Sorry if this post is incoherent/not worded well, I’m just stressed and not sure what to do. I started working at this bakery in January and right off the bat things were really sketchy.
I am a transgender woman and felt like I had to tell my interviewer about that because he was going to see my drivers license which says Male so no point in trying to hide it. He then starts telling me that he fired a transgender employee because they used the woman’s restroom and didn’t look like a woman which “freaked the guests out”. He also said that it might be a problem if I told everyone I was transgender and wanted to use the female bathroom.
This was immediately red flag territory but I ended up accepting the job because he said the pay would be about 17 an hour as a host with tips (it was nowhere near that), and because he said he was leaving soon and moving to a different state.
I also started at this job because they said they would train me on the line as kitchen staff but they didn’t even train me for a week and then told me I wasn’t fast enough which was a huge blow to my self esteem.
Then, just recently I was talking to 2 other employees and they were talking about how they were going to have to quit because they weren’t making enough money. I asked how much their hourly was and they said 8.50 and I told them how I was making 10 and they were being underpaid.
A week later a different manager pulled me aside and was asking why I was talking about wages. I immediately said I was talking about pay because I heard it is illegal for employers to punish employees for talking about wages. She then said while it’s technically illegal, talking about wages is “unprofessional” and creates a negative work environment because people will be jealous if someone deserving gets a raise. She also started saying how she doesn’t know what any of the other managers make and she doesn’t care (probably because she makes so much she can afford her convertible sports car.)
Anyways, a whole week later, she pulls me aside again and asks why I talked about wages. At this point I’m very confused because I hadn’t even talked about them since, not to be obedient but just because it hadn’t come up. She then says it has caused a huge headache and lots of employees have come forward asking about their pay. She said that the founder would have sent people home for talking about wages and it’s a big no no and that she can’t wait for me to learn and grow in professionalism. She also said that if I continued to talk about then she would write me up and if it kept happening I would be fired.
Now I’m not really sure what to do. I know I should quit but I’m wondering if there’s any legal recourse, they also don’t give hosts their legally mandated 30 min break every Saturday, the shift is just shy of 7 hours long. Is there anything I can do or should I just cut my losses and forget about this place? My workplace is in Tennessee in the US if that helps.