Joke at my expense at networking event

[Reubensway]

I am self employed and attend various business/network events, this morning I went to one I hadn’t attended before but had heard positive things about.

There was about 25/30 people there, and it is essentially ‘chaired’ by one man. After I have my presentation about my business, he made a comment about where I am from (Liverpool). He said that anyone with their purses or wallets in front of them on the table should hide them immediately, to some muffled laughter from a few others.

Am I being unreasonable to expect professional standards as opposed to stereotypical jokes? I won’t return to this particular meeting.

No. It's not acceptable just because you and a pal think so and claim to have been round the block a bit.

This wasn't banter between friends. It was a professional setting where the OP was presenting her business.
Undermining her presentation by suggesting she's a thief is sheer nasty moronic behaviour.

Annoys me that we still have to put up with this shit in 2026.
Fellow scouser here. I've never stolen so much as a pick n' mix sweet - unless you count accidentally walking out with a fancy Tesco shopping bag that I'd packed but not scanned.
Nobody wants to believe it. It seems some cities/counties are STILL fair game. Brummies are called dozy, Essex folk are called thick and brash.

It is not ok. I know being from Liverpool is hardly a protected characteristic, but he needs to be challenged for singling you out and creating a negative impression of you, undermining you professionally, just because of your place of birth or accent.
He's giving small-dick energy.

My apologies

You didn't say you disagreed with it either.

I have called this type of stereotyping out and will do so in the future.

I'm sure Liverpool won't miss you.

Apology accepted

I'm sorry he made you feel bad. 💐
Have to say though, the scouser as thief joke is something of an antique these days, tired and lazy, and it wasn't very funny to begin with. So he probably made a show of himself telling it, and looked like the sad loser he probably is.

Because the presenter thought it was funny and that OP could take a joke. A sterile workplace sounds a hellish environment. She could easily have just said "everyone thinks they're the first, yeah I know, I had your hub caps away in the tea break" and everyone would be on board that it is actually a pretty crap and lazy joke.

Probably not. I loved the people. Its a minor criticism.

Or he could just have shut his mouth and listened to the presentation and commented on that. That's a novel idea in 2026.

He could have. But he's guilty of a lame joke, not some great offense to OP and Liverpool. And who said 2026 has to be all straight laced and sterile?

Well, he's revealed more about him than you OP - and not in a good way.

This "joke" is used to demean, exclude, or make people feel uncomfortable. It is never funny. Course trainers and meetings chairs should know better.

Mutual teasing between peers of equal stature might be okay if you know the person well enough. The conversation might not be okay for a third party.

I work for a large Civil Service Organisation based in Liverpool - we had an All Staff Event and one of the Exec Directors made a similar "joke" about anyone who had driven to the venue better have alternative transport to get home because the wheels of their cars would probably not be there at the end of the day. You can imagine how that went down !

As a fellow Scouser I would have called him out there and then and enjoyed his discomfort.

Once stayed at a hotel where one man remarked on "northern lack of sophistication". That night he and his friend came in drunk and woke everyone up. As he entered the dining room next morning I called across to tell them that their performance last night was an example of southern sophistication we could do without. There was a round of applause from other guests.

I can be a bitch.

Jokes are meant to be funny.

A workplace without stupid, lazy, stereotypical comments is not “sterile”. It is professional.

Would you really.

Extremely unprofessional and I’d be considering a strongly worded email actually by way of complaint. I’m not surprised that you won’t be attending another such meeting and I hope you tell the organisers exactly why you won’t be!

@Everanewbie if @Reubenswayhad just finished her set at the Comedy Club then the (tired old) joke might be fine but she has just given a presentation about her business in a professional setting. It’s not workplace banter among people who know each other well. It’s got nothing to do with Liverpool or Liverpudlian sensibilities and everything to do with trivialising and dismissing OP.

Not funny and not professional. If you can leave a negative review somewhere then do so.

Extremely unprofessional and humiliating. I hope you told him so.

Ahh I clicked on you are being unreasonable by mistake. You are 100% NOT being unreasonable! Completely unacceptable

I was in Liverpool last weekend and have never felt so "foreign" in my life. It's not that people were unfriendly exactly (except the drunk ones brawling on the Mersey Ferry, I didn't warm to them) I just felt different, and like everyone knew I was different, in a way I haven't in foreign cities.

I am from the Westcountry and get all the combine harvester jokes, inbred, drunk on cider, Wurzel, practically Welsh, and even a dirty northerner from those down in Cornwall. Its just lazy banter. It doesn't hurt or undermine me. A quick sarcastic "never heard that one before" shuts it down pretty quickly. And if I want to engage I can hit back with something about where they are from.

Fellow scouser here. It gets so tiresome hearing the same punchlines over and over again. I have been known in the past to act completely ditsy when someone’s cracked a similar joke and said “oh why, I don’t get it”.

He's not a professional but he's very insecure that he has to use cheap worn out jibes. I would have thought everyone was embarrassed for him.