Comments

1
She is trying to get her 15 mins. This is absolutely ridiculous. Nothing illegal was done here. She was fired as an employee for slandering the company in front of customers. She needs to learn how customer service works.
2
Sounds like the headline should have been, "Pagliacci Makes Mistake, But Then Makes Good on Commitment to LGBT Community." The owner seems to have taken it seriously and closed the location for training tonight.
3
Dylan better hope hiring manager from Starbucks is not reading this. They like to avoid any Drama.

Pagliacci's owner apologized and is making adjustments accept it and move on. You won !
6
Honestly, I think Dylan would have gotten further by instead of taking the "that was rude and you hurt my feelings" approach, going for the "don't go around starting problems or you're gonna have problems". Our society stipulates that women are allowed to get all emotional about things but men tend to interact with veiled aggression.
Personally, I prefer the veiled aggression tactic. If a customer's getting pissy for no good reason, better to act kind of exasperated than ask them to stop being mean. I dunno, just my Monday-morning quarterbacking.
7
Gotta stress that working at a pizza place will never, ever earn you any respect unless your delivering the pizza. Dylan fucked up by assuming an apology would be forthcoming and accusing the company of not defending her and the managers fucked up by suggesting she could simply go to the back whenever mr asshole showed up for a slice. Possible that the termination was made easier by her tone of voice, as its difficult to not feel enraged when an asshole like that comes into your store.
8
I've never heard of "man" as related to the gender of the person you're addressing when it's used in the way it seems to have been here, the "hey, man" sense. The guy was a jerk to laugh at her (if that's what happened rather than a nervous laugh from being corrected when he maybe had no gender in mind), but it seems not at all clear that saying "thanks, man" means you think the person you're addressing IS a man. This whole thing seems like it COULD be a misunderstanding: "thanks, man" with no gender in mind, the correction, an embarassed/confused customer reacts in not the best way and laughs, and then next time he's there he gets read the riot act and an apology is demanded when, again, he may just talk like The Dude and therefore may have thought apologizing was an unreasonable request. If that's all true then, of course, ideally he should have said, hey, sorry, I didn't mean to address you as a man, just a figure of speech. But dunno if being a bit of a dolt is necessarily "harassment." Or maybe it was all intentional. Not so sure though from the way it's described here.
9
Nothing illegal was done here.

Important correction, especially given no one in the story, nor the story's author claimed otherwise!
10
who fuckin cares this is not news he was born a dude the guy was not that rude he just wanted some pizza and that MAN does not deserve a apology i dont believe anyone should be fired but this is just dumb
11
Accepting an apology from the owner of the company, the same one who is shutting the location down for training, disciplining the managers and backing her up on refusing the customer service if they harrass her, is not compromising. It isn't giving in and accepting less for the trans community. It is graciously accepting that the business owner is doing everything possible to right the error. EVERYONE in customer service deals with dicks. It's part of the job and refusing them service is rarely an option for any of us, trans, gay, women, people of color, differently abled, etc. We ALL face those jerks and keep doing our job. To refuse the earnest attempt to fix this and threaten legal action anyway is only going to make it harder for the next trans person who doesn't get a job because the owner/manager doesn't want to risk the social media campaign/ lawsuit that comes along if the person doesn't get above and beyond what other employees receive or there is a problem and that employee refuses to accept a rectification. I know I support the trans community 100% but I would not hire you, Dylan. What I get from this article is someone who revels in drama.
12
Read this again and it seems even more like he has to have said "thanks, man" (or the correction would have been "actually, I'm a woman" not "actually, it's ma'am"). Putting "man" after things is like calling a group of people "you guys" - it's not about gender. Maybe this is a generation gap thing? Maybe people don't do that as much these days? But it seems possible that him not apologizing could be because Dylan lit into him and was confrontational and he felt defensive, having in his mind not done anything wrong or said anything about gender at all. Seems reasonable to act defensive in that situation, and I don't see how getting angry and talking about "misgendering" is warranted if someone was just throwing around colloquialisms that are typically used in a gender-neutral way.
14
I think she handled this about as well as she could. She was respectful and communicated to the customer why he was being rude. And it was her right to refuse service. The owner of the company also did the right thing by aggressively working on training and communicating clearly how disappointed he was in the response. The only people who really fucked up were the bigoted customer and the management who allowed the employee to work in an abusive environment without support.
15
The only impression I have of the trans community is similar to militant feminism, its mostly negative, attention gathering and generally suspect under scrutiny.

This story while not much of a story in the end, reflects that.
16
I've encountered transgendered folk working at that place for years, which always brought a smile to my face. This person though is just trying to start some unnecessary crap. If Justin Bond gave the OK to use "tranny" in close quarters than that customer should be allowed his "whatever". After all he just wants a piece of fucking pizza, not to have to go to uptight PC classes.
17
I was raised by two hippies from Long Beach, CA- my speech is littered with "man" and "dude" regardless of the gender of the people I'm with. Had she asked for an apology, I probably would have said, "sorry, man!" by rote habit.
18
People are assholes and working retail means learning how to deal with assholes. She needs to lose the chip on her shoulder and develop some thicker skin.
19
I call everyone dude. I also say "man" a lot. Conversely, I get chastised by people younger than my 47 years for using "ma'am". I guess I'm too lazy to say "thank you, madam" but I'll try to remember...
I would also like to think that Dylan would welcome the opportunity to work with Pagliacci's Trans101 campaign & perhaps take it chain-wide, helping other trans employees have a better experience.
21
I'm really curious how Pagliacci would handle a customer who was being abusive in a sexist way toward a ciswoman. Would they tell her to suck it up? Because that's definitely been my experience. I have never, not once, seen a male customer be reprimanded for abusing female staff.

I also find it odd that Dylan took it upon herself to reprimand the customer without an okay from management. I work in a customer service field, and talking back to a customer directly would be a firing offense. That's the job of a higher-up, period.

In any event, I personally am getting tired of this idea that misgendering is some sort of human rights violation.
22
I worked at this location back in 2006-2007. I had a difficult time there after three of my lesbian coworkers decided they didn't care for me. They would make disparaging comments about my body, my facial hair, and they even told me that the man I was dating looked like a "chi-mo" which a friend told me meant "child molester". I tried a few times, unsuccessfully, to get the manager at the time to intervene but he showed little to no concern for my situation. One day, a friend of mine stopped by on his way home from work to say hello to me. He asked me if he could have a bread stick so I gave him one since I'd witness my coworkers hand over literally hundreds of dollars worth of free food and sometimes alcohol to their lesbian friends. The very next day, the manager called me upstairs into his "office/closet" and told me three coworkers reported that I stole food. I told him I gave one bread stick to a friend and how the other employees would always give copious amounts of food including gelato and alcohol to their friends who came in much more frequently than mine ever did. He said he'd never seen or been made aware of such instances so I was "probably making it up" because I got "caught" and was trying to bring others down with me. He then stood up, closed the door, turned back towards me and said "suck my dick real fast and we'll forget this whole thing, deal? I said "HELL NO!" and then he fired me. I left in complete shock and walked back to my apartment. Now, I have absolutely nothing to gain from posting this. I am not posting this just to make a sensationalistic claim with absolutely no merit. It happened just as described. I'm just not surprised to see that this company has mishandled yet another sensitive and potentially volatile situation. Dylan has my sympathy.
23
Dylan, based on the story as reported here it sounds like you won and have the full support of the owner of the business.

Sometimes we get so wrapped up in the fight that we miss the fact that we just won. I respectfully suggest you pause take a deep breath before you decide on your next move.
24
I think she should stand up for herself, but thinking about how I would handle harassment, I don't think it was a good idea to carry the grievance over to the next time and hit the customer with it from the outset. She says he's a regular customer, but it appears this was their first interaction, and I think it would have been more appropriate to take issue if she had waited for him to do the same thing again and he did.
25
So upper management is totally on her side, instituting workplace awareness training, disciplining the offending manager and she's filing a complaint? She's a churl because this sounds like sincere concern on the corporation's part to make things right. She is also stupid because Pagliacci is voluntarily doing everything that would be done in response to a complaint of this natureif it were ordered to do so by the City and she now sounds wholly unreasonable.
26
i wasn't there and i don't know anyone involved, and i'm pro-sensitivity in general. however, this certainly READS like it was all one big misunderstanding that needlessly escalated. tone is lost when words are put into text, and it's certainly possible that it went down the way she said it did, and with all the hostile intention. but the words on the page are not damning, in my opinion. agree with @8.
27
The next perceived insult would have been immediate, I'm sure. But again, "thanks, man" is not the same as "thanks, sir." She even quotes him as using "man" in that second interaction again in a "hey, man" sense.
28
Seems like she didn't want the company apology, which is unfortunate. Just run away and think Starbucks is the answer. How stupid.
29
People hurling invective about you night and day because of your chosen lifestyle and beliefs.

In the Pacific Northwest?

Nah. Never happens.

Heads held high you walk on low lying clouds of silver righteousness, as you excrete perfectly formed cylinders of alabaster, odor-free.

31
I'm confused. We're expected to laugh at deniers of biological facts, like anti-evolutionists, but then are required to take seriously the protestations of a person with x and y chromosomes who claims to be a woman.
32
Could the posters like @31 please shut the fuck up? If I say "please" it's polite, right?
33
@25

And that's why I wouldn't be surprised if she didn't get hired at Starbucks and maybe even if Pag decides to withdraw their offer to rehire--though the owner here comes across as someone who might be willing to let her return anyway.
34
Don't expect to be called mam or ms if you got a name tag that says paul on it.
35
What a bunch of asshole opinionators.
Give her a fucking break.

I like what @23 said:
"Sometimes we get so wrapped up in the fight that we miss the fact that we just won. I respectfully suggest you pause take a deep breath before you decide on your next move."
36
"Dylan" - Paul seemed to be her last name. Which is also not a name that automatically leads someone to a specific gender, true. But you can't effectively correct someone "misgendering" you if they weren't actually doing that...again, I suspect that's the problem, based on the account we have here.
37
"No laws were broken" -- are you kidding?! At least two laws were clearly broken. It's illegal in Seattle to discriminate against transgender people, such as by making them go to the back when transphobic customers come in. It's also against federal law to retaliate against complaining about harassment and discrimination, for example by firing someone.

Both managers need to be fired immediately if they haven't already. If they aren't, Pagliacci's owner needs to be prosecuted and, hopefully (but doubtfully) shut down. It wouldn't even be a question if he kept managers who discriminated and retaliated against another protected minority.

Awesome job to Dylan for standing up to this and bringing attention to this. It obviously isn't helping her directly, but it's helping lots of other people now and in the future.
38
Sorry, but telling a customer that they were rude to you on an earlier visit, and you want an apology-that's likely to get you fired from any customer-service job. If anyone needs to talk to the customer, it's the manager on duty.
Also, being called by the wrong gender-I'm called sir pretty often and am neither male nor trans-isn't that big a deal. Really.
39
So this person (A) presents with the name Dylan Paul and (B) cultivates an ambiguous appearance, then gets offended when someone laughs at being corrected? Then accosts the customer 4 days later demanding a personal apology? Then when the customer says "man" it's the employee who's being harassed? You know what's ruder than not selecting a person's chosen gender? Demanding personal apologies for unintended slights. People in the service industry are fired for being rude to customers all the time, and this is a not unreasonable example of it.
40
I don't think demanding an apology ever makes sense. If someone is genuinely sorry, they'll apologize without being asked. If they're not sorry, then the apology means nothing anyway.

I think it makes even less sense in this situation, where the guy's there to get pizza, not to get personal with the employees. She was right to correct him about her gender and it's unfortunate that he laughed, but as other have said, that could have been an involuntary nervous reaction on his part. I've dealt with worse in than this in customer service, like people screaming in my face, and I never demanded an apology.
41
I agree with 8 here (and 8's subsequent comments). It sounds very much like "man" was generic and not a gender assumption. Would the offended person have taken offense if the regular customer had used "dude" instead? If so, then I have some hot news -- offended person needs to find work where serving the public is not involved. I was in retail for years; you don't take it on yourself, as a retail service worker, to confront or lecture the customers, whether they're regulars or not. If you're truly offended, get the manager to deal with it, that's not your job; and if you're easily offended, get a job away from the public.
42
Oh man, I know plenty of folks who could so be that customer...or Rockmama76's (@17) parents. They may have purged cat and chick from their vocabulary, but the man (or dude) lives ever on.
44
I read her blog. The customer was not harassing her. Dylan is biologically male, identifies as female looks gender neutral. The customer was not harassing Dylan he simply wanted to be left alone and she demanded a verbal explicit apology for the fact he called him "man" even though technically Dylan is. Here is a reality check: using this as leverage to harass people for honest mistakes does not win you allies. I have worked in customer service and have dealt with people far more offensive then this with far more diplomacy.
45
Also, fuck The Stranger for tolerating transphobic comments. You now delete homophobic, racist, and at least egregiously sexist comments. You completely tolerate transphobic comments, even slurs. That's a political and hateful stance.
46
"Man" has been used in casual speech for emphasis, not gender, since at least the '50s. Maybe it's fading. Being ignorant of that doesn't make you misgendered when someone uses that term, though.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mxMRCENr…
47
Ok, first off, people can be so stupid and cruel. Shame on them.

Second, I'm impressed w/ the owner trying to make it right.

Third, really, I'm just saddened by how mean and awful people can be.

48
typical uber sensitive,self rightous,self important,over entitled,hypocritically correct,ignorant drama magnet.
big gauges,septum pierced,..hair that looks like red foremans "whipped cream head" persona,and your going to get offended by a term that was im sure not meant to be taken in an offensive way? really?
then you throw a fit?
and the guy probably reacted the way he did because he hadn't meant it that way and was probably a little like,wtf? maybe?
off of your high horse,you ambiguous looking person with a penis who claims to be a woman.
good luck seeking new employment.
I suggest the pizza places and coffee joints on cap hill though,no career based job would hire you for a face to face CS postion based on your appearance and obvious GIGANTIC chip on your shoulder.
sorry if thats a bit too much reality for ya there kid.
49
This article is even sillier than Dylan Paul for not considering the possibility of the generic, non-gendered use of 'man' (which, by the way, goes back to the word's usage in Old English, and predates its gender-specific meanings). The only person this article reflects well on is Pagliacci's owner.

I get where Miss Dylan Paul is coming from. When a subject is raw for oneself, it is hard to treat possibly innocent remarks that rub the wrong way as anything but an affront. But maybe journalists are supposed to have a little more perspective than that, man.
50
@45
Might just be that there's no one in the office after 5 pm.
51
I read her blog a few hours ago when a friend had a link to it. This article is very different than what she posted. Either she changed it since then or SLOG manipulated facts. She was not told to go to the back to the restaurant if the customer came back. That is an obvious attempt to make it sound like she's Rosa Parks and was told to "go to the back of the bus". She was told she wouldn't have to deal with him and another staff person would help him. He also did not sound malicious or abusive. He sounded like he wanted Dylan to stop harassing him. Many things stated in this article contradict what I read on Dylan's tumblr a few hours ago. These changes in narrative are dishonest and an obvious attempt to frame Dylan taking an unintentional slight and making it into a catastrophe (which is what she did) into making it sound like harassment and/or threats had occurred even though by Dylans own blog account they had not.
52
Agree with Danielle Askini that companies should have a plan in place to deal with any harassment, discrimination, or violent reactions their trans employees may face from the public. Kudos to Pagliacci's for making this an occasion to move forward on that.

I'm interested to hear what folks think Pagliacci's should have done differently in regards to this customer. It sounds like Dylan wants him banned from the store and that seems kind of extreme to me. Is this a lifetime ban? It sounds like the customer has no desire to continue the feud or have a conversation about proper use of pronouns. The manager already spoke to him. He didn't use any slurs or throw a fit. Should he not be able to get pizza there?

53
Pathetic. Pagliacci's should have stuck to their guns and kept her fired. If they're going to sacrifice their business to Tumblr social justice pandering, throwing out paying customers for the sake of someone who clearly doesn't know how to get along with others or behave professionally, I don't see them staying open much longer.
54
I'll remember this next time I think about eating at Pagliacci's and won't.
56
Yegads my comment is daft. Somehow I trimmed that down to incomprehensibility, which is my usual habit, but wow it reads wrong.

I was trying to say that the whole thing leaves a bad taste in my mouth and I'll probably take a break from Pag's for a while. Usually I'm so happy to go there, but this whole thing is so ugly.

Cheers to the owner for doing the right thing though.
57
I drop "man" and "dude" casually too.

But I also like to think people would possess more tact and awareness about it in inappropriate situations, such as a when you offend someone of their gender; and if it's a slip (it happens), you would be able to own up to it. I can't believe that somehow, that's an acceptable excuse.

58
@37/45, have you ever actually worked anywhere? In this world, I mean.
59
Ansel,

This is the problem with how you approach writing. To you, the world is divided into two camps: good people oppressed by bad people, and your mission is to advocate for the oppressed good guy. The problem is that you are taking it upon yourself to decide for everyone who is good and bad - without bothering to ask very many questions.

There are more than two sides, and your posts would be richer and more interesting if you recognized that.

I've been openly gay for over 35 years. Several friends of mine have been fired for being gay; some have been beaten up for it. I get what antigay employment looks like, in many forms that it can take.

This wasn't one of them. She wasn't doing her job. That is the problem here. When you work retail you have to be careful how to handle customer harassment of employees. It needs to be clear-cut.

My husband works for Trader Joes. One day he was working the checkout line when an old-country babushka came thru. She was upset by my husband's gender-ambiguous appearance. She demanded to know whether my husband was male or female. Taken by surprise, he asked: "Which one do you want me to be?"

This set her off and she started shrieking curses at him until my husband's manager (a native of NJ) leaned over and said to her in a command voice: HEY! LADY! NO ONE CARES WHAT YOU THINK!"

That shut her up.

My point being: at no time was my husband rude to this woman. He did his job in a professional manner and left the escalation to his manager, who appropriately dealt with the harassment.

The employee in the situation you described tried to deal with the harassement by herself, which was a mistake. She should have reported the harassment to her manager first, and give him or her an opportunity to address it. Only then - if they failed to address it - would this have constituted a hostile work environment as you are suggesting.

If you would bother to inquire deeper and interview more people you might often find there is a richer and more complex story to tell. Reporters who divide the world into black and white - regardless of their political orientation - are not doing their readers a service.
60
@52

I don't think the post says that Matt Galvin, the owner, spoke to the customer, but the ban he mentions sounds conditional; if you act like this, then you are not welcome here. I don't think we really have enough information to know if the customer should be able to get pizza there again--and it's really up to the company and the law.
61
I feel strongly that the term 'cat' is shamefully underused as a salutation and needs to be reintroduced into the contemporary vocabulary immediately. Additionally it should be amended to 'hep cat' whenever possible.

Thank you for your prompt attention to this matter.
62
I guess people do use those masculine terms for everyone. The one that bugs me is "you guys" spoken to me and my senior citizen mother when we're together. But what bugs me isn't so much the gendering but the idea of someone in their 20s addressing someone old enough to be their grandmother as if she's a peer instead of an elder.
63
@59 right on. This case sounds very murky, where management and the employee could have handled it better. Pagliacci is queer friendly and I know other trans friends who work there and say their response has been good. I know we're used to fighting 'the man' when it comes to corporations but in this case I think Pagliacci made good. Especially after offering to rehire her, and give sensitivity training, she has no injury and no case to take to any human rights commission.
64
It's really cool that this person decided not to give the customer the benefit of the doubt and actually started shit with them the next time they came in. Sexual dimorphism exists in humans and just because you identify as a particular gender doesn't give you the right to get righteous while representing a company. She absolutely deserved to be fired for starting shit.
65
Let me grab my fawkin' violin!
66
Dylan Paul's whining makes me want to buy more Pagliacci pizzas than I already do.

I used to work with a woman who was often mistaken for a man. She understood that people would make that mistake on occasion and, when it was appropriate, she would politely correct them. No big deal, no demands for apologies, not threats, and NO WHINING. Ms. Paul needs to mellow out and learn that people do not always conform to her expectations. ESPECIALLY if she hopes to continue working in a customer service position.
67
I sometimes call my daughters and wife "man" or "dude." My 6 year old daughter has a friend that sometimes calls her "bro". These have become terms of endearment that have little to do with gender.
68
because all you motherfuckers were there in person and can accurately assess the situation, the tone and the intent! That's amazing how you can all time travel and relive the events in other people's lives and shit.
69
A further complaint after Pag's offered Dylan the job back and instituted sensitivity training is thoroughly out of line. They made a mistake and are making every effort to make good on it. Additionally, their initial response seems reasonable to me. They effectively gave her permission to avoid doing her job for a bit because this guy made her uncomfortable. "Get away from him and get somebody else to handle him," is a good way to resolve the situation such that she can be comfortable at her place of work, and this dude can keep giving the business money (which ostensibly is a thing both this dude and the business want to have happen).

The customer clearly fucked up here though. Maybe he was innocently using "man" in a non-gendered sense, maybe he wasn't. It doesn't really matter. If you make somebody feel shitty about who they are - even if it's on accident - you should probably apologize. It's not they hard to say "Oh shit I didn't mean it like that, sorry," or even, "Oh my bad. Sorry." It's going to make the other person feel a ton better, and costs you nothing. Did Dylan make a mistake by demanding an apology? Maybe, but that's not the point. The whole thing could have been sidestepped if this guy made a choice to give a shit about a fellow human being.
70
She has every right to address a customer when she has a problem with them. She sounded very polite when explaining to the customer how she felt about their interaction and instead of saying "hey, I didn't realize what I said offended you" and apologizing, he said it again. He knew she had a problem with it and blatantly ignore her polite request. I understand that man is used in a very generic way, but it can be offensive to people. Just like using the term "guy (s)". I'm glad I work in a customer service place that wouldn't allow this. My manager allows us to stand up for ourselves and others and gives us the right to express our concerns/problems with our customers and will back us up every time. I guess I'm just lucky to work for a place that follows anti-discrimination laws and supports/trusts it's employees. It's sad more businesses aren't like that. Just because someone is paying for a service doesn't give them the right to be disrespectful or rude.
71
This is a crazy story. Life in Seattle must be pretty easy if pizza shop employees can demand apologies for perceived slights from by their customers, and expect to keep their job. I'm sure Starbucks can't WAIT to hire this drama queen.

That pizza shop must be flooded with customers every minute of the day if they can afford turn away business so easily.
72
Just out of curiousity, why does this article contradict what Dylan herself posted? Why was the original use of the 'misgendering' not included? Why was the 2nd 'misgendering' included which specifically shows it was colloquial in use and not deliberately malicious?
73
Legal action? That ain't gonna go nowhere. A public mea culpa, retraining, and an offer to rehire and pursue better corporate polices is literally the best result she was going to get. Based on her original blogpost about this i got the distinct impression as well that this woman was fired not for being transgendered but for going public after her dispute with the manager and badmouthing pagliacci in front of customers. If thats the case, there are no grounds for a lawsuit. But you know, rock on dylan, way to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory.
74
I've always found the best response to intentional misgendering is reciprocity.

He says: "I don’t really care what’s happening in your life, man, I just need my pizza.”

I say: "Whatever you say, lady. I'm sure whatever man you're ordering from will be glad to get you a slice. Good to know you don't care, ma'am. Who's next?"
75
If you read her Facebook explanation (on reddit) she admits that she had already told her manager that she was quitting. So she wasn't fired. It's sad the owner has to bow to this selfish child's made up persecution. Of course this store is on broadway so it's incredibly smart to do what he is doing.
76
Can you say "pathetically self absorbed human being"? I knew you could.

Dylan, it's much easier to wear slippers than to carpet the planet.

77
My take away from transgender is that they are all super easy to piss off and offend if you say anything or look at them wrong. I think it's best to simply avoid them completely to protect you and them from anything that will be contrived as abuse.
78
First World Problem
79
This is a clear case of discrimination. A biological female or make would have list their job immediately after they initiated a confrontation with a customer for a perceived prior slight, and they would not have been hired back. This person was offered a new job entirely because of their transgender status. If you can't deal with idiots you have no pace in retail.
82
@ 37, your crusade against Pagliacci for not providing the perfect vegan pizza is well documented. I suggest that your prejudice disqualifies your opinion here.
83
obviously the asshole should have been fired,

it is sad to see the owner squirming and cravenly trying to avoid the predictable but totally unjustified PC shitstorm.
84
Wait, retail and food service workers can backtalk to customers whenever they want now? Sweet!
85
Dylan Dylan Dylan. You are a young and tender soul, just starting out in the world and learning that some people are inconsiderate jerks. I was a teenager in Mississippi in the mid-70s. I was chubby with freckles and curly hair when the societal norm for girls was thin with long straight hair. I couldn't stand disco music and and I didn't believe in racial discrimination. My life was made a living hell because of it. I was taunted, ostracized, and beaten up by a football player. Twice I was sexually assaulted and horrible rumors were spread about me. I wasted years hating myself because I allowed these people to project their hatred onto me. Now I love my curls and curves and who I've grown to be.

You are outside the norm. You are different. There will ALWAYS be people who will stare at you, laugh at you, treat you with less than the respect you think you deserve. How you choose to respond to that will determine your quality of life for the rest of your life. You are going to have to pick your battles carefully; otherwise your entire life is going to be made miserable by those who don't approve.

Gender identity aside, you are in a service industry and you are going to have to deal with asshole customers. It's one of the main requirements of the job. The sooner you learn how to do that and not take personal offense, the happier you will be. Best of luck to you going forward.
86
My grad program suppressed multiple sexual harassment claims by trans gendered students because they didn't want to deal with the reputation hit. This stuff happens a lot.
88
So if your manager decides your sexual harassment claim is unwarranted, then you can be fired for it? That's an awesome precedent. Morons. All the way down.
89
You can be fired for trying to kick out a customer who hadn't crossed any kind of line. I don't think the guy meant any harm in the first place, and starting off his next visit with a demand for an apology was not an effective (or appropriate) tactic. She should have let a manager handle it, if it had to be handled at all.

Firing might have been too much, but a write-up would have suited.
90
@88, it wasn't sexual harassment, that wasn't even the claim Dylan Paul made, just plain harassment. More, she wasn't fired for filing a bogus claim, but for trash-talking the company on the floor to other employees and in earshot of customers. Way to show strong reading comprehension while complaining about idiots.
91
Seems like someone forgot to shed the male privilege she was raised with at the trans door. Only someone raised as a white man would be so "shocked" that her "dignity was something so easy to dismiss." Welcome to womanhood!
92
What 24-year-old wants to be called "ma'am"?
93
Can we ban MiofInfo5? Their sole contribution in this thread has been hate speech.
94
@93: "Every" thread.

FTFY.
95
Well said, @85.
96
I am VERY supportive of the T in the LGBT, but this was a WAY overreaction by the employee. I don't need to be corrected by an employee of an establishment that I am frequenting, unless I did something hideously disrespectful. Way TOO much drama. She should have remained FIRED!
97
Ansel has become an expert of rustling up this low wage drama queens and spinning their bullshit tales. Always with stupid facial piercings, tattoos and weed whacker haircuts. A parade of losers who will always be stuck in low wage jobs. $15 an hr won't save their asses either.
98
Sad this happened.. And yes, you can say all you like that anybody in a customer service job gets crap from people all the time, so deal with it. But that doesn't make it ok. I can totally see why she would want to engage this one on a legal level.
So she trash-talked Pagliacci's, in a moment of hurt. They fixed it. They wanted her back. Good for them. It's not Pagliacci's at fault here now, they did a decent job, once the problem had been brought up to top level management.

It's the ongoing factor of the effect that this type of abuse has on a person, the daily wearing down of your soul, when it happens a lot, over time. Women (cis and trans) get abusive crap from guys like this all the time.

I am glad she's doing something that draws attention to it.

Good for Pag's, that makes me want to eat their pizza.
And good for Dylan Paul for not wanting to effing take it any more. I have been in the position where I have had to shut up and just take it, for the sake of keeping a job, etc. and that truly sucks.
99
Does Pagliacci sell whine?
100
I once worked years with Michelle, who became Mikhail. I never had an issue with his change and he knew it, we discussed it openly and he knew I respected him in every way. BUT...for the life of me, I could not stop with the 'her' reference in casual conversation, I would constantly correct myself within seconds and apologize.

It wasn't an insult, it was the deep seeded gender identification (think first impression psychology) I had from knowing Michelle for years. Because this was never done intentionally he laughed and gave me a pass on it...especially after a couple years of apologies and self-corrections. Psychologically we imprint people in our minds in specific groups...Dylan could easily have appeared to be male to the customer and that's where he locked her in at in his head. Especially when you consider it's a casual business relationship, the overt effort to identify this person really isn't there.

Regardless of what the intent of the customer was, purposeful, negligent, ignorant or colloquial, coming back and demanding an apology is just a doomed effort. You're not going to get 'satisfaction' out of the apology, you're now just seeking retribution...that isn't high on the customer service to-do list.

The customer may even have corrected his behavior on his own, had he made a gender reference in the future...he was never given the opportunity, he was confronted over something he likely didn't even remember.

If I was called out for the hundreds of times I called a woman "Man" or "Dude" and had an apology demanded of me I'd be far more anti-social than the customer. He just wanted his pizza...
101
Misgendering someone is appearance based sexual harassment. Closeted female trans "privilege" is not male privilege, unless cis male privilege leads to a 40%+ attempted suicide rate.
102
No employee in ANY establishment should ever tolerate abuse from customers and management should enforce respect for their employees, whether that means lecturing the customer and ordering them to cease their abuse, to ejecting the customer from the premises and filing legal charges for harassing employees trying to do their jobs and creating a hostile work environment.

Time to show these disrespectful jerks that the customer is NOT always right, particularly when they arrogantly deny the rights of LGBTIQ employees.
103
i self Identify as "lord Fauntleroy, the all-knowing one" and would like to put
in my notice that all ;far and wide; are now to refer to me as such. non-compliance
will result in a day long sensitivity training course. good day
104
@101 how non-normative of you.
105
Yeah, well, that's just, like, your opinion, man
106
A customer made you upset?.....she should grow some balls.
107
As @85 said, knowing how to pick one's battles is a very valuable life skill. If Dylan is going to take to task everyone who calls her "man," be it colloquially or antagonistically, she's going to become a very negative, bitter person. This whole thing got blown WAY out of proportion, and that's more the fault of the manager than anyone else. There will always be asshole customers, and her supervisor should have had her back, not fired her. The manager needs to get the boot or at the very least, a demotion, as they don't have any business managing other people.

But now she's planning to file a complaint after the owner of Pagliacci's has done everything he could to right the situation? That's dumb, and a waste of everyone's time. If she wants to continue doing good, she should join up with a trans-focused nonprofit or something.
108
@106 errr, how d'ya think they make the meatball special at Pagiacci? With the offended tears and testicles of the the sexually confused.
109
@88 Is this the only comment in the whole thread that mentions how ludicrous it is that an incident like this can lead to someone being fired? Saying 'Pagliacci doesn't care'? Heh?

I must say I am not terribly surprised by that however. I have a good friend who is a chef so I am well aware just how shitty restaurant employees are treated, especially kitchen staff. Indeed if there is one part of the work force above all others that desperately needs to be unionized, it would be restaurant workers.
110
the guy just wanted some pizza.

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