Why is my 22-year-old apprentice colleague so helpful to me when he clearly dislikes people like me?

[AmusedTaupePlayer]

Hi Mumsnet,
I’ve just started a new job and I’m a disabled, non-white queer woman. One of my colleagues—a 22-year-old male apprentice—has taken to going out of his way to help me with tasks and paperwork. On the face of it, that seems kind, but he’s also been openly very vocal about his support for Trump, Reform UK, Andrew Tate and Tristan Tate. He’s told me he “doesn’t care” about refugees, women, disabled people or queers.
I’m baffled. Why would someone who clearly holds such contemptuous views towards my identity go out of their way to support me at work? Is he genuinely separating his personal beliefs from his professional conduct? Is this a sign that he actually respects me more than I think, or is he just playing a strange game?
Has anyone else experienced this kind of behaviour? Any ideas what might be going on in his head, or how I should handle this relationship? Thanks in advance.

I think the internet has made us forget that things aren’t all or nothing, people with different views generally socialise well enough without falling into extremes.

I’m an immigrant and the amount of people that I get super along with but have an issue with immigrants… it used to really get under my skin (still does if we start debating it seriously) but as I grew older I’ve accepted I’m not going to completely see eye to eye with every single person I socialise with.

I don't know if its an age thing possibly more of a group that you associate with thing.

Many of my LGB friends have said that there are two sides to this the gays and the queers.

That aside the OP does seem quite caught up in labels, her own and the labeling of others.

My father had a Chemistry degree and would be genuinely kind and generous to anyone he met in person but then spout right wing things he read in the Daily Mail. I suspect he was neurodivergent. He struggled with nuanced or critical thinking and change. Your colleague could be similar?

How depressing that a top student at UCL follows Tate and Trump.

OP, why not ask him, in a very pleasant way. Say, 'You say you follow them, but you are always so thoughtful to me, which their views wouldn't support. Why is that?' And start a gentle respectful conversation that allows him to question his own views.

He's treating you as a colleague and with respect, which is as you should be treated by all of your colleagues.

Also this, yes. A lot of my relatives have different views to me. I just don’t get into arguing any more. I used to when younger.

I don't think '22 year old male' is considered labelling.

OP has given a description of herself. No labelling if you discount queer. Non white and disabled are factual identifiers. It is what the post is about.

I'm a middle aged old fart, so I can only assume it's 'the yoof' there's a label. I suppose it's like it's always been, the outrageously camp and those that just don't feel the need to let anybody know their sexuality regardless of what it may be.

Have I just assumed the OP is female? I can't go back and check now!

I'm tired.

I agree with this. My ex was similar. Had incredibly strong beliefs about certain types of people, and I fell into several of the categories that he seemed to have contempt for, but for some reason couldn’t see at all how it didn’t stack up.

This all over

OP I cant work out if this is a joke thread or not.

One of the issues with the modern world is that people seem to define themselves by labels, and they overshare. I couldnt care less what your identifying characteristics are and you shouldnt care what his are. You're at work, your place of work to do a job and to work with your colleagues, this is what he is doing, that is what you should be doing

And to echo other posters who have it right, not 'caring' or being bothered about different cohorts or demographics is not 'hatred' or outright hostility, its just different priorities. People in the main rub along with each other, you dont have to agree on beliefs or have the same priorities as each other.

I don’t know, I don’t care about whther someone is queer or whatever. I don’t dislike someone because of it but I also just don’t care about anyone sexual orientation, it is literally of no interest to me. I’m an ethnic minority, I don’t feel it needs to be acknowledged by anyone. A lot of people like what is perceived as a strong leader, I actually dislike trump on a personal level but I think for example dropping a bomb on fordor was a good thing. The tate brothers thing would bother me because they have literally zero redeeming qualities, I would buy him a Jordan Peterson book to stir him towards something more vaguely normal (before anyone jumps down my throat his advice to young men seems to be stop whining an take responsibility for yourself).

It depends how it’s done, does he stand around all day slagging people off and saying vile and horrible things or has he just said he’s not interested. He may enjoy making you uncomfortable if it’s the former. If it’s the later I would relax a bit.

Also men will put women in categories of fuckable and unfuckable (even the “nice” ones). When he’s talking about women he’s probably talking about the ones he wants to date, he probably feels comfortable talking about it to you because you aren’t in his potential dating pool. That’ll be the incels rotting his brain. I would just ask gentle probing questions about that, you can usually shift someone gently by helping them have some perspective. But you have to genuinely curious about another humanbeing to do that without judgement.

Support you in what way? What’s the set up generally

There’s a difference between political belief systems and interacting with individuals. You can be great friends and neighbours with everyone in your area, and still feel that migration brings issues that need consideration. You can treat women with respect and still think that men as a class face discrimination.
When political thinking overrides courtesy to individuals, that’s the problem. Too many people use politics as a stick to beat other people with.

Yes good question, I expect men at work to be polite and professional but I’m not sure I need my womanhood supported.

He doesn't mean you with his views, real life person who he likes and gets on with, it's the "others" it's always the fictitious others, same with racism, but not your neighbour, single mothers etc.

There are a few options.

1. Idealogical hatred against abstract entities that they don’t actually apply to individuals. You’re not “like that” so you’re ok.
2. He’s doing his job and doing it well by the sounds of it.
3. He’s one of those people that buys the DM bullshit , but it doesn’t transfer into action or active hatred, at least not towards individuals they meet. So they are still courteous, polite etc as they would be with anyone else.

My question is, why haven’t you shut him down/asked him to stop? The workplace is not the right environment for those kind of discussions.

Actually I think it’s the OP who is struggling with nuance and critical thinking. The OP, along with many others on this thread, seem to have very black and white, social media type thinking, rather than understanding that humans generally aren’t black and white thinkers. People have been conditioned by social media into thinking there is only one way to think on every subject, and if you question anything or you don’t toe the line with the accepted view then you’re a hater, bigot or fascist. I mean, imagine starting a thread to complain that someone is being professional and treating you decently?!?

Well you’re wrong. Queer is part of the LGBTQ community, hence the Q.

What baffles me is that he has told you all this stuff about his beliefs when you’ve just started the job. How on earth did the conversation go?

To be fair, some of the worst men I've ever dated are Guardianista self-proclaimed "feminists" and "socialists" (who got massive inheritances and rent their properties out).

Don't judge people by their political stances, judge them by their behaviour with people.

As a disabled woman myself I would be very wary of him. Why is he supporting you so much in your role?

Watch out that it doesn’t become a case of look at what I do to support poor little disabled woman who can’t do it herself because that’ll square with his views and with the general abysmal level of disability awareness in the workplace, he’ll have ample opportunity to misrepresent his support for you, and management may not get it, especially if you are new.

These things can and do happen, and can get amplified and misrepresented to employers and to the world at large and have resulted in significant court cases.

He’s lining up your post post-apprenticeship - you’re new and apparently to him easy target - female and disabled. I’ve had people say openly to me that they should be doing my job even though I’m a leader in my field. I’m not ‘worthy’ of a post that I hold down and navigate independently with all my knowledge and experience because I’m female and disabled.

Be professional, remain friendly, stay cynical, discourage conversations on non-work topics at break times or keep them to neutral topics such as the weather or a good book or TV programme, and widen your professional and friendship circle at work, including joining any protected characteristic networks if there are any.

If you have 1-1s with your manager, ensure that they are aware of all your achievements and competencies, take every opportunity to grow within your own role, and ensure that all your reasonable adjustments are properly documented.

No he doesn't. Do you really think a degree in maths means he understands himself his own reactions and emotions? These are very different types of intelligence.

I would say that if you are really genuinely interested in the dichotomy of his behaviour to you compared to the things he says about grou0d of people you identify with, , you could ask him

You are of course under no obligation to try to do that but posting on here instead of actually asking him and genuinely trying to understand something about him that puzzles you, makes it seem like all you want to do is get everyone to tell you how awful he is. Particularly when you dismiss out of hand suggestions that may actually likely to be the case.

He might be an absolutely terrible terrible person, or he might just be be a bit young and thoughtless with poor critical skills when it comes to other people and how he relates to them. The latter is in no way impossible just because he is intelligent with a degree in Maths!

Plenty of people seem happy to use the term queer about themselves and it's not anyone's jobs to police them and call them hateful for how they describe themselves.

But I will say, I've never known anyone describe themselves as "non white". That's a term exclusively used by white people IME. When trying to be PC and getting it really wrong.

It's like getting a woman to describe herself as "non man" as the Greens did so embarrassingly a few years ago.

So I can't help but wonder about a thread covering the trifecta of disability/race/sex while talking about what a nice non racist boy those right-winger are in real life 🤔

Sorry just realised I qoted someone, and didn't mean to !

Apologies

I think that configuration is not that unusual. As in ‘I hate black people but Ahmed at the local shop is great’.
But you should not have to listen to this man’s offensive comments. HR or management should take action if he won’t stop when you ask him to.