Would you report offensive message in a group work chat?

Yes so, I agree with the second paragraph. If it’s stopping someone from doing their work then fair enough. It needs to be sorted.

But I just had images of HR calling someone in the office to tell them they HAVE to say good morning to xxx because otherwise it’s bullying.

I completely agree. People are literally calling out for people to receive consequences for expressing views they don’t like, or making jokes THEY deem offensive, but it won’t be long before those individuals express an opinion themselves that offends someone else and then they are on the receiving end of the same fucking bollocks.

What if OP text the person back and said “I don’t like that, I think you are racist”

The person she says it too is offended by being called a racist but rather than explaining their stance to OP, they go to HR and the OP gets investigated and disciplined because it turns out that actually, the meme wasn’t racist…

This has to work both ways to work at all.

People have the right not to be friends with work colleagues. They have the right not to like their work colleagues. They don't have the right to exclude collagues they don't like in such a way as to make their working life unbearable.

If their behaviour means that they are ignoring them if the colleague speaks to them, that they are not passing on information necessary for them to do their job and if they are encouraging others to exclude them, this would be considered to be bullying and harassment in most work places.

Ok, so individual(s) in HR get to decide what they class as offensive or not? What about their individual views? Do they receive training on ‘things that are classed as offensive’ ? If so, who writes the training material?
Do you not see the problem with this??

Well it doesn't really matter does it? If HR don't think that it's racist or anything to worry about then nothing will happen.

Regardless, OP should report it if she thinks it is racist and offensive.

Exactly when the road is built don’t be surprised when it’s used. And it won’t just be used by who you currently favour.

No, you completely misunderstand me.
If a bunch of people were freezing someone out in the workplace I would think they’re a bunch of immature pricks. I hate seeing people being singled out… BUT, those people should still have the right to not speak to someone they don’t want to speak to.
It’s like the old adage “I might not agree with what you’re saying but I will defend to the death your right to say it”
You just cannot go around trying to control people’s speech and behaviour (outside of the realms of which causes actual harm, of course) because it’s ‘offensive’

But WE DONT KNOW what the meme even was… just that the OP found it offensive.

Do you not see the problem with people ‘taking action’ because they’re offended by something? Who gets to decide what is offensive? It’s completely subjective - I may find something offensive that is water off a duck’s back to you or vice versa.
By all means tell someone to stop being a prick if they’re being one, reply to the text and express your view but actually reporting it to HR is completely unnecessary IMO.

It’s like that guy who got an actual prison sentence for posting something on Facebook. Did I agree with what he said?? Of course I fucking didn’t, in my opinion the guy was a complete moron. Do I think he should have gone to prison for saying it? Absolutely fucking not.

A 'grass'? 😂

FFS are you 10?

i would in an office. Especially as a young woman sharing with a man who thinks it's appropriate to make sure it's in my eyeline.

As a manager I'd be Having Words about workplace harassment with him and anyone else egging him on,

Rubbish. 'The harasser'? She doesn't even know him.
Calling out an inappropriate and offensive post and asking that it be removed is exactly what should be done first. It also gives the OP an idea of 'who' else is in that group by their responses and whether she should even bother being part of it.
Depending on the response, HR may very well be the next step. But straight to HR, no. Yes to a screenshot though

@CJsGoldfish Nope. It is not OPs job to investigate, call people out, or figure out 'who else is in the group'. This is an HR matter.

I very much doubt that any business would support this. The procedure will be to report misconduct, not to confront colleagues yourself.

Certainly you don’t need to reply to them all, but it seems ungrateful to me to start a thread and then not even bother to read all the responses you get.

Taking piss out of terrorist group is not islamophobic automatically though... That would make hella lot of muslims around me islamophobic.

Just to add. That applies if ut was only taking piss out of Hezbollah not muslims in general. Adding just in case for clarity

Yeah fair enough op. I don’t think you have to reply to all, with some of the stuff being thrown about it would have been nice to have some clarification as to what the
meme was.

So why start the thread?

Where did op say it was Islamophobic?

Edit: my mistake, I looked back and Op said it’s an Islamophobia post about pagers in Lebanon.

Ok so it was Islamaphobic. In that case you should go to HR. If it was just rude about an individual staff member in a generic way then I'd just confront the person. But if it's blatant racism etc then it's too serious not to go further up. Especially as you say you've no working relationship with the Islamaphobe personally. It's shocking that someone thinks sharing this is OK. I'd imagine they'd be disciplined at the very least. But screenshot the message and send to HR.

The only time I would find it normal if it was something illegal and police was going through the phones.
There was a case I read about where someone shared child porn on a parent whatsapp (to warn people about it, not to share actual porn for the fun) and someone reported it, and police later on confiscated all the phones and the trail where the clip came from etc etc.

Id never hand over my private phone to a busybody HR wanting to go through my private messages on my phone because we gossiped or someone shared a meme.

Agree,especially re Some people were sacked/ demoted based on what was found (in both the chat reported and others)
So they went through their entire phone, searching?
Were the 'other' things also work chats or just things the hr rep found they didn't like?

Interesting, it seems like a massive overstepping and abuse of power on the part of the employer.

Is the investigation carried out by a proper forensic team (if that's the right word!) And not just Becky from HR unless she's had specific, intensive training.

Personal. They were told they didn’t have to hand them over but would be taken to disciplinary over it.

But who decides if what's been said is discriminatory or not?
Look at this thread, pile on of posters agreeing with op that what was posted IS discriminatory, and they don't even know what it is!

Was it on personal or work phones?