama tambien soundtrack
Want:
a vacation
Elsewhere:
urban legends
<<numbers & stories::::Contrary Mary>>