An oral history of Industrial Light & Magic:
DYKSTRA: The warehouse was probably 1,300 square feet and smelled like a gym locker. It was hotter than hell. If you lit a model with 6,000 watts, you could get to 130 degrees.
LORNE PETERSON (MODEL MAKER, MODEL SHOP SUPERVISOR): Somebody found a big water tank, and we filled it with cold water. We’d dip in during break time.
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The guy who sexually harrassed Joan on Mad Men (pardon me, ONE of the guys) proceeded to behave inappropriately while being interviewed by Buzzfeed:
Then, in the middle of the shoot — for which we asked Johansson to act out reactions to so-called dicks in the workplace — the actor made another comment, one we did capture on camera. “I’m not shy,” he said to my colleagues and me under the hot fluorescent lights inside the studio. I laughed at his improvisation, which admittedly was pretty funny. Then he said, a little too casually, “I’m sweating like a rapist,” wiping his forehead and the sides of his face, seemingly not paying attention to the camera that was recording those very words.
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This interview with Mad Men‘s Stan, however, reveals him to be the sort of lovely person one would hope.
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Rachel Kramer Bussel’s grandpa is a hero:
PTSD is not particularly associated with WWII vets, partly because the term didn’t emerge until after the war in Vietnam, and partly because we downplayed its effects. We’re “the greatest generation,” the ones that lived through the Depression and returned home as heroes. But war is war. When my father returned home with his Army unit after they defeated the Germans in World War I, veterans with psychological problems were termed “shell-shocked.” My generation’s issues, described as “battle fatigue,” were famously dismissed by Gen. George Patton. The rate of PTSD among WWII vets is difficult to ascertain, but one study put the number at 26-33 percent.
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There is nothing I enjoy more than a scathing restaurant review in the New York Times, and basically every word of this is a pure delight:
One night, the bar made me a Paloma in a pint glass, while a woman at my table got her Paloma in a much smaller glass. Everybody knows women drink less than men, so we appreciated the thoughtfulness. To avoid making her self-conscious, I suppose, the restaurant even charged us both the same amount, $13.
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My natural instinct is to ask, “What do you guys think we should do? Okay, here’s what we should do.” As I’ve gotten older, though, I’ve learned that I can be a lot more effective when I’m not the last word on everything. In your 20s, you want to get your way; in your 40s, you start to seek harmony. Kevin (McDonald) is a great guy to work with in that he is as willing or more willing to laugh at your joke than to fight for his own. He adds energy more than he takes away. And Dave (Foley) is quiet and he’ll say, “I think this is a pretty good idea,” but he won’t jump up and down about it. He is almost always right, so it’s in our best interest to pay attention. Working in a group and balancing those personalities can be tough, but it is also this amazing chemical thing where the room has a bigger spirit.
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I didn’t think it was any big achievement, but this doctor’s note says I haven’t used my muscles in so long I’m getting a trophy!
— Avery Edison (@aedison) May 19, 2015
Tags: feminism, link roundup, the internet
That restaurant review is going to carry me through today.
” I also stayed alert and sober when faced with the Tijuana Manhattan, made with tequila in the place of whiskey and served in a rocks glass with no ice at all, even though it was the temperature of a freshly killed snake.” Wow
And it’s written by the same guy who reviewed Guy Fieri’s restaurant! This man is a precious American resource. We should put him on the list to be spared from the feminist culling.
I can support that, yeah.
I started on the ILM article yesterday at lunch and it’s SO entertaining. They got an escape slide from a 757 and turned it into a Slip n’ Slide! George Lucas got back from doing other work and found out they’d been messing around so much they’d only finished 1 shot and they had a year to get the other 799! Can’t wait to finish it over lunch today.
Also enjoyed over lunch yesterday: a profile on the incomparable Judy Blume.
Haha, I just posted that part! I WANT THAT
Also, totally cried reading the Judy Blume profile. The first time I ever read the word “fuck” was on Page 147 of Here’s To You, Rachel Robinson. I have a lot of Feels about that book.
I read “Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret?” SO MANY TIMES. It was the first time I read about another girl going to synagogue. Also, I was very confused when I got my period and there weren’t belts involved.
That book and its prequel (Just As Long As We’re Together) are so great and underrated as far as the Blume canon goes.
I definitely think I read them out of order as a kid, but I read them both repeatedly. I wanted to read about those girls so much because I felt like they really reflected my friend group at the time, but there were only those two books and man, I wish there were more.
JUDY BLUME IS SO IMPORTANT, OH MY GOD
SO IMPORTANT.
Stephanie was my favorite, but I always wanted Alison to get her own book, too! It should at least have been a trilogy.
Seriously, Judy Blume. <3 <3 <3 She’s always seemed like the kind of friendly, tell-it-like-it-is woman I want to be when I grow up. This is as true now as when I was reading her books as a kid.
And I’m here for Sally J. Freedman, any day.
“At most restaurants, you are served what you ask for so routinely that your eyes glaze over with boredom. Javelina does not fall into the trap of dull predictability. One night after I left, I realized the guacamole I’d ordered had never arrived; it’s not every restaurant that gives you something to think about on your way home. Meanwhile, people at the next table were presented with a dish they insisted they hadn’t asked for. “You didn’t order brisket?” the server asked, keeping up the playful spirit. ”
Beautiful. Anyone else have any perfect restaurant reviews to share? I need more!
Eater does lists every year, and they are always always ALWAYS worth reading. Scathing restaurant reviews are one of my very favorite things.
Oh thank you for linking to this. Great morning reads!
Happy to be of service!
“If soldiers had killed Escoffier’s family in front of him and then forced him to make dinner, this is what he would have cooked.”
Thank you for this. <3 <3 <3
I consider it a civic duty.
“If The Bistro doesn’t make it as a restaurant, it could reopen as the Museum of Unappetizing Brown Sauces.”
Ooooh my god. Too good.
Quattro Passi: “I’ve said it many times: I have no problem spending big money on meals out. I’ve paid more than £282 of my own dosh for lunch. It just needs to be utterly memorable, the stuff of recollections whispered breathily late at night. It can’t be a pallid fart of mediocrity, priced for some dodgy clientele that’s ripped off the gross national product of a small impoverished nation and is now domiciled in London for tax reasons.”
You absolutely must read the NY Times review of Guy Fieri’s American Kitchen and Bar. It’s so amazing, I printed it out and hung it at my desk for a while.
oh my GOD, yes, that is one of the best ever.
That was the one I was going to link to! Such a brilliant style it’s written in, too.
YASSSS. I hate Guy Fieri with the burning of a thousand suns and that review gives me the warm fuzzies. Also his food sucks and I have so many friends and family members in the industry working their assess off, producing amazing food with care and attention, and this fucking dudebro douchebag gets famous? For what, having shitty hair? UGH hate rage.
I have equal hate for Mr. Ferry, and even cackled with glee at the news report when his yellow Lamborghini was stolen.
There was an episode of Bones recently where they worked on the murder of a Guy Fieri analog (he had awful catchphrases and a gem-encrusted jalepeno earring and a crack habit) and it was way more cathartic for me than it should be for any reasonable, non-psychopathic person.
And it’s written by the same guy who did the one linked in today’s round-up! That was the first thing I checked and I’m so delighted he’s still employed to write these. I hope the NYT tripled his salary.
Oh man, I’m such a sucker for “were you aware that you’re terrible? Why are you terrible?” writing. As a Midwesterner raised on British television, it speaks to my soul.
The headline for this is pretty on-point: America at the Trump Hotel: the food is amazing but you shouldn’t eat here ever. EVER!!
Oh man, I love that one too! I’m strangely proud that such a terrible eating experience is in Toronto.
I normally don’t like to link to Gawker because I feel like everyone’s all ready seen it, but this set of Epcot dining “reviews” are delightful: I’m such a fan Caity Weaver’s writing.
Full title of the “set” of reviews is: “The Best Restaurant in the World Is: Disney’s Epcot Theme Park”
I only took time to read the 11 food reviews, my favorites being Dinner in Canada, and Lunch in France. http://goo.gl/VpVwak
Just saw this, Frankie Boyle and Akala breakdown the institutional/media racism in Britain during the election, amazing and clear. Show it to all your friends!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7YCu5B6AMoQ
Also this is a great article to forward to any fuckboys you encounter: http://www.cracked.com/blog/5-helpful-answers-to-…
+8 million likes. I shared it all over the place. Thanks for linking it!
Tex Mex is the real crime here — YES I SAID IT— Mexican Authentica or the Cali-adapted version before DEATH BY QUESO
See also: “One of Javelina’s calling cards, queso, is usually suggested by the servers when taking orders. Occasionally this Tex-Mex cheese fondue is served hot, but more often it arrives lukewarm, which prevents trips to the emergency room. The cooler temperature offers the added benefit of allowing a latex-like film to congeal on top, which provides an interesting contrast in texture with the liquefied cheese below.”
i’m sorry to see someone be so incredibly wrong so early in the day.
Queso Defense League, reporting for duty!
Its fine. This is the hill I will die upon, even if alone (w my grilled fish tacos and pico de gallo)
we definitely have pico de gallo in texas too. even my small town texmex was serving it in the 90s
The small TX town I lived in didn’t have pico de gallo at any of the Tex Mex restaurants; neither did the nearest bigger town. Not even at the taquerias. It was all runny, flavorless “hot sauce” all the time. I still shudder when I think of watching native Texans pour squeezy butter into that stuff and scoop it up by the chipfull.
sounds like north Texas, which is basically Oklahoma 🙂
East Texas, behind the piney curtain. 🙂
Oh yeah. Towns there are pretty far removed from real Tex Mex I guess. I had relatives up that way (Marshall, Avenger, Orr City, etc.) and they viewed Tex Mex with suspicion 🙂
The folks in my former neck of the woods (near Tyler/Kilgore/Longview) were terribly proud of their Tex Mex. I think it was a sickness.
What is real Tex Mex though? There were dozens near me, they were in TX. How were they not real?
HAHA you are right! “Real” means “anything I don’t like isn’t real” when it comes to food, I guess. That’s a very good point and I should be less of a snob about it. That prob won’t happen, but I can try.
There’s a restaurant here called El Real that is an homage to old school tex mex from all over the state, and the sheer variety of kinds of Tex Mex is pretty amazing. Also, it is the only place I know of outisde of San Antonio where you can get puffy tacos.
Tex Mex is a bastard cuisine to begin with so I think talking about “real Tex Mex” is mostly just confusing. But there’s definitely a difference between good Tex Mex and bad Tex Mex, and there are a lot of different factors. Geographic location, size of the town, size of the Mexican population in the town, regional preferences, ratio of authentic Mexican influence to Americanization, good old fashioned skill of the cook, and about a thousand more things all figure into it. The part of Texas you’re talking about is definitely not known for good Tex Mex (to people outside it, anyway).
That totally makes sense. The various regions of TX are quite different, so it stands to reason that the Tex Mex would too.
Is mixing butter in the salsa just an East Texas thing? Please say yes.
Oh dear lord yes. That’s just an abomination, and one I have thankfully never encountered.
I have known people to mix a jar of store-bought salsa with a container of cream cheese and serve it as a dip, though that’s pretty universally regarded as trashy.
It is OK. We are are horribly wrong about things from time to time, and today is your turn.
Oh, honey, no.
(I’m not even a Texan, but I married one. Do not slander the queso, nor yet the chili gravy, for woe unto those who mock without understanding, who scorn without wisdom.)
I fear and regret nothing.
Alas I recognize your choices and understand that life is a rich tapestry, that apparently includes… chili gravy?
Chili gravy, the miracle sauce.
http://www.food.com/recipe/gebhardts-chili-gravy-… http://www.homesicktexan.com/2007/01/essence-of-t…
We pretty much use the Homesick Texan recipe, but with gobs and gobs of the Gebhardt’s chili powder my mother-in-law sends up to us in vast quantity. I also use oil and vegetable stock rather than lard/bacon drippings or beef stock, because I recently stopped eating meat. I realize that in itself probably means I need to turn in my wannabe-Texan card, but…
Lifelong Texan and I have never heard anyone use the words “chili gravy” together before. I can guess what you’re talking about, but calling it chili gravy does make it sound unnecessarily gross.
It’s ok. We can’t all be perfect. The enchiladas love you even if you don’t love them.
Enchiladas are GREAT! Esp w shredded chicken and mole sauce…
What is this silliness?!? My personal motto is: all the Mexican food! Sometimes I jus t want fresh tortillas and mole sauce. Sometimes I want tamales. Sometimes I want enchiladas smothered in cheese and chunky green chili. Sometimes I want fish tacos. Asking me to choose just one of these is like asking me to say which of my (non-existent) kids is my favorite!
(token disclaimer about how I know it’s not the open thread, etc)
So far this morning I have discovered a fraudulent charge on my credit card statement AND was informed that the centralized government pay centre has finally processed my pay increase… but backdated to April of this year instead of November of last year like it should have been. Sorted things out with the bank, still on hold (half an hour and counting!) with the pay centre.
A whole lotta financial bullshit to deal with in one morning, is what I’m saying.
I wanted to post my favorite line from that restaurant review, but there are just too many of them. Although:
I also stayed alert and sober when faced with the Tijuana Manhattan, made with tequila in the place of whiskey and served in a rocks glass with no ice at all, even though it was the temperature of a freshly killed snake.
I want to know how he knows what a freshly-killed snake feels like.
I can’t figure out what he means by that – is a freshly killed snake warm? cold? lukewarm?
Room temperature?
That is driving me crazy! Snakes are cold-blooded, so doesn’t it kind of depend on whether they’ve gotten to hang out on a warm rock lately? I’m suddenly realizing I don’t know that much about reptiles.
Datefriend has recently applied for a position at ILM…I’ll definitely be forwarding him the article.
This part, though…dang, I want that:
At the surplus store, we got an escape slide from a 727. You’d put a little Wesson oil and water on there—it made for a hell of a good Slip ’N Slide.
When we were leaving college in the early 90s, I had a friend who went to work at ILM, and we were all, “gee, okay, nerdpainter, whatever makes you happy, snicker snicker.”
Turns out we were also wrong-headed to have been snarky to all the Computer & Information Science majors.
/hindsight
PSA: Bill Nye the Science Guy is now on Netflix!! Well, about thirty episodes of it, anyway. BUT THAT’S ENOUGH.
Thank you. This may be the best thing that’s happened yet today.
😀 theme song started playing in my head. Bill! Bill! Bill!
Ah, Pete Wells is getting sassy, isn’t he? I don’t always agree with his writing, but the line “it’s not every restaurant that gives you something to think about on your way home” is sooo rude, I love it. And wow that place sounds terrible. Sometimes I don’t mind when food at a restaurant is a bit lukewarm, especially at a busy restaurant or when dining with a big group. But you cannot have lukewarm queso. Nor would a warm Manhattan of any variety be at all palatable.
In other words, the nanokitty photo Mallory posted on twitter this morning Killed Me Dead. Hesosmall!
When he gets salty, it makes the reviews so much better. I’m always up for a good hatin’.
A non-admirable but very real part of me is also enjoying the comments, in which there are many Texans not getting the irony at all and explaining to Wells that really his experience wasn’t that good.
Or those who thought he was being sincere about the quality and are saying “sounds good, I’ll have to check this place out!”
I think Pete Wells deserves an award for that line. Shade of the Year Award – Restaurants Division. RuPaul could emcee the night, televised (naturally) on Logo.
That review is one of my top ten favorite pieces of written matter in the universe. I am not exaggerating.
ETA: to ppayajunebug regarding the legendary NYT Flavortown review, obv.
Someone on Twitter posted Javelina’s menu (here) and … is that $16 for one brisket taco? People. Come to Texas. You can get 16 brisket tacos for $16 if you know where to look! And they’d be better than that one, too.
Jeez, and I thought the hipster $6 taco place that just opened here was stupid expensive.
I just realized that our new hipster donut place here in my (Houston) neighborhood needs to offer brisket-topped donuts. One for the suggestion box! 🙂
Y’all got a hipster donut place? But… Shipley’s! Why would you need a different donut place when you have a Shipley’s nearby?
(That, I realize, is a silly question, given that you also have at least two hipster hot dog places in your neighborhood.)
Well, the hot dog place (Good Dog) is amazeballs IMO. The other one used to be OK but now sucks. :/
Donut wise, we have (as El Guapo might say) a plethora of donut choices. There’s the Shipley’s on N. Main that still uses delicious trans fats in their boudin kolaches, and now Hugs & Donuts, who have amazing kolaches and maple bacon donuts (they’re expensive, tho). Also, our next door neighbor’s god parents are the Shipleys, so they have donuts around a lot.
tl; dr: donuts
Good Dog is a piece of nirvana. I could walk to the other one so easily when I worked on Yale/6th, but why bother when Good Dog was just a jaunt away?
For decades my company built the cases / counters for Shipley’s (I guess they still do, but I’m gone, so what do I know?) Every time they came by to pick up stuff, they’d bring boxes of donuts.
Also, we built the Crave Cupcakes interiors, and they always brought cupcakes, and even remembered to bring gluten-free ones for my sister sometimes.
(The jewelry companies never brought us boxes of gemstones, though, which I think is a real oversight on their part.)
Ahhhh, you live in the neighborhood I lived in for over a decade and just moved out of (for Oregon) last month! Nostalgia…
We miss you!
THE FUCK? When I was in law school, my best friend and I would hit up the taco place on the way. Two bean and cheese tacos, a carne guisada with cheese taco, a bacon egg and cheese taco, a diet coke and an iced tea: $10. $16 for a taco is just nonsense.
I mean, I already bitch about Torchy’s Tacos and their absurd $6 a taco pricing.
I know I should scorn Torchy’s, but somehow I just can’t resist an occasional visit. They’re still nothing on the taquerias of South Texas, which are the only things I miss about living down there.
I would more easily put up with Torchy’s $6 tacos if their lines weren’t so damned long.
The Conformity Station Torchy’s is no-waiting … between semesters, that is.
Three months of easy-access overpriced tacos- huzzah!
“My joy helping veterans file VA benefits claims is not entirely selfless. Making life a bit easier for disabled veterans is the most effective remedy I know for reducing the pain of my survivor’s guilt. Each time a submission is approved, I look upward and tell my four crewmates, who died when our B-17 was shot down, ‘This is for you guys.’”
I’m not crying, it’s just…allergies.
I definitely cried like a fool.
Thank you, Toast, for yesterday’s WWII letters and today’s hero vet. I don’t think it can be emphasized enough how incredible that man is for facing his PTSD and getting help. My oma was a teenage refugee in WWII and has had PTSD all her life. It wasn’t until my mom was reading about PTSD when my brother deployed to Afghanistan a couple years ago that she realized why her childhood was so screwed up.
Oma doesn’t believe in therapy, though. Likewise, my opa, her husband, has said that when he returned from the Korean war, his father said to him, “You saw terrible things over there. It’s best to just forget and never think about it again.” Guess how well that works.
I know this is really late to the table but…. my father is a Korean vet and NEVER talked about the war. Ever. Until dementia started 3 years ago and now he perseverates on his experiences there. Or more to it, he perseverates about who (civilian and soldier alike) he couldn’t help when they needed it and how he is a failure morally because of it. It’s heart breaking.
I would like Johannson’s lawyers to explain to me exactly what context would make “sweating like a rapist” sound innocent.
I’d like to know how ANY touching, outside of a handshake, is not inappropriate. They didn’t say he didn’t touch her, but that he didn’t touch her inappropriately.
I have heard “sweating like a pig” before and found it descriptive and possibly inaccurate. Do pigs sweat? I will have to google. I have heard “sweating like a n-word,” which is offensive and a simile that will provoke an immediate rebuke from me. I have NEVER heard “sweating like a rapist” but I am planning my response if I ever do. It does not end well for the speaker.
For whatever reason, the idea that the original Star Wars movies probably also smelled like sweaty gym lockers only adds a level of verisimilitude to them.
agreed. also, I have rarely been so disappointed about not being able to go back in time. I wanna work in the big sweaty hanger and build moons.
Doesn’t that sum up the problems with the prequels, too?
“What’s your problem with Episode One, exactly?”
“I dunno, I guess it just doesn’t look like it would stink like feet.”
Pretty much. They’re just too seamless and expansive and it makes them kind of boring. But “doesn’t stink like feet” is a lot more succinct than the roundabout argument I usually go into, so I think I’m stealing that 🙂
“This doesn’t look like a movie that featured behind-the-scenes shenanigans from the props department. I just can’t get excited about it.”
More Cracked links! This time about the gendering of children and toys! Really interesting piece about the causes and history of gendered toys
(I’m quite obsessed with Cracked atm, its where I get all of my news and most of my opinion pieces. Which is a bit sad.)
http://www.cracked.com/blog/5-reasons-dividing-to…
I think that the gradual self-reinvention of both Cracked and Buzzfeed has been fascinating to watch. Especially when you get pundits reacting to them at a slower pace. “Buzzfeed? All they have is listicles! Cracked? It is a Mad magazine clone site!” Up your game and get with the times, pundits. Things change fast on today’s intertubes.
Buzzfeed I’m a bit more meh on. But I like that Cracked can convey messages clearer and be much more honest because their ‘just’ a comedy site. They are consistently dropping serious truth bombs, Robin Williams, Ferguson, Iraq/Iran wars, they consistently deliver. There personal experience series has been amazing, and humanized a lot of media scapegoats (Terroists, Neo-Nazi, Pedophiles etc)
I also like that they are pro-women slightly left leaning, because they’re audience are often the complete opposite of this. They reel them in with dick jokes and then hit them with some serious truth. If they manage to convert even one MRA fuckboy, then they’ve improved the world slightly.
My only wish is that they expand their world view a bit more, they’re currently very US-centric, but their audience is pretty global
Yeah, that’d be cool!
Like the Daily show and it’s ilk they can use the guise of comedy to really tell some good truths, and don’t have to pull their punches or pretend to be ‘balanced’ or whatever that mainstream news sources do.
And man, they make white men angry. It’s beautiful.
I basically said this exact thing on Facebook today so please get out of my brain.
Yeah, Cracked has definitely gotten less bro-y, which is nice.
oh, I love how that article builds up to the “if you skipped reading this and are angrily commenting right now, you’re a sucker who’s been played by the industry” conclusion. And that pink gifts for brown-eyed children is a nifty fun fact!
I understand his point, segmentation does make it easier to sell to consumers, but its been taken to a ridiculous extreme. Boys prefer mechanical toys, girls prefer human/animal toys, therefore boys should play with weapons and girls should play with cleaning appliances. Its not a good message! (Especially the wepons/violence thing, how about we don’t give ANY kids guns?)
Today in Dude, You’re Not Helping: Brettler does not deny that his client said he would serve tennis balls down my colleague’s throat, but says, “There is nothing sexual or inappropriate about that statement,” adding that categorizing it as such “is absurd.”
As a palate cleanser, may I offer Mr. McCulloch’s “Daves I Know”.
The official anthem of all Daves!
Nobody names their kids Dave any more. When I was in college, I and three of my closest friends were all named Dave. :/
When I was in high school, I went to a summer creative writing program where there were very few boys, but all of them were named Dave. It was unnerving.
Now people name some of their kids Eustace, and some of them Tim, and some of them Clarence, and some Sonny Jim.
Trufax: sophomore year of college I knew 14 Daves.
Hi Toast, This probably isn’t the right place to ask this, but I need advice about racist co-workers. I’m relatively new in my office (5 months) and getting tired of the very casual racist slurs and remarks that I hear maybe once a week or so. Almost everyone here is white, including myself, but we live and work in a very diverse city and we are public servants so we work with everyone. Since I’m new I’ve just taken the “refuse-to-acknowledge” strategy, but I don’t like keeping my mouth shut about offensive comments.
What do I say? I don’t want to harm my professional relationships but I also don’t want to let things slide.
Do you have a superior you trust? Doesn’t need to be the person you report to, necessarily. Just the person you think would be most open to discussing your concerns.
I kind of do, but it seems like it’s so ingrained in office culture, that everyone seems to just be resigned that there will always be racism. I think everybody has been here too long.
And if I tell the superior “I’m tired of hearing racist remarks,” what can he do? What do I ask him to do?
I just saw there’s an open thread! Maybe I should re-route over there…
What can you do? Depends on where you live. Are you in the US? If so, then you can raise a complaint about racism in the workplace to whomever is the human resources analog in your government job. Whoever hired you, perhaps. This is very serious business, and making a complaint must (by law) be treated seriously. Note: I said must not will. Sadly, there may be resistance to this, especially if people are conflict-averse. But most of the time phrases like “EEOC complaint” and “hostile workplace” get people to sit up straight and pay attention.
If the problem doesn’t seem to be universal – probably there are 2 or 3 primary culprits? – I know people who have spoken up and been fairly deluged by others jumping in to agree.
The issue with speaking up is, as you likely know, those who can casually make slurs whenever they want turn into sarcastic jerks when called on it. So once you do speak up, you will get crap like “Oh, Alien, excuse me, can I say that? Was that a racially derogatory remark?” (cue Jerk’s pause for approbatory laughter.) And you get to stay calm and reply “I see you are more aware of your language now. Yes, that was racist.” It can be a hell of a tedious cycle until Jerk realizes he should shut it, and there will be an upsurge in Jerk’s slurs either pointedly in front of you, or pointedly behind your back with an “Alien’s not here so I can say this now” caveat for Jerk’s audience.
Anyway, Nicole’s idea to speak to a superior is a great call. You could also come up with a general “I feel” statement that gets your point across without directly calling Jerk a jerk. “I feel uncomfortable when I hear derogatory comments about race or gender in our workplace.” You’re not telling him to stop, you’re not asking for a solution, you’re just stating your views. But state those views every time you hear a slur, and you are empowering others who feel the same, raising awareness, and being true to yourself.
Good luck. It sucks, big time. I’ve been in a similar battle, regarding sexism, and it was my father/boss who needed reprogramming. It worked, but it was stressful starting out until my mother/other boss and female coworkers jumped on board.
Take notes. When it happens write down who said what and who heard it. That way when you decide what to do you have something to use. It might also help you figure out if there are other people in the office who are unhappy with the way people are talking but also afraid to say anything.
That PTSD piece is wonderful -it seems like a lot of the time trauma is talked about as though it belongs only to one generation (though which one varies), so hearing about people of all ages sharing their (horrific) experiences and learning to live in the world is immensely reassuring.
That review gives me so much joy, especially since the chef, Richard Caruso, has earned my undying scorn by publicly saying that lime juice doesn’t belong in guacamole. “It takes away from the flavor of the avocado,” he says. GTFO
Trufax: sophomore year of college I knew 14 Daves.
Do rapists (rapers?) sweat a lot?
Do they sweat more than people who willingly have sex sweat?