AIBU to think people are jealous?

[cherrypieandcheese]

NC for this one!

I work very hard running an online business that has helped a lot of people and gained a lot of traction. I tend to keep it very quiet. I take a very small salary thats not enough to pay bills and I hope one day in the future I can go full time. In the mean time I work part time. I scrape by every month. I try and not tell everyone what I do on the side because I'm a little embarrassed and I find people at my work are put off. If they ask me if I have another job and I tell them briefly about my side hustle, the conversation goes dead, so I change the topic.

Everyone at work seems really friendly and I think people like me. I still feel new, been there just over a year, but get along with everyone. Yet I am still not invited to parties. There are group chats I am not apart of, but people who have started working there in the past three months have been welcomed into. I am the only one. I held my own party and no-one from work came, despite all being invited. Others from outside work came so it wasn't a flop. I am the same age and have a lot on common with these people.

We have all just been put on unpaid leave. Three of my colleagues have posted on Facebook tagging every singe colleague at my workplace on how sad they are that they are no longer working together, except me. Again. Theres no-one I am close enough to ask about it without being worried everyone will find out my concern.

Everything went well in the first two months and only happened when people found out about my side hustle. I don't know if people feel as if we're too different because of my side hustle? I have opened up to a friend who has told me I should be so proud of how many people I have helped, but I am not. I am embarrassed. I feel the side hustle makes people feel as if they have nothing in common with me.

I have received a couple of sly comments about it from people at work. Someone suggesting I am going to leave as soon as my side hustle takes off, so i'm not really loyal to the company, another saying I must not have time for friends and family because I work so hard juggling two jobs and dont have the right priorities Just comments I can ignore in the moment but felt really off. This has happened from 5-6 people.

I really don't think there is anything wrong with my personality. I get involved, I am friendly and outgoing. My friend said my colleagues are jealous. Could this be true? There is nothing to be jealous of because what I do is very lonely, hard work, and I have thought about giving in a million times. Or is there likely another problem with me?

I have never had any problems in any other work place. This is the only job I have had since starting my side hustle and the only one I have trouble integrating. If anyone could shed some light it would be appreciated, thank you.

OP sounds like in-group behaviour where someone gets to be the outcast or scapegoat.

This behaviour can repeat in a given group (rather than a team). Watch,wait & listen, you may find this group struggles to function what with the shutdown or alternatively implodes

If you wanted to test, Maybe mention you might have some part-time work and see if anyone is interested, given the current state of the economy.

Is your side-project viable currently ( remote / virtual)

What a nasty bullying thread this is!

The OP clearly doesn't want to say what her project is. What does it matter that she's called it a side hustle? Why so much venom towards her?

As for the question OP asked, it sounds like you may have voluntarily excluded yourself for some reason. Difficult to say without knowing the full facts. Is your side job some kind of sex work - this could explain it? They sound like an unpleasant bunch to work with (much like most of the posters on this thread)! Can you find another part time job to get you through until your own work can support you full time?

I think they might think you're taking advantage of vulnerable people and profiting off them.

I'd not be too keen on someone if I thought that was their game.

A possible similar situation within my team where I worked with someone else (and I’m not saying this is you as I have no idea), she became so focused on what she was doing elsewhere talked about it all the time boasted about how brilliant she was but was really really bad at her job and incredibly negative. She came across as very self centered.

She literally had no self awareness about how she was perceived, so much so she was shocked when she got dismissed.

Now I am not saying this is you at all as this is quite extreme, but maybe ask yourself, do I talk about this side project too much, would what I am saying alienate people, am I focused and passionate about my job (the full time job) do I positively engage with work colleagues.

The answers to the above might give a clue as to why they may not like you. If you care enough maybe ask someone you are closest to there about it. If you don’t care don’t worry about it. It is within your power to change the situation if you wanted to.

@cherrypieandcheese

@DailyKegelReminder yes they are sarky. And the project has gained media attention and floods of compliments on Facebook from friends which I find really embarrassing. No comments from anyone at work but I don't expect that

Maybe people think you are virtue signalling ?

Yes the fact you use " side hustle" is a very derogatory phrase to use .

What does it matter that she's called it a side hustle? Why so much venom towards her?

All we have to interpret the situation is OPs own story and the language she has chosen to tell it in.

She’s literally asked if we agree that her colleagues are jealous and we’ve responded with ‘actually, the words you use are off-putting and have negative implications, so it’s probably that rather than jealousy’

Bullying or just Occam’s razor?

simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Occam%27s_razor

Any body else watch the trailer in DuLANG'S post?

Subtitles-"chuckles in Rich"- that is hilarious.

Well it could be that you just didn't fit in & it happened to manifest about the time your side line was revealed.

Or that they disagree with what you're doing or that they're all nasty & used it as an excuse.

Who knows?

As long as you've got other friends & can get along well enough at work.

I have to say my first thought was 'cam girl' but that's what 'side hustle' made me think of first.

If it was a genuine small business that you were building up why would you be embarrassed. I don't understand?

I mean lots of people have a main job and another small business as a sideline. It's not unusual so why the coyness?

Using the term side hustle is not a crime! It's just an easy way of explaining income in addition to your work surely? What is the massive problem with it?

I follow quite a few 'saving money' type bloggers on Instagram, they use it all the time. They're not MLMs.

I think its sex work of some kind.

Side hustle = MLM and I would have no interest in hearing about it.

@DuLANGDuLANGDuLANG

She’s literally asked if we agree that her colleagues are jealous and we’ve responded with ‘actually, the words you use are off-putting and have negative implications, so it’s probably that rather than jealousy’

Who’s ‘we’? Don’t speak for me. And is it also Occam’s razor to harangue OP with assumptions that she’s a prostitute servicing old men and disabled people, as people have done upthread? Is that the ‘we’ you are including yourself in?

Oh Jesus who gives a fuck about the word “side hussle”!

There is a very odd culture on MN where if an Op or there DC is being bullied IRL posters pile in and continue the bullying online. I’ve seen it many times on here, “it’s your fault” “your the one causing this” and then the insults start. Why? What are you all getting out of this by calling the op a sex worker. It’s pathetic mean girl behaviour.

Posters are only asking questions and entertaining themselves because we are all stuck inside and OP has been so weirdly secretive, leaving an information vacuum.

And stop being so judgemental about prostitutes.

I’m clearly not speaking for you, I’m arguing against you, annamie

😂😂😂

I don’t think you understand Occam’s razor, either, which is a shame because I deliberately chose to link to the ‘Simple English’ version of Wikipedia, rather than the mainstream one.

so making petty bullying jabs about “boss babes” and “huns” is just weird and makes you look jealous.

Yeah, totally jealous....

The use of the "side hustle" is really irritating. If you have been using that in real life it might have pissed people off.
You're making money out of some kind of social enterprise helping vulnerable people. Some people don't like this kind of thing as they consider it exploitative.
Some people might think you are running some kind of MLM scheme and therefore don't really want you coming on meals out etc for fear of you pushing the scheme all the time. You might not be but I've had experience of a couple of people running MLM schemes and ruining evenings out by pushing pushing pushing all the time.

I very much doubt it is jealously. The jealously line often gets trotted out when someone is feeling excluded for some reason. "They're just jealous hun xxx". There is usually some other reason behind something like this.

In any case, YABU to think it's because people are jealous but YANBU to be upset by the way they are treating you. Whatever the reason, their behaviour is not pleasant. Try to ignore it if you can and just get on with your own life. FWIW, I've often found in previous workplaces that the part-timers have a harder time fitting in and are often overlooked when planning nights out simply because they aren't there all the time.

Either they find what you’re doing distasteful, because it involves sex, or religion, or just exploiting people. Or it’s nothing to do with what you do, it’s just the way you talk about it. You’re boring, or patronising, or maybe overly perky in an irritating way.
Or maybe it’s not your fault and you just don’t fit in. Some workplaces do have a culture where anyone who is a bit different for whatever reason are shunned. If that’s the case you’ll have to either grow a thicker skin or leave, they won’t change.

Seriously @MNHQ? I ask someone not to be a twat and it gets deleted, but someone tells me to piss off and it stays? Can you please explain the difference?

You do seem a bit smug and that you think because your project on the side to help vulnerable people has been in the media and on FB people should be falling over you. You do this for money not out the goodness of your heart. They might be jealous but I think it's more likely you go on about it too much. I never comment on these type of posts on FB and would likely hide you.

This thread is activating my ‘inner Rizzo’.

This is the Internet, when OPs don’t come back the chat meanders. Not all humour is to everyone’s taste, some of us think fair work deserves fair money and ‘side hustles’ are a way of making ordinary people accept lower working standards and longer working hours whilst conning them into believing it’s their own ‘choosy-choice’.

Good luck OP! Perhaps now is the perfect time to make your ‘side hustle’ a legitimate full-time endeavour? ‘Vulnerable people’ could do with the help and your job is suspended anyway.
Leave those ‘jealous’ colleagues behind with a swish!

Tbf I doubt it’s sex work if there’s been media coverage.