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I'm a 36-year-old homo in a large metropolitan city with a sizable gay community. I'm out, proud and being single. I'm also on the promiscuous side. Being that I'm a slut (a label I'm not afraid of) and that it's also 2017, there exists a number of photographs of me in a number of sexual positions. My face isn't clearly visible in any of them, but some photos show more of me than others, including tattoos.

I've sent these photos out over the gay hookup apps. Now, in my mild defense, I'm 36. I remember IRC chat rooms, which predate even AOL. When I used gay.com it took more than ten minutes to attach a photo to an email. I've sent and received dick pics thousands of times in 16 years.

So imagine my surprise when I was setting up work at my restaurant—where I've been employed for only three months—and I glance over and spot a busboy showing photos I recognize to a manager. I step closer and it's very obvious to me—having seen and sent this photo for over a year—that it's my mouth with a dick in it. I watch as he scrolls and it's a photo of me in a mask (my lower jaw visible) at IML, he scrolls again and it's me with another dick in my mouth.

I confronted him and asked, "Where did you get those?" Busboy told me he got them from his cousin who talked to me and I apparently told the cousin I worked in the neighborhood. Cousin sent Busboy my pics asking if he recognized me, and Busboy (allegedly) didn't recognize me and was asking Manager if he did. I demanded to see pictures of the cousin, and he showed me one bad photo of a guy I didn't recognize.

I was willing in that moment to forgive Busboy and acknowledge I'd been catfished and forget it all if Busboy deleted my photos and we all just moved on. But eighteen hours later, I'm feeling skeezy about it. When I was newer to the job, Busboy showed me a video of himself fucking someone, and I humored him by watching after listening to him tell me some hookup story. But why was he showing those pics to Manager? Did he know they were me and was trying to show them and saying "do you recognize him" or did he really just not know?

There were so many questions I didn't even think to ask in the moment and now I'm wondering what, if anything, to do.

Manager was standing right there when Busboy told the story, and he didn't refute it, so I am inclined to believe he's just dense, he was doing what he said he was doing, and that it was an innocent mistake. When he was clocking out I happened to be at the computer and I asked "did you delete those?" He said he did and I asked if I could see his phone, but he said his ride was outside and left in a hurry. He also said he only had two photos of me but I definitely saw at least four. But on the other hand maybe he doesn't know those other ones are me?

I don't know what to do. I only see Manager once a week and if it's truly nothing I don't want to involve the whole management team and owners. I'd hate to think what might happen if the owners learn their employee is sending out photos of them having sex. I live and work in a prominent gay area, every single homo I work with has waited on people they've slept with, or swapped pics with. It shouldn't be a big deal, but I'm reluctant to peruse it if it means everyone knows these photos exist.

Sigh. I don't know what to do.

Improperly Tossed My Fotos Around

Let's think this through: You work as a waiter in a gay neighborhood, you're gay yourself, and, like millions of other gays (and straights and bis and pans and on and on), you've swapped dirty pics with prospective partners online. By your own account you've released hundreds of dirty pictures into the wild over the last 16 years.

I can't imagine this news—there's proof circulating online that one their gay waiters had a dick in his mouth—is going to come as a huge shock to the rest of the management team or the owners. It shouldn't be a big deal, ITMFA, like you said. But that doesn't make what Busboy did acceptable—or what Manager failed to do, i.e. shut Busboy down. Busboy was sharing intimate-if-semi-widely-shared pictures of you with a coworker and for a transparently bullshit reason. This could create—what's it called? Oh, yeah: a hostile work environment. And that creation could in turn create large legal headaches for the owners if you decided to make a big deal out of this or if the same thing happened to another employee who decided to make a big deal out of it—and could, if they learned of it, point to your experience to prove a pattern.

You're in a predicament, ITMFA. Pursue this—complain about exactly what happened to you the other day—and you'll be forced to have an awkward conversation with your employers about the cocks you've had in your mouth and the photos you've shared. Let it go and asshole Busboy and negligent Manager will continue to behave in ways that make you and others feel uncomfortable, singled out, or harassed.

If I were in your shoes, ITMFA, I would be to go to the managers over Manager's head—or go to the owners directly—and ask if to speak confidentially. Then I would tell the owners there's far too much dick pic swapping and dirty video sharing going on during work hours. I would tell them it's distracting, it's unprofessional, and that while I don't have a problem with it personally—goodness no—I'm concerned a customer or a fellow coworker might.

If they're concerned—and they should be (this is how sexual harassment lawsuits happen)—they can direct their management team to put a stop to dirty pic-and-video sharing during work hours. That won't magically delete your photos from Busboy's phone, and it won't make Manager any less complicit in Busboy's assholery, but it might keep it from happening again.

HUMP! 2017 Call for Submissions!

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