Redundancy announcement - furious with manager and colleague

[Robin85]

I was told my job is being put at risk yesterday, along with almost 85% of those in my department (100+ people). A lot of us have been there 15-20+ years so there was a lot of emotion and anxiety about the future.

Today’s my non working day so I’m trying to take stock of things, and I can’t help but still feel angry about something a much younger colleague said. He is in his first role out of college and only been here about 1.5 years, so I don’t think the impact on him is quite the same (also lives at home).

About 10 minutes after we left the room where the announcement was made, he said in earshot of about 5/6 of us female colleagues, that at least we will all be alright. He was asked what he meant and said well it’s not like the men can go on onlyfans. One of my colleagues relayed the comments to our manager and he just laughed and said he was just trying to lighten the mood.

I think I’m more annoyed with how my manager replied but appreciate I am still emotional due to the announcement. Do you think that comment should be reported to HR or should I just forget it?

How would I know? I don't know this person.
I can only judge him from what OP has shared. This is someone reacting to some devastating news with some silly joke, not someone who has persistently shown abusive sexist behaviour.
We all have put our foot in it at some point. We all make mistakes.
Cut the guy some slack.

I find looking blankly, blinking a few times, then saying "im sorry I dont know what you mean" or in this case "sorry, it sounds like youre suggesting we go on OnlyFans to make money. Is that correct?"

Highlight their sexist bullshit calmly and matter of fact. Every single time.

Don't report it to HR. It was a crass and thoughtless comment especially for people really worried about getting a new job and the financial implications and uncertainty.

It should have been addressed by the manager. The laws relating to SH now pose a preventative duty on employers, so any manager who thinks it's up to them to decide comments that even stray in that direction can be dismissed as 'just a joke' is frankly a liability to the company and needs a training course.
And it might be 'funny' from a young lad. Not so funny when young lad becomes an older man with authority over female colleagues and says this sort of thing to young women, is it? This sort of comment regardless or age or circumstances needs zero tolerance and nipping in the bud.
That said OP, that's your managers failing and not something you can really address on your own unless you feel strongly enough to complain.

Unfortunately it's seen as a legit source of work for women regardless if they want to or not.

I don't know if I would bother.

He is 100% on the chopping block having only been there 1.5 years, and will get very little if anything in terms of payout - so he was probably feeling pretty shitty too and made a bad joke.

IMO you are in a much better position than him right now, so I don't think its fair to say it will have little impact on him.

The job market is very tough right now - you have 20 years experience + will get a very nice redundancy package (if you are indeed made redundant).

As others have said you're misdirecting your anger, understandably as there isn't really a correct place to direct it.

And yes...
cold comfort but hes likely top of the list and redundancy will be notice period only so nice and cheap to fire.

I'm sure there's a fine market online for male-only sexual content. The buyers would of course be 99.9% men, as for any form of prostitution or 'sex work', but there are plenty of gay men out there.

If you remind men of this, they tend to protest that they are not gay. As if women selling sexual content are attracted to the disgusting men who pay for it.

Yes, he is a misogynist and under normal circumstances he should absolutely be made aware that his comment was unacceptable. But I understand that at the moment you have bigger fish to fry with your own job under threat.

never heard of "OnlyFans" until this thread, so that comment would have washed over me

@BoringBarbie but you are saying those comments about yourself. This lad said it about women. he didn't say he or other men in the building would have to become rent boys. This is the issue he is directing this sexist comment at women, and so many women accept it. As I said earlier I bet no-one suggested sex working as an alternative job to the male colleagues.

From the sounds of it, it was a stressful situation, the room was probably very tense, and he said the first thing that came into his head to try and lighten the mood after a really horrid announcement.

Was it ideal? No. Is it worth making a huge song and dance about? Absolutely not.

Unless this lad has form for making inappropriate comments, just let it be.

it was an bad taste joke, made in a stressful situation. He’s young and maybe naive, and also facing redundancy. Your post reads as if you are more important than him as he’s been there for less time.

And he’d have probably chuckled

Obviously without being there, it sounds to me like it was in ill thought out joke to try and lighten the mood.

One of my ex-colleagues used to jokingly say that as a young, white man he was in one of the most discriminated against categories and I can see where he's coming from. With a lot of employers looking to recruit diversely, he wouldn't win many points.

He sounds extremely thick.

The faux naivety on this place never fails to make me laugh 😂

Not at all - very intelligent actually. A bit controversial in his opinions, obviously, but I can see how he might feel like that. Realistically he's more likely just experiencing fair treatment, rather than others being discriminated against, so it feels like a disadvantage.

I recently had a National Statistics form come in, which questioned specifically our recruitment process and how much I take ethnicity, gender, religion, sexuality, etc, into account. It was very much written as if it was expected to form a significant part of the recruitment process to ensure that my workplace is "diverse".

I can assure you that my workplace is as diverse as they come (11 people and 7 different nationalities!), but every member of staff has been recruited based on the ability to do their job, not for some tickbox exercise to meet diversity targets.

I get those forms too and they are pretty benign and just read like they want to know if the employer records certain information and if so, takes positive action (not positive discrimination) if it has been identified they could do (via statistics etc) so 2 equally qualified/experienced candidates with one from an underrepresented group, the underrepresented PC holder would be selected, or if you have a tie break process etc.

He still sounds thick for that comment 😂 he is in no way shape or form the most discriminated against.

I'm so shocked at those that think this is ok. If this was a women saying something about a man. He would of gone straight to HR.

Disgusting behaviour. Just because they are women.

I don't know who you are but I just wanted to say I'm sorry to hear that your job and the jobs of your colleagues are in danger. To answer your question, yes I would speak to HR. It was a totally inappropriate comment for your colleague to make even if he is very young and still living at home with his parents. 215 of my colleagues have also been told they are facing redundancy this week. They deserve support and respect not people making those sorts of comments even if it was a comment made in jest. HR should know about it and be having a little word with the person who made the comment. It was a tone deaf and completely inappropriate thing for him to say.

If he was making jokes about only fans I doubt he would be that offended if he was the butt of one of these jokes enough to even think about HR

Not to worry, he's the one that it'll be cheap for them to get rid of.

I am so sorry about your situation. I have been an HR executive for many years and would be happy to answer any questions you have.

What a c*ck. That would have really annoyed me too and the manager sounds equally as sexist. Unfortunately it may not be the right time to be rocking the boat as it were (although it’s not fair that you cannot call out this type of behaviour at any point). If you hear something like that again I’d give either of them the reply that’s it’s totally inappropriate.

I can't believe how many people would just let this go. It's absolutely inappropriate and sexist. What a horrible work culture many people are in if this kind of comment is accepted by so many