Archived Turn the tables on religious persecution

[SoCalMama]

I mean....you don't really have the authority to turn them away or kick them out just for having shitty views on things. But if anyone is making you feel uncomfortable, you have the freedom to ask someone else to take over for you whether it be another team member or an LOD. Calling an LOD is the best thing to do if they're just being really belligerent or aggressive.

I've done this before with guests that were just hostile or I just couldn't help them for whatever reason. You're never going to change anyone's opinion, and work isn't really the place to have that kind of dynamic discussion. You're never going to teach anyone a lesson nor should be expecting to do that. My advice is to not feed into whatever nonsense guests are talking about. You don't have to agree with them, but you don't have to be so appalled either. I usually just say things like, "Is that right?" or "Well I don't know about that." and let the guest yammer away.

I've flipped my light on twice up front.

Once when some redneck decided he'd start swearing because he didn't want to pay the mandatory $4 recycling fee on his $100 television. I don't get paid enough at Target to listen to profanity.

Second time, some ignorant woman would not shut up about the bathroom policy, even after I quit acknowledging her existence. Best quote from that encounter, "I read all about it on the internet." Well, damn, it must be true lady if you read it on the www!

 

[NPC]

I've flipped my light on twice up front.

Once when some redneck decided he'd start swearing because he didn't want to pay the mandatory $4 recycling fee on his $100 television. I don't get paid enough at Target to listen to profanity.

Second time, some ignorant woman would not shut up about the bathroom policy, even after I quit acknowledging her existence. Best quote from that encounter, "I read all about it on the internet." Well, damn, it must be true lady if you read it on the www!

It's amazing how effective it is to just go, "I'm sorry about that, so are you still taking it?" And just staring at them until they make a decision. Sometimes I just ask, "So what are we doing?" I don't even offer to call a manager.

Lmao, the internet. Shit, that lady must know!!! XD this isn't really a "bad" encounter, but I once had to listen to a guest tell me all about why he was buying fluoride free toothpaste. Something about the fluoride not blocking his third eye. It was definitly a smile and nod moment.

 

[phibot]

Missing the point about not serving overly rude people.

If someone calls me a homo or some shit like that, then I'm going to ask the LOD to please assist this guest that I feel uncomfortable assisting.

Sure, but that wasn't the example that was provided. General statements =/= direct attacks

 

[commiecorvus]

I have a little bit of an advantage since when people start ranting about Christianity, I just smile and say that I'm Jewish.
That tends to shut most of them down right quick.
I work in a government office so I often have to bite my lip when people bring up political topics.
However, my boss has given us complete autonomy when it comes to being cursed at.
We get to tell them to leave or we will call the police.

 

[Mrlogistics]

I couldn't think of a damn title.

So, you know how *christians* are occasionally refusing to sell cakes, flowers, pizza, whatnot, to gays on the grounds that it offends their precious religious sensibilities? Well, can I refuse service to a guest who is being openly preachy and bigoted?

'm serious. This woman was going on and on about how she could only buy her grandson these kids books but they had to be the ones about Noah or Adam & Eve and the other books "should never have been written".

I'm offended!!! I wanted to call a TL and excuse myself. She was really making me uncomfortable and I NEVER feel uncomfortable by guests. I might be angry or laugh at them but this was really outrageous. I wanted to excuse myself to go to the men's room, just to fuck with her.

Seriously, she was gay bashing and rainbow bashing and bathroom bashing. I wish she'd just gone to Walmart.

What are my rights as a Target employee?

I think some of us may just be a little too sensitive. Old people are set in their ways, and I doubt it was any sort of personal attack.

 

[Flow Warrior]

You make a great point, but I think the idea is to give them a taste of their own medicine. It might not be the best solution, but I do think they need to know how they're making others feel by denying service based on something that can't really be controlled. If someone didn't sell a wedding cake to an interracial couple, people would flip out. But for some reason, it's acceptable and encouraged (in some subset of the population) to deny services to the LGBT community and these people need to wake up and learn how it feels to be discriminated against.

It's not necessarily about revenge, it's about teaching them a lesson. Again, I'm not sure this is the best way to go about it, but there is some merit to it.

That is an interesting point, however, I have a story to tell. I have encountered people sadly in target as guests and elsewhere who as you say would shout discrimination if it was a interracial couple. The reason why they think it's acceptable and encouraged to deny services to the LGBT community because they believe they are mentally ill. Yes, you read the words correctly. They believe that LGBT people are mentally ill and that we should be 'helping' them by not.

You can't teach a lesson to a person who doesn't believe in the concepts of the lessons.

So its never as easy as you think. In the future if you feel uncomfortable, by all means find a TM who is willing to do it. I personally don't care what the persons ideology is. I'm there to find them stuff to buy.

Example: Today, had a lady come up to me looking for a pill she found on google to feed her dog because it vomits when she drives with it. I gently suggested that would be medicine and that she should consider taking her pet to the vet.

She said she did already and vet told her to stop driving it around it has issues with balance and thats why it vomits. But she said she takes it everywhere so she needs to get it something. Pulls out phone and shows me a text in most a foreign language that mentiosns Pepto bismol for children. So I again warn her about feeding our medicine to dogs and take her over there to the pharmacy area.

Its not my job to care if she kills her dog through idiocy. Its not my business to worry if your lady believes that the only books that should exist should be biblical. It only becomes so if I meet them outside the store.

 

[BigEyedPhish]

I couldn't think of a damn title.

So, you know how *christians* are occasionally refusing to sell cakes, flowers, pizza, whatnot, to gays on the grounds that it offends their precious religious sensibilities? Well, can I refuse service to a guest who is being openly preachy and bigoted?

'm serious. This woman was going on and on about how she could only buy her grandson these kids books but they had to be the ones about Noah or Adam & Eve and the other books "should never have been written".

I'm offended!!! I wanted to call a TL and excuse myself. She was really making me uncomfortable and I NEVER feel uncomfortable by guests. I might be angry or laugh at them but this was really outrageous. I wanted to excuse myself to go to the men's room, just to fuck with her.

Seriously, she was gay bashing and rainbow bashing and bathroom bashing. I wish she'd just gone to Walmart.

What are my rights as a Target employee?

All you can do is accept their Idiocy, and refuse to put yourself on their level.

 

[Redzee]

An angry guest confronted me about Spot's policy and plans and I said that's Corporate and they don't check with me.

 

[Kartman]

I do a back-flip and go "Tah-Dah!!!"

 

[Tessa120]

I had one sucky encounter with a bigot. The wife wanted to get some pull-ups and wanted to take advantage of a "get a gift card" offer. The absolutely only way it could be done, due to lack of inventory, was to buy one girls' themed pull-ups and one boy's themed pull-ups. She was concerned about product difference and I was explaining that the only difference was color and character when the guy started in about how kids could choose their gender these days. I just fixed a smile on my face that I knew either looked fake or looked like a snarl and he just kept going on. I'm pretty sure he kept going because it was obvious that I was taking offense.

That is an interesting point, however, I have a story to tell. I have encountered people sadly in target as guests and elsewhere who as you say would shout discrimination if it was a interracial couple. The reason why they think it's acceptable and encouraged to deny services to the LGBT community because they believe they are mentally ill. Yes, you read the words correctly. They believe that LGBT people are mentally ill and that we should be 'helping' them by not.

I have no words. That is super insulting to gay people and super insulting to mentally ill people. I can't even think of a response to that line of thinking.

 

[graffiti]

I work with a lot of LGBT+ and ally management who'd totally have a TM's back for excusing themselves from the interaction (some E/TLs outright told guests off around the time of Pulse), although I usually just put up with it until I can escape and talk shit about them to my coworkers because I hate confrontation. I feel like exusing yourself by saying they're welcome to file any of their complaints with guest service or to get the number to corporate from them, and then warning a TL and guest service about the situation in case there is a complaint about you, would be a reasonable response to the bigotry. Target has been really big on inclusivity so it'd be hypocritical for management to expect you to be subjected to or to punish you for that.

 

[Redzee]

I have no words. That is super insulting to gay people and super insulting to mentally ill people. I can't even think of a response to that line of thinking.[/QUOTE]

Many people of a generation myself included, were taught precisely that. There used to be extraordinary stigma attached to either situation.
(Couldn't activate quote box Jenna :/)

 

[redeye58]

The thing that stuns me most is the apparent hypocrisy; that some religious folk will deny services at a job that demands equal treatment for everyone but seek exemptions because it runs counter to their 'deeply-held religious beliefs'.
If they don't get exempted from doing said job, they scream 'RELIGIOUS PERSECUTION!'
Even when exempted, they try to thwart anyone else from serving said individual because they don't believe such individuals deserve 'protected status'.

 

[smashandthrash]

Thanks for the money, you angry person, you.

 

[buliSBI]

I have never had a guest that started on a religious tirade. More of I privileged and "Guest is Always Right" attitude.

I had a few that made strong comments about Target/Salvation Army, and the urban myth rumors that Target was a French company or forced TMs to say Happy Holidays.

The Golden Rule is to treat every guest equally and politely. Even though TMs have to bend over backwards for some. But if a guest is making you feel uncomfortable, let them say what they have on mind. Present the Guest Relations info or get a TL/Exec involved. TMs are paid to defend Target policy but not enough to debate social politics.

There are some guests that will purposely pull a TM into an argument in order to get something out of it.

 

[2Spooky4U]

Second time, some ignorant woman would not shut up about the bathroom policy, even after I quit acknowledging her existence. Best quote from that encounter, "I read all about it on the internet." Well, damn, it must be true lady if you read it on the www!

I love when people bring up the bathroom policy. Outside of being transphobic, the main argument tends to be that it allows predators to go into the bathrooms unchecked; following that argument, I will immediately respond with "so how do you feel about the fitting rooms?" Our fitting rooms aren't gender segregated. They have a somewhat similar layout to the bathrooms, the only major difference (besides it being okay to take a piss or shit in one and not the other) is the front door, and while I'll state ASANTS, our store keeps the main bathroom doors propped open. The guest service desk is right next to it, while fitting rooms on and off are manned at the desk by at least one person, so there is at least some half-assed safeguard there in the form of a team member should a crisis arise.

If you wanted to pick someone up and take them to Touchytown™️, a magical gender wall isn't going to stop them. It's barely about the same level of difficulty to snatch someone up in the fitting room as it is in the bathroom, which is what leads me to believe these people couldn't care less about people getting the trenchcoat-and-van special. It's because they don't like trans people.

 

[Tessa120]

I love when people bring up the bathroom policy. Outside of being transphobic, the main argument tends to be that it allows predators to go into the bathrooms unchecked; following that argument, I will immediately respond with "so how do you feel about the fitting rooms?" Our fitting rooms aren't gender segregated. They have a somewhat similar layout to the bathrooms, the only major difference (besides it being okay to take a piss or shit in one and not the other) is the front door, and while I'll state ASANTS, our store keeps the main bathroom doors propped open. The guest service desk is right next to it, while fitting rooms on and off are manned at the desk by at least one person, so there is at least some half-assed safeguard there in the form of a team member should a crisis arise.

If you wanted to pick someone up and take them to Touchytown™️, a magical gender wall isn't going to stop them. It's barely about the same level of difficulty to snatch someone up in the fitting room as it is in the bathroom, which is what leads me to believe these people couldn't care less about people getting the trenchcoat-and-van special. It's because they don't like trans people.

Oh people freak out about the fitting rooms.

I had a mother of a pair of 13 year olds that was all weirded out by me sending them into separate fitting rooms instead of together into a family room. She was talking about how some guy got his hands on a kid and was trying to take her out of whatever store they were in and no one was paying attention. Ma'am, you really think that with me there sorting clothes and you watching the hall and AP watching the cameras and no back exit that someone is going to get his hands on your kids? And if you are really that afraid, why did you refuse my offer of sitting on one of the benches in the hall and instead are standing in a way that partially blocks your view?

Then there was another woman who talked about how it was inappropriate to send a kid old enough to dress himself into a fitting room that she couldn't see the front door of, simply because it is mixed gender which makes everything inappropriate, who also refused my offer of sitting in the hall. Again, me there, you there, AP watching, what's going to happen?

Or the woman that also refused my offer of a seat who wanted her daughter to simply open the door and show off her swimsuit instead of stepping into the hall because it would be inappropriate for other guests to see her dressed like that. Bitch, you are willing to buy a bikini for your 12 year old that's going to show her body off to teenage boys and grown men when she goes swimming and it's totally appropriate to you for her to be seen in that context, but it's totally inappropriate for her to wear the same bikini in a store? And if your thinking is weird enough to honestly believe that, her opening the door to a fitting room that anyone walking by can see in is going to make her far more visible than her opening the door and stepping out into the hall at the far end with you sitting in the hall near her.

Yeah, I'm more often away from the fitting room than right there, but the accompanying person will always be there, and AP is always watching because that's a prime spot for stealing, so yeah, nothing is going to happen.

 

[redeye58]

I've always responded to the 'bathroom boogie man' scenario with the following: So you're worried that some guy will dress up like a woman so he can sneak into the women's & try to accost your wife/daughter who are in individual locked stalls. Why aren't you worried about the pedophile standing next to your young son at the urinals?

 

[Kartman]

It's the Lord's Will.

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