Making this post for a friend, I hope r/antiwork is the right place for it.
TLDR at bottom
So my friend got a job at an optometrist clinic just two weeks ago. The pay is good, they are advancing quickly in training and by all means it should be a decent work environment. As you probably predicted, it is not a positive environment for them.
For context, my friend is the only black employee there, and also they identify as non binary.
In summary: there is one specific coworker, their trainer to be precise, who behaves beyond unprofessionally. On the first day she made suggestive comments about said friends natural afro. The second day was after the horrific massacre in Uvalde TX, and she proceeded to rant about insert insensitive extreme pro gun views. This trainer is constantly giving her opinions, entirely unsolicited, to my friend and making them very uncomfortable. The most recent rant was terribly critical of the LGBT+ community, of which this friend is a part of.
Now regardless of your political views I think we can all agree that the work place is not an appropriate environment to hold someone hostage with your political/religious beliefs (nor is anywhere imo). But where she really crossed the line was attacking them personally stating “if they (friend) were more bubbly and less quiet, maybe they wouldn’t be single”. This type of talk is unacceptable, boils my blood, and I personally want to confront this work bully; which obviously would only make things worse.
How can they discreetly make this behavior stop? This woman is definitely the type of person to retaliate and react poorly if it got back to them. Because they’ve only had the job two weeks, vs jerk wads two years, it seems scary to approach someone in charge about this issue. Especially since they’re a PoC who would probably be dismissed as being overdramatic. What can be done to make work less awful?
TLDR: terrible work bully rants all day and makes personal attacks against my friend. They are worried about bringing it to the attention of a superior as the bully has worked there significantly longer and could retaliate.