What is My Job to You?

                My coworker and I were leaving the live theatre we work at to go work a box office shift off-site for a different event we were hired for. We were busy telling stories and laughing and having a grand time, but I had the feeling that someone was staring at me. I had a quick glance around to see if my suspicions were true, and just to my left was a construction worker getting his bike ready to leave after his day of work. He was giving us, or rather me¸ a very critical stare as if I was doing something wrong. I re-evaluated everything that I was doing and I couldn’t think of one thing that I was doing remotely wrong; I was at work, I was doing my job, and I was being a positive and dedicated employee.

                This man was staring at me so intensely that I was just about to ask him “can I help you?” But before I could say a word, this man spits out one of the most offensive sentences I have heard spoken to me in a long time. He stated, “you should be working up here with the men, not in there with all of the ladies.” All the while he had a look of disgust on his face while he was saying this to me. I outright laughed in his face, my coworker was silent. The man was confused at my reaction, hopped on his bike and left the area. I looked at my coworker and said, “he obviously doesn’t know my day job.” This is, in fact, very similar to his job.

                Then, as my defensive walls began to go back down once the danger had passed, I began to get very upset. It is people like him that make it hard for women to work in fields that are not stereotypically female jobs, and for men to work in fields that are the opposite. And, out of all of the men that work at this theatre (which is the majority of the employees), why was I the one to be the target of criticism? I sell tickets and snacks there, it’s no different than working in a movie theatre or a concert hall, yet the men that work there aren’t criticized. Not only that, but I shouldn’t have to defend that my job is more masculine than people think, because what does it matter?

                I want to find this guy and talk to him. I want to ask him why he figured that it was appropriate for him to express that thought to me. I want to know if it really affects his life that I work in a place that he deems feminine, and why is that wrong? I want to know if he feels improper building a facility that is dedicated to the arts (because that is what this construction company is working on)? I want to know if this guy knows that his words really hit home to me, because I have been bullied my whole life about my life choices and how they have not been the most masculine decisions. I have not felt the way I did that day since high school. I want him to know that his words only make my choices more strongly aimed towards my non-masculine passions, and that I will never succumb to the gender binaries our society dictates we should follow.

                All in all, after taking so many classes about oppression and promoting the progress of removing that oppression, I have become naive in our society and how little progress we’ve actually made. I have been surrounded by great, accepting people and it surprised me to see someone with such a backwards and disappointing way of thinking. Granted, he was probably raised on that mindset, and it’s possible that he is surrounded by people who think similarly, and so he may have been just as surprised of me as I was of him. Regardless, it was a huge newsflash to me – and that my job as a teacher in this disgusting society is going to be a lot harder than I imagined.

Until next time,

Dillon