Homophobic experience at work

I'm a nurse and I was orienting a new nurse to my floor.  This actually happened and I posted the below on facebook.  What do you all think?

 

 

 

Okay, picture this dialogue between me and an ignorant person that I just met:

Ignorant person makes a stupid homophobic remark about gay people.
I wasn't sure I heard him right. So I didn't say anything. I just kept quiet and hoped that I was wrong about him just being incredibly ******g stupid. Then..... Ignorant person makes a SECOND homophobic remark and includes the classic hand hanging sign to indicate someone gay. I just stared at him and let it go. (Trust me I had a reason, otherwise I would have been all over his ****). Finally, ignorant person makes this remark..."You know that guy with the overly tanned body and the blonde tip highlights? You don't wanna have to bend over to pick anything up in front of him..." Then does the "hand hang" again. I had enough...so I said... "DUDE..I'm GAY! I am married to a woman and you cannot say that **** to me. You need to watch what the hell you say because all these comments have been VERY inappropriate and you can seriously offend someone as well as get in a hell of alot more trouble than you can even imagine. This is 2013 and you should never imply that you know anything about anyone!" He just stared at me with his mouth open. He then apologized to me over and over again. He then asked me if people knew about it. WTF? Is this not 2013??? I said, "Everyone knows and no one cares. If you don't like me for something as incredibly ignorant as who I am married to then that's not my problem. I am secure in myself and don't need anyone's approval" ASS.

 

It is so hard to believe that some people are still like this!!

I live in Idaho...trust me, there are still lots of people like that! I don't see it as much because I am a college student and the campus is more open, but I still live in a small town and there are young and old people that ignorant. I am president of our GSA and we put posters around campus to recruit, and we have to deal with people tearing them down. My wife and I look forward to moving back to Oregon because it is more open, but even there we were discriminated against in a rental situation. Just today we were talking about if anyone at the hospital is going to give us a hard time. I don't think so, but still need to take steps to make sure the nurses understand that she is my significant other and therefore can be given info about me and my condition.

I am a strong believer that hate can live anywhere and our best defense is to live out and proud! We, as a community, need to support eachother regardless of how we identify (gay, bi, trans, ect). When I grow up (I am a 32 year old college student) I will be working for an lgbtq organization to help people be stong and confidant. Thank you for speaking up and he will be a better person because of it!

I know that there are still alot of people like that out there but I guess that I was just thrown off with him doing it at work.  That was ridiculous.  When I was in college I was a co president of our LGBT.  I loved it.  It was definitely an experience.  I know that no one at the hospital will give my wife a hard time about coming into see me or giving her info because I work at the same hospital that I am going to have the surgery in.  I also have domestic partner health benefits for my wife through that hospital.  We also have a gay group on campus.  It's a very gay friendly hospital and its HUGE!!!  We are ranked number 4 in the country.  I have never had an issue with myself and my wife.  Thank God that's one thing that I don't need to worry about.  I wish you luck and hope that your wife has no problems at all.  Don't be afraid to stick up for your relationship if they try and give you a hard time. 

I don't think I could've kept my mouth shut either. Go you! I have had ignorance personal and work. I work in a pharmacy and a pharmacist was harassing my gay friend so much she ripped things off Her desk. I turned her into our HR dept. I also have lost a couple friend because of the way I CHOOSE to live my life. And our neighbors hate us and always in the spring the cops are called because he starts harassing us with name calling. It's sad that people worry so much about others lives that have nothing to do with theirs.

I'm surprised somewhat that this was coming from a nurse. I wonder where he trained! I have had tremendous support from nurses every time I have encountered them either personally or professionally. I live in a small city in IL and it's not very progressive but I've never had a single problem and I've been out  28 years. My wife is a teacher and her colleagues all knew. We're both retired now but we are out and no one seems to care. If they do, they aren't worth knowing. I've even had people tell me that knowing us has been a privilege and opened their eyes to be accepting1

So good for you ! Hooray!

Connie

I first just want to say, "Way to go Chickadee!" If he feels he has the right to express what he thinks then you by sure have the right to express what you think and defend yourself! I'm not Gay so I can't completely know what you have to deal with, but I have many many very close gay friends, and I would never in a million years, even joke about anything mean when it comes to being gay. I've always found that disrespectful and try to always see it as if I was in someone else's shoes. Just stand strong and be the beautiful self you are, and just toss out those who can't be open and accepting and realize we are all different and made the way we are for a reason. You got this!

Thanks everyone.  :)  The way that I see it is that there are ignorant people everywhere including nurses.   The one thing with nurses is that they always have their own personal feelings and thoughts on things that most don't express towards their patients.   I don't know why but he must have seen me as some type of person that would be okay with him saying that.  Hopefully it opened his eyes a little but unfortunately ignorance is hard to break.  thats my opinion.

Congratulations for coming out to him!

You're a strong, inspirational person.

Utahrob

Nurse to nurse, I think you ought to let your supervisor know. Anyone this ignorant and unkind so soon in the process is only going to be more trouble later. Some of the wrong folks are going into nursing. So sad.

They are aware. He has been a nurse for over 10 years. He was just new to the floor. He floats the hospital. I haven't seen him since.