Racism at work

[NCforobviousreasonsok]

I'm interested to know peoples take on this.
A colleague used an offensive word (go it letter beginning with a p) to describe a type of place. They seem somewhat remorseful but it's still wrong.

It's being dealt with formally, but I want to know how you would expect this to be dealt with at your workplace? It's upset a few people and rightly so - I'm just debating if it's a sackable offence or warning and if so, how severe?

I thought I'd update to say it ended as a final written warning. I'm hoping I made the right decision as usual got opinions from people one real life and some thought it a first warning. Others were disappointed it wasn't a sacking.

I guess you can't please everyone but after advice from HR this was the most extreme outcome they advised.

I hope I made the right decision as I don't want existing staff to think we were not harsh enough. Only time will tell.

Yes, absolutely this. It was still used often in the 90s where I’m from, all this “I haven’t heard this word since my grandad died in 1975” is sheer nonsense.

Prince Harry used it in 2009!

You shouldn’t be relying on strangers on Mumsnet to give you professional advice.

lols- I can assure you any non yt staff won’t be surprised at this outcome 🙄.

It isn't the scenario that determines whether it is a final warning, it can only be a final warning if someone already has one or more warnings in place. First warnings are not final warnings

I'm sure your staff will be fine with being made to work with a racist. 🙄

Do bare in mind that you have now set the tone for what will be tolerated in your workplace. You will have to exercise the same leniency towards homophobia, sexism, ableism etc.

Tell me you didn't read all the OP's posts without telling me you didn't read all the OP's posts.

I hope you apologize to the OP when you read how "off" you are, in so many ways.

How do some people ever cope with day to day life? face palm

That was the first time I ever even heard the term, and I only figured out it was offensive because of the backlash he got for it, years later when it got published.

(From a small town on the other side of the pond).

Edited to add: I think a written warning with stiff consequences (canned) for any further infraction sounded right. If you can add this: Have it in their file for 24 months and make them take training on respect of others in (and out of) the workplace?

It was going to be a tough call, no matter what. You took everything into consideration and also listened to HR. This person should still have to take training (as I said in a pp).

Nobody is saying that the word wasn't used often in the 1990s. Or indeed in the 1970s and 1980s. We are just saying that it was considered every bit as racist then as it is now.

It is true that overt racism is considered less socially acceptable now than it was back then, but that's a different point entirely.

Children may have been ignorant if they were raised by racist parents but adults absolutely knew that the term was considered to be racist, and they used it anyway because they didn't care. And of course, Harry knew when he said it as well.

This would apply if they said 'Pakistani shop' or assumed that the workers were Pakistani.

Everyone knows that word is not in common usage. Even when people 'got for a Chinese' they use the word Chinese and not the offensive short form.

I want to be quite careful here and say that I completely agree that using the word was inappropriate and that my teacher was right to tell me not to use it. I'm not trying to defend its use, specifically.

But I think it's unfair to call my parents racist. They were poor, uneducated, and had a small and homogeneous social circle. They didn't read newspapers or take an interest in current events. I can fully believe that they didn't know the term was offensive. The main reason why I don't think they're racist was that the term was never used in a derogatory or malicious way. I never got the sense, at all, that they disliked Asian people, saw them in a negative way or thought they were inferior. They didn't tell racist 'jokes' or act in other ways that would suggest racist attitudes.

Of course, to an Asian person hearing that word from them none of that context would matter, which is why I agree that using it was wrong.

I think there's a difference between ignorantly using a term that others will perceive as racist, and actually 'being a racist' - the latter is a very totalising judgement. I'd say they were ignorant, yes, and not very curious about the wider world (there was a lot of 'not for the likes of us!' when I took an interest in things they weren't familiar with) and I know that's something a lot of middle-class people would look down on them for. They weren't perfect. But do I think they knew it was a racist term and used it anyway, because they were racists? Absolutely not. For one thing, they wouldn't have used it freely in front of their children if so, because they cared about looking respectable and wouldn't have wanted us to repeat it if they knew it was a 'bad word'.

We will have to agree to disagree.

I completely understand your loyalty to your parents and your wish to see them in a certain way. I have no desire to criticise them as individuals.

But I remember that word being used in my primary school in 1980 when I was 7. Even as a very young child, I knew that it was very offensive and my classmates knew it too. I simply do not accept the argument that it was considered to be an acceptable term back then. I just think that, in certain communities at that time, racism was normalised and racist language was common. To be fair, it's still like that in some communities today.

Finally, I understand your point about the difference between intention and ignorance and I don't totally disagree with it. However, casual racism can often be every bit as damaging as the malicious kind, and I don't think ignorance is really a defence.

I totally understand that feeling of loyalty to your family and knowing deep in your heart that it's meant with zero ill intent.
I have criticised my entire life certain use of very obvious racist language - no matter what age/era you are from..... but my incredibly liberal mum still refers to cigarettes as f@gs 🫣.

She loves her gay friends with all her heart - and they know it, and recognise that it's an ingrained term for her because the woman has smoked from age 11 and is still going at 70 😭.

I can't change her , no matter what I say.

This is fascinating to me, because I have never, ever associated the word fag (for cigarette) with the gay slur. I assumed (perhaps wrongly) that it was just one of those quirks of language.

And being northern, hearing people at parties ask to ‘bum a fag’ was often a thing.

Is fag for cigarette unacceptable? And has it always been (like p-word)?

I don't know anyone who thinks fag as a slang for cigarette is in any way connected to fag/faggot as a slur for a gay man.

Because it isn't.

Nothing wrong with calling a cigarette a fag, we all know that it means cigarette in the UK

Fag for cigarette predates f@ggot becoming a homophobic slur. The two words are not connected.

Does HR response to racism in the workplace depend on what previous training has been given on the subject?

For example, I work for a large corporation and have to complete a 'respect for people' training course annually. I have been in on weekends to run process trials and heard operators discussing ordering a chinese as 'ordering a ch**ky' among other language that contradicts this training.

I always wonder if senior managerment or HR overheard this language would it be instance dismissal? As they've signed off training to say they understand it's wrong and harmful?

I know my training dictates I should have reported what I heard but at the same time didn't have a complete feel for the place at the time.

So my wife, kids and I should be OK with people using homophobic slurs because they're just words and we're choosing to be offended by them?

I read them well thanks. Cringed reading them the exact same way I cringed reading your post too.

I think they have a medicine for that. Or they should, since many MNers have that ailment.