Diversity training

Last Thursday afternoon I attended a mandatory session on diversity at the Wallace Building where I work. It was a three hour session of mostly common sense type information. Though looking back at my post regarding my job at Gamble Robinson in Omaha, my how we've changed!

Back in the early 1980's, the company I worked for sent paychecks each week from Minneapolis to the GR post office box in Omaha. In with checks, in that way pre-email era, I often found copies obscene comics - drawings that featured phalluses (is that the plural spelling??), breasts and lewd language. They even faxed the stuff to us - we thought it was a hoot!

We thought nothing of rude and sexual comments from customers and salesmen alike. I participated in the back and forth banter and told racist jokes with the best of 'em. It was many years later that I started to feel uncomfortable when someone tells a racially based joke.

But you know by now that I'm a smart assed joker. Where IS the line between naughty/funny and out of line? I guess the answer is there IS no answer, because it depends on audience and situation.

At the diversity training we got to watch a video of an experiment filmed in Riceville, Iowa in 1968. The teacher, Jane Elliott, was tired of only teaching about discrimination, and decided to put her third graders in a situation that would really bring the lesson home. The first day she said blue eyed children were the best - smarter, more attractive and privileged that the brown eyed kids.

It was amazing how quickly to lesson took effect! Soon the blue eyes were teasing the brownies, and browns were feeling testy. One part of the film showed a group of girls huddled together forlornly at recess because they were forbidden to use the playground equipment or play with the blues. They comforted each other. The video also showed the class 14 years later (did we really look that bad in the mid 1980's?) meeting with the teacher, discussing how the experiment affected them. The experience seemed to have made a lasting impression on each of them.

The video was interesting, but the rest of the diversity training was kinda lame. I did get to meet more folks who work in our building. It IS the most diverse place I've ever worked - many nationalities are represented, and I know several openly gay people. It's refreshing really, and it gives me hope. Even though we don't always agree, we can work side by side and respect each other, but still have fun and be ourselves.

I know and love several gay people. I think they deserve the same rights as the rest of us when it comes to choosing partners. (after all why should they be denied the challenge of melding their lives together with another person) Our niece Peg and partner Brooke were married a couple years ago and have twin boys who are nearly 1 now. And I've known for years my friend's son is gay. He is a really neat kid.

Knowing gay people has caused me and my family to shift our paradigms. It's easy to make generalizations about gays when they are somebody else. But when they are people we know and love, we realize they are just people too.

But where is the line - what is off limits and what isn't? Some gay guys are more feminine than I am! So I make fun of myself in this way - is it okay to laugh about them? I had fun telling the story about the guy who sat by me at New Employee Orientation who said "I love your shoes"?? I had wondered if he might be gay, and when he asked that, I made to jump to "yes he is!" Is that bad? I know that not all gay guys are into fashion -and not all guys into fashion are gay. But hey, that was kinda funny!

Jud didn't want to shop at a certain store in the mall because it was too gay. Is that a slur? Or just him saying he wasn't that into fashion? My point is, despite diversity training, I'm still confused. Because I'm in a new state job, I'm trying to be very careful about what I say, especially in emails - you don't know how many I've deleted already!! I'm going to keep working on my personal comment muffler - think before I talk, and as Jane Elliott says - think about walking a mile in another person's mocassins.