Racist comments at new job--WWYD?

[Lakshmibai]

I have just started a new job. This week I was in my office which adjoins the main open-plan office. I overheard a group conversation which went like this:

'My aunty puts stuff in her bins and Indians come and take it'
'Indians always come and do that.'
'You leave something outside and its gone in an hour.'
'One of them offered her 20 quid for it but she said she'd rather pay 20 quid to take it to the tip'
(general agreement ensued)
'hahahah Indians, they even come over from xxx nearby town just to see what they can get from bins'
'Pakistanis do it too'

All said in a mocking way.

I didn't run out there and say anything to them. Now I feel bad and unsure what, if anything I should do. What they were saying was really derogatory. But if I bring it up, things will not go well for me in that job, especially since I'm new. I don't want to let it slide either though. The team is very small and it will be obvious who flagged it, if I do. If I'd been in the room I would have had to speak up but I was just overhearing and it will be my word against theirs.

It's not too late to flag it up to management as it just happened on Friday.

WWYD? AIBU to say nothing? Or to say something?

Hi OP. I'm also of Indian heritage and I find that being an Asian woman, I have to be a ultra 'bolshy' version of myself at work to prevent incidences of casual racism like this being passed as banter. For example in your case, I would have said loudly that at least they know how to recycle or something of that nature. I've found that men with the exact same ethnicity as me don't experience the same level of casual racism at work even if they were the quietest person in the office 🤷‍♀️.

@Livelovebehappy they definitely would, I’ve seen people do it. There are a lot of very thick people in the world, who will say non-specific anti-black things (all black people are criminals, or whatever) to a black person and be surprised when they take it personally.

And plenty of others who aren’t bothered about offending non-white people, because who cares what they think?

I know you're very new in your job, I feel they deliberately made those comments to make you feel uncomfortable. They obviously haven't actually met Indian/Pakistani people then have they? We come from hardworking communities, pushed by our families to study and have great careers, why would we be attracted to rifling through bins.

[quote Xenia]Sounds like it is theft www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-13037808[/quote]
This is what you’ve taken from this post?

@isadoradancing123

Yes i would rather pay £20 to have it taken away than have someone go through my bins

Did you deliberately ignore the racism or just not mention that it clearly seems fine to you?

Sounds like they do perhaps have prejudices, but I'd be doubly sure they're not just describing the situation factually before you complain. I worked near a charity shop before and it was almost always Romanians that would rifle through the discarded stock.

I wouldn't say anything
Jobs are hard to find where I am, I'd been trying for years before landing one 3 weeks ago so I wouldn't rock the boat and risk losing it.
Morals and ethics don't pay my bills or feed us

On a slightly different but related note, I often wonder where the line between predjudice and preference lies. It's obviously prejudiced to dislike a race simply for being that race, but then part of me also speculates that one shouldn't necessarily be obliged to like or approve of all cultures. There are definitely some very different cultures out there and some are quite openly misogynistic, however it's usually seen as bigoted to say you don't like Islamic culture, for instance, even if your reason was that 50% of Muslims think homosexuals should be imprisoned and many support Sharia law.

@ForrestTrump

On a slightly different but related note, I often wonder where the line between predjudice and preference lies. It's obviously prejudiced to dislike a race simply for being that race, but then part of me also speculates that one shouldn't necessarily be obliged to like or approve of all cultures. There are definitely some very different cultures out there and some are quite openly misogynistic, however it's usually seen as bigoted to say you don't like Islamic culture, for instance, even if your reason was that 50% of Muslims think homosexuals should be imprisoned and many support Sharia law.

I fail to see any relation this has to a brown woman being forced to hear racist dialogue in the workplace. But on your point, more than 50% of Christians believe homosexuality is a sin yet you never hear mainstream people proclaiming dislike of "Christian Culture". Many people around the world are Muslims of different denominations with different beliefs so there is no singular "Islamic Culture"

Ignore Xenia they say anything for a rise. Will bring up the fact they went back to work 2 weeks after having a baby in a minute.

The awfulness of what happened aside, how much do you need the job?

What a tricky position for you. I favour the manager route. You should be able to keep your annonimity.

Confronting them may result in making you an outsider. They aren't going to change their views but they need to know that it's unacceptable to air them at work. Frankly, it puts the workplace into disrepute. I agree with the poster that said this is becoming more acceptable but if we say nothing, it will get worse.

Xenia, you make me so sad. Increasingly so over the years.

I just made a quote about something relevant - that you may not steal from rubbish. I thought that was quite interesting. Not every point has to be entirely the same as the one before that. On the Indians point where I live (I think the most Hindu borough in London) Indians tend to be better off than others as they work hard, do well at school, their marriages tend not to break up and they buy property when they can so if anyone were getting free food from bins it would be more likely to be white Freegans (I think they are called) or tramps.

The dustman's "Right to Tot" even has gone which seems a pity to me but in the old days they were allowed to take out of the bins whatever they could find to sell. That went probably when recycling came about.

It may make someone "sad" to be told bits of law but actually it is more helpful than a heap of sympathy so people can understand what might get them into trouble and what might not.

I used to work in an office with openly racist people. I complained many times to my line manager and to their manager, nothing was ever really done.

It’s wearing being around people with such hideous opinions and it played on my mind a lot. I found one person in my team crying in the toilets once because she’d heard one particular person making fun of people with mental illnesses (she suffered a lot from depression and felt he was making fun of her personally).

It’s just shit. Definitely complain, hopefully your company will be better than mine was.

'It may make someone "sad" to be told bits of law but actually it is more helpful than a heap of sympathy so people can understand what might get them into trouble and what might not.'

It's not the being told about the law that makes me sad. Just to be clearer.

@ForrestTrump

Sounds like they do perhaps have prejudices, but I'd be doubly sure they're not just describing the situation factually before you complain. I worked near a charity shop before and it was almost always Romanians that would rifle through the discarded stock.

They are not describing the situation factually. They are ascribing a behaviour to a whole ethnic group, when it is not a behaviour that the whole group partake in.

As the behaviour is one they are also disparaging of, the conversation is racist.

@Pileoftoss

I agree, it will depend on the policies in place in this particular working environment. I'm not surprised there are workplaces that don't get this kind of thing right. If we don't speak up, it will become more commonplace, however. At the same time, I don't think the OP should make her working life awful. You want to stay in the post and it's better for the workplace that someone dilutes these racists.

Are you in a union OP? If not, I think you should join asap and talk to your rep about this.

Thanks everyone. Sadly I do really need the job because I have been out of work over lockdown. I will see how it goes but definitely speak up if I hear anything again. Bit nervous about monday now.

That must have been awful to hear. I sat across from a woman in a previous job, I'd been there three years and we'd grown to be pretty close. We had good natured debates and we'd shared very private details of our lives, comfortable that the other wouldn't repeat them.

One day she was telling me about her weekend and then she made a horrifically racist remark, casually and off the cuff. I was so shocked I couldn't even reply.

I didn't do anything. I wish I'd said something at the time but I was honestly so shocked, I kind of wondered if I'd misheard. I know rationally that I didn't mishear, but you never expect that sort of racism in an open plan office and it's delicate to navigate at work.

It may well be indians or pakastani or romanians or whoever, it may be white english people going through bins, what is wrong with saying who it is and what they are doing

In case you genuinely don't know the answer to this question, if a white person was doing it no one would have mentioned their ethinicity. Yet apparently if someone of a different race is doing it it's fine to characterise them purely in terms of their race, and make generalised comments about the entire race based on that person's actions and then go on to make derogatory comments about people of that race. This isn't OK. It's racist.

* In case you genuinely don't know the answer to this question, if a white person was doing it no one would have mentioned their ethnicity.*

Oh yes this is definitely true. I’m half Czech but because I’m white I don’t have to listen to assumptions being made about me because of my nationality.

I’m really sorry, OP, that really was vile behaviour and yes, definitely racist.

Report OP. Racism has no place in this world and people should be pulled up on it.

No if it was a white person they woould have been accused of being Easter Europeans, or druggies or travellers. Because it is happens round my way and the ethnicity is mentioned.