(no subject)
At the sensitivity training where they made us all say what about us was "different" in the "probably hard to work with unless you are comfortable with this difference" sense that we'll be encountering so frequently with the people we serve, almost everybody in the room said something like "I love music" or "I have great kids" or -- I'm not kidding -- "I'm proud to be me", which struck me as an impressive defensive reticence in people who were, oh, you know, recent immigrants from Nigeria, or stone deaf, or illiterate and just out of high school, or obviously furious at the world.
I took a look at my trainer's nose-ring and chin hairs and large weight, I listened a little to the language she used, and I took a calculated risk:
"What's different about me is that I live in a community where everybody who isn't gay, lesbian, queer, asexual or transgender is really, really used to being surrounded by people who are. When I go to work at places where standard gender roles are expected, where there are specific ways that people of different genders are supposed to relate, I get really uncomfortable, I get really worried that I'm not going to know how to talk or dress or move around; I don't think I'm going to get along with anybody. It usually turns out to be fine, but, oh man, I go in pretty bristly."
This was almost the truth, it was part of the truth, it was close enough to the meaning of the actual truth that I felt a whole lot better about going to work when one of the workers from my site came up afterward and was like "you and everybody are just going to love each other."
What it also was, though, was a code word. It meant "I belong to this organization's management class."
***
Oh, I should mention: this post was originally an email response to glowing_fish's email about feeling the need to prove membership in a club in order to get employment in order to have membership in a club. Thank you, MNH, for getting me into a topic and voice I enjoy enough to disseminate.
I took a look at my trainer's nose-ring and chin hairs and large weight, I listened a little to the language she used, and I took a calculated risk:
"What's different about me is that I live in a community where everybody who isn't gay, lesbian, queer, asexual or transgender is really, really used to being surrounded by people who are. When I go to work at places where standard gender roles are expected, where there are specific ways that people of different genders are supposed to relate, I get really uncomfortable, I get really worried that I'm not going to know how to talk or dress or move around; I don't think I'm going to get along with anybody. It usually turns out to be fine, but, oh man, I go in pretty bristly."
This was almost the truth, it was part of the truth, it was close enough to the meaning of the actual truth that I felt a whole lot better about going to work when one of the workers from my site came up afterward and was like "you and everybody are just going to love each other."
What it also was, though, was a code word. It meant "I belong to this organization's management class."
***
Oh, I should mention: this post was originally an email response to glowing_fish's email about feeling the need to prove membership in a club in order to get employment in order to have membership in a club. Thank you, MNH, for getting me into a topic and voice I enjoy enough to disseminate.