Summary

A trogdolite accused me of being discriminatory at work. Flipped the script on her by throwing Human Resources policy back in her face.

 

Body

So, here I am at work, happily enjoying some down time, minding my own business. Bottle of water in one hand, phone in the other. Throw my feet up on the counter to get comfy and take up as much space as possible.

A land whale wildly appears, huffing away.

"Can you take your feet off the counter?"

"Sure!", I reply happily. She passively aggressively wipes the counter off with an anti-bacterial wipe.

As soon as she is finished, I throw my feet back up on the counter.

"Your feet at filthy! I asked you to take them off the counter!! Why are you disrespecting me!!!", she angrily snorts.

I should mention at this point that the "D" word set off a few alarm bells in my head. I work for a large institution that has a 4 page "Harrassment: General and Sexual" policy. This land yacht is a miserable twice divorced middle aged troll who has recently put forth a whole slew of harrassment complaints, trying to get several of my colleagues (also younger males) in trouble. There have been several discussions about the harrassment policy in the past couple of staff meetings.

With this in the back of my mind, I begrudgingly remove my feet from the counter, "Oh, well, sorry you feel that way."

The swamp donkey huffs and turns away, seemingly happy she won this round.

I plot out my plan of attack using the holy bible of social justice workers everywhere. The infamous harrassment policy that has all young men living in fear of how their words and actions will be misconstrued by sea hags.

Pouring over this treasure trove of buzz words, rights, responsibilities and formal resolution processes, a light bulb goes off in my head.

I furiously scratch down my speech on a piece of scrap paper. Carefully scrutinizing each word as a lawyer before a Grand Jury trial would.

I then approached the would-be counter troll with a smile on my face. Of course making sure one of my fellow male colleagues was in ear shot.

"Can I talk to you for a moment?"

She turns her massive girth to face me. I had to resist the rotational gravity created by her spinning in her chair pulling me towards her.

"Yes?", she stammers.

"I found your comments about my apperance and attire offensive. Especially insinuating that my shoes were 'filthy'."

"B ... b ... b ... buttt" she chortles, attempting to interrupt me.

I continue, unfazed by the disgusting sight of her gums flapping.

"You are not my manager, you are not allowed to order me around."

"I find your repeated requests and offensive comments intimidating and they create a hostile work environment."

"Buuttt, feet on the counter are bad!!" she stammers.

Unfazed by her brilliant retort, I continue.

"I like you as a person and I realize working nights in close quarters with others is difficult. We have to be tolerant of each others differences and try to create a positive and pleasant work space."

She attempts further stammering, which I ignore.

"Thanks!", I said. I turned and walked away from her, sitting about 10 feet away with my back turned.

So, what do you think her only plan of action was left?

Yep, she cried. She fucking balled crocodile tears out her swollen, puffy, frog-like eyes.

 

Lessons Learned

  1. Use their own tactics against them.

  2. Always stick up for yourself.