fighting daily battle against ignorance &...

[kwebb]

...this time it's gotten broken down to colors. Thats right , som'n as trivial as "male vs. female" colors.

Part of our uniform at work consists of a soft blue shirt. I had a guy come up to me today and ask when the company was going to stop giving it's male employee's such a feminine looking colored shirt.

I know, My gawd. Since when is baby blue considered femme anything anyway. In society, isn't that supposed to be the male color. At least it is today, and from what I understand back in the early 1900's it was flipped. So its all culture. But this is not the 1st time another male has said something similar to this to me.

Anyway, I stood my ground and turned the tables on the dude.

"Really, well, personally I'm waiting on my pink one right now", I respond. He starts trying to laugh at me. But I ain't laughing.

"Or maybe a soft lavender/lilac color, those are my faves you know", I continued to let him have it.

By this time a female co-worker overheard the hysteria and I judging from her track record with certain male/female appropriateness (she'll usually weigh in on what men are not supposed to wear, and will actually let the old scripture from Deuteronomy fly off at times), I thought she would be coming to his rescue somehow, but that isn't exactly how it went down.

I continued my barrage and tried to corner him ( which you have to understand suprised the hell outta me).

"What they need to give the men is a black t-shirt, now that's masculine, I like my tees to hang long too", he chided.

"Oh really, no we don't want it to hang too long offa you or people might, God forbid, think you had on a skirt" ,I confidently flaunted in his face.

He gets all flustered, starts looking around, and then says , "now you know that is not of God". I come back with "Oh really , what do you think Jesus had on then?".

Then she jumps in with the deut. scripture and starts talking about something outta the bible about God telling some man to make some linen trousers out of sacks or something that went right over my head.

Again I say, my gawd, how much longer can I work with these people!! And then it finally dawned on me I was fighting the losing battle. There are always gonna be people like this, and for some reason I seem to be doomed to always encountering them. Its always like some mysterious force is bringing 'em into my path, my world.

He finally said, I had gotten him to kinda see the light and he will come over to my 'side' of the coin. So I guess I was kinda proud about the way I hung in there and did not allow myself to be intimidated. Little things sometimes, simple things.

The argument really does not hold water and apparently I am gettting strong enough to point that out to people. Self-acceptance could be near?

It was an interesting exchange, there was no fear in me.
But could there be some fear in him, fear of being labeled anything as less than masculine.
I felt like I turned a corner, no matter how small it may seem.

Thanks for bearing with me thru the story.

[tekla west]

You can have all the self acceptence you want as soon as you want to give it to yourself

[tekla west]

Anyone who used Deuteronomy better be holding true to all of it or none of it. I would remind her that Christianity is a religion where one belives all or nothing, not a cafeteria where one gets to pick and choose. Since she is wearing clothing of mixed fiber (I'm sure) then she should be stoned to death. I'm sure she will see the light and even go pile up the rocks.

I always avoid the bible argument by saying "That may be in bible-land, but here in the Good Old USA we are secular society and government, you aren't being some sort of anti-American Taliban type are you?"

[Marla S]

Wonderful story. Thanks for sharing.
I think you performed quite well :thumbsup:


It was an interesting exchange, there was no fear in me.
But could there be some fear in him, fear of being labeled anything as less than masculine.
I felt like I turned a corner, no matter how small it may seem.

You are probably right. If he isn't completaly dumb and thinks in stereotypes only, he might fear more than hell the question: Are you gay ? :eek: :D

[kwebb]

Not really trying to go too far down the biblically-speaking road, since I don't want the post to lock up, and besides, we have all been there done that and could do it all day long, but it does not add up any shape form fashion.

If they come at me again I'll start quoting some of my own scripture , like Jesus and the eununchs, Gosp. of John-stop judging by mere appearance, Samuel-God looks on the inner, man the outer, etc.

I'm ready for 'em.

Its this cultural thing that used to (big time) and still somewhat gets me bogged down. My next quip was gonna be to the guy "show me somewhere in the bible where it says man is not supposed to wear a certain color and maybe I'll listen to ya".

Half the folks saying this kind of stuff has not even delved into the biblical issues surrounding it, they are just repeating what some preacher has told them. And I work with church folk daily, but suprisingly I am developing a rather tolerant attitude of their beliefs on certain things, and it's in a word......................................ignoranc e.

Joseph Campbell once said everythign you could do is evil to someone somewhere.