Personal background: I strongly feel just about everyone grows up and has something shitty about them. I know growing up I definitely thought and said some less-than-ideal jokes about women, minorities, etc. And while some of that was the proverbial ‘the times’, and some was growing up in a sheltered hyper Christian southern American conservative situation, I regret my actions and am happy I grew past that. And I do think people, especially younger, can grow past their shittiness, especially with the help of others, which was true for me too… When I got my first W2 job a superior I looked up to helped mold me into a better person by calling me out on things and modeling a better behavior.
Current situation: I’m now the supervisor position, have been for a decade (retail is a trap) and I’ve taken that to heart, calling out jokes that aren’t funny, etc. But recently we hired a new kid who acts really incel-ish, and who apparently has attached himself to me instantly. I’ve had moderate success so far just telling him his ‘lol women dumb’ jokes aren’t funny, and modeling how working with women is… normal? Anyways, I don’t wanna screw this up so do y’all have any suggestions for me to help keep him from going down an unfortunate path? I know at the end of the day I’m not responsible for others’ routes in life, but I feel we should all do our parts.
This is such a lovely question. Thank you for being you.
I’d say that it would be important to talk positively about the women you know. If you have a female SO, for example, tell him how smart and curious and funny she is. Make a point to be open about the respect you feel for the contributions of your female co-workers. Tell him stories about when girlfriends were clever, and so on.
I definitely do some level of this but I can step it up for sure. I’m the only guy in my position and while I have about five years of experience on any of them I respect them all and give them the same deference they do me, we’re one big team and all in the same position, nobody’s anybody’s boss in any way.
I don’t talk about my wife enough though, I could do that and hopefully at the same time counter the “boomer humor” comic sorts of jokes
I don’t recommend talking about SOs. Incels may (appear to) be misogynistic but in the end, they turned out that way because they are (or feel) completely unwanted, for whatever reason they come up with, valid or not. Talking about your girlfriend or wife to them will probably remind them what they are missing, make them more envious and aggravate them more, despite claiming to hate women.
This is a good point.
