Weird conversation

A co-worker told me she's a bigot without saying she's a bigot

The Merriam-Webster definition of bigotry: "obstinate or intolerant devotion to one's own opinions and prejudices: the state of mind of a bigot."

It doesn't necessarily have anything to do with ethnicity, although the word is often used as it relates to racial prejudice.

My co-worker, "Jan," was watching something on her phone a few minutes before the end of her break. She asked if I had ever heard of the red restaurant. She actually said something else, but it sounded like "red restaurant." I told her no. She said it was in New Orleans. From what she was saying, I eventually figured out that she didn't mean fine dining. I asked if it was a thing rather than a place. She said yes, then showed me the video.

I don't know how long the video was. I only saw about 15 seconds. It showed about 25, maybe 30 men standing around in red dresses. Jan told me the event was for charity. She may not have specifically asked what I thought but I was certain she wanted some kind of reaction. What I said apparently wasn't what she expected.

I said okay.

My opinion of what they're doing is irrelevant. The simple fact that they're doing it to help others works for me. If such an event were held near where I live, I might join them. I've never worn a dress as an adult. I might have tried one on when I was a little boy, but that was all.

Well, there was that one time. I'm an actor in community theater, and about 15 years ago, I did kind of a tour de force in which a woman was one of my 15 characters. But the "dress" I wore that day was under several costumes and over others. Since I had only a few seconds between costume changes, the only way I could do it was to put on all items at once, save for jackets, scarves and such. It was far easier to peel off layers and throw on an article than it was to take off one outfit and put on another. I submit that having a dress on over pants and several shirts doesn't count.

Between the conversation and writing this, I did a couple of online searches. The event is actually called the Red Dress Run. For those unfamiliar, it's an event where hundreds, maybe thousands of people show up wearing red dresses or other attire. And like Jan said, they raise money for charities.

Back to the conversation.

"Okay?" Jan said rather loudly after my comment. Then she went on a disorganized rant. "There's right and there's wrong," which she must have said four or five times in the few minutes we talked. I interrupted her several times, pointing out that, "You just said that," and asking questions like, "So what's wrong about it?" She never answered.

I asked why she was upset. She said she wasn't, but the tone of her voice betrayed her. Clearly, something bothered her as she felt it necessary to talk about right and wrong. I repeatedly asked, "What are they doing that's wrong?" She did not respond. I asked if they were wrong to raise money for charity. She said no, which left me to conclude that it was the sight of men in dresses that bothered her.

Here, I should point out that all the men in the clip I saw were black. Pictures of past events show an integrated crowd, but the video focused on this one group. Jan and I are black. So it's possible her distaste is from seeing black men in dresses. She never mentioned color, but it's possible it wasn't men in dresses that bothered her so much as it was black men in dresses. I've heard some black people speak as if they have no negative thoughts about homosexuality in general, but they act like they're wounded when they learn that a black celebrity or athlete is gay.

Either way, I think it was bias on her part.

Jan never said what was wrong about what they were doing. If she could point to some law, code of ethics or even a clinical study that says men wearing dresses causes psychological damage or something, I could accept that her disdain was because the men in the video violated some rule. Absent that, I'm left to think she was upset simply because she didn't like what she saw.

No laws were broken. No one was harmed. No property was damaged or stolen. So if no rules were broken and no one got hurt, there's no reason for anyone in another state to be upset. Save your outrage for something that matters.

To be clear, if Jan simply doesn't like to see men in dresses, she has that right. But I think it would have been far easier to just scroll past the video and "snooze" the source.

Before we ran out of time, I said, "Your bigotry is showing." She denied being a bigot. I said, "Yeah, you are. You're judging them." She didn't like what she saw. And I think she was hoping I wouldn't like it, either.

If you get mad because you see somebody doing something you don't like and you can't explain what they did wrong, that's a YOU problem. Likewise, if you get mad because someone you sought agreement from doesn't react the same way you did, that's also a YOU problem.

People don't need your approval to do things you don't like. I don't like piercings on certain parts of the body, but I don't go around telling people who have them that they're wrong. I don't like hip-hop, but you'll never see me at the radio station, telling the deejay not to play that.

If it's not illegal and it's not causing harm, why get upset?