(Isn’t it sad that men standing up to other men in the name of decency is so rare that I feel the need to thank one who does?)

It works 90% of the time (except when someone says ‘I want to hear it anyway!’) and avoids making the situation awkward because it is so smooth and the conversation or joke-telling session can just keep on rolling.

It’s best in situations where you don’t necessarily want to make a Big Deal out of someone’s indiscretion, but still refuse to let them poison your otherwise intelligent evening, such as when I’m working for tips behind the bar.

Last week I accidently sent someone home with his tail between his legs from a party at my house because of some racist joke he was about to say. I don’t regret doing it but I wish I would have been more classy about how I did it. I didn’t mean for him to have to go home early.

I once refused to let a 50 year old man (I’m only 26) come into the bar because he was wearing a shirt that said “50,000 battered women, and I’ve been eating them fried this whole time”. His whole group of friends then explained that it was a FOOD joke, threatened me with violence, asserted that I must be gay (for liking women?), and one feigned a fake punch to see if I would flinch (I did). These were grown-ass men, not college boys!

The “let’s keep it classy’ comment that I usually make probably would have been more smooth, and made the boss more money, but straight-up, people spend more money in the end if there are more ladies in the bar having a good time and feeling good.

An African-American woman I work with was listening to her privilege-assuming colleagues go on and on about how they didn’t think they should have to pay taxes to foot the bill for someone else who couldn’t be bothered to work to support themselves, and she remarked, “Didn’t stop you from using our labor for free to run your plantations, did it?”

Another young woman I work with has a thyroid deficiency that has left her very thin, which her co-workers see as not a worrisome side effect of disease, but a desirable state in which she can impersonate a runway model. Finally, after one too many open remarks about her size, she snapped, “Hey! Skinny people have feelings too!” We planned a t-shirt with that most cogent remark, along with an illustration of a stick figure flipping the bird; when I told the story to my e-mail correspondents, the universal response was, “Can you get me one in an XXL?”

I’m concerned about speaking up too seriously because I get easily flustered and will likely trip over my words AND it will make my dealings in this community more difficult than they already are. I don’t want to quit the sport I love.

But I just HAVE to say something. It’s important to me not to be complicit to such behavior.

Last night I was overwhelmed after two blond jokes lead to a rape joke and I ultimately said “That’s very problematic” and then announced that I was done with my immediate company of men and moved to another table.

I don’t smile politely like I used to when someone tells a blond joke. Now I drop my jaw in a look of shock.
I responded to the first blond joke by saying “a white guy walks into a bar…” hoping that such a lead in would make my point sufficiently clear. Perhaps not. It lead to another blonde joke in which the womans mother dying was part of the set up.

I announced honestly and candidly, with a smile on my face to lighten the load, “MY mother died six months ago.”

It was a roudy moment at the bar so I’m not sure if the third guy heard me. HE told a rape joke that he should sue the catholic church for the offense of NOT being deemed “cute enough” to get raped. That’s when I said “that’s very problematic” and left the table (noticeably).

I’m not too upset with my response but I think I could’ve done better. I invite opinions as to how.