Sunday, November 23, 2008

Some People are So Rude

To begin, let me apologize for my lack of comments lately, but I promise I will get all caught up on reading in the next few days. I actually worked on Friday, as in went to a real workplace outside of my home.... I know, I know, weird. Then Friday night I went out with a few friends. Ever since Friday night I have been puzzling over how some people can be so rude.

A friend of mine from work and I decided we would call a couple other girls and go out to a local bar we like to go to on Friday's for karaoke. We had also discussed the possibility of running over to our local gay bar for an hour or so to see a friend of mine that bartends there. My husband had a long day and he didn't want to go. Her husband had been flying back across country all day after being out of town on work all week. He said he wasn't sure if he wanted to go or not. As background- we have gone on vacations with this couple for the last couple years, and go out with them on weekends or hang out at their house pretty regularly. Another friend wanted to go, and her husband may come with her. We all get to the bar around 7:30pm. Myself, my friend, our other friend and her husband, and another couple- we all eat and have a beer. Karaoke starts and we decide it might be a good time to run over to see my buddy at the gay bar. Obviously (although not necessarily so), my bartending friend is a gay guy. He is also my study partner at school. I am friends with him, his boyfriend, and about 10 of their other friends. A bunch of great guys.

So my friend calls her husband to see if he is in fact going to come out or not- so that he doesn't show up at one bar just as we have run over to another one. She tells him what the plan is. That is when he goes ballistic. For the next 20 minutes he is screaming at her on the phone. He was not only disparaging her- calling her all sorts of names and telling her she was being irresponsible. He was also being extremely rude and disrespectful to gays in general. She held the phone for me to listen during part of his tirade and it was all I could do to keep my mouth shut. Now, if you don't like gays, so be it. But name calling is really childish. And just an FYI- gay bars are not a den of iniquity with guys all over each other while straight women hang all over them wishing they could get in on the action. Our gay bar anyway, looks like any other bar- except perhaps that it has a disproportionate amount of attractive men sitting around.

At any rate, they argued and the entire time he was driving over to check and see if we were really at the karaoke bar. Then he asks my friend if my husband knows we are planning on going to the gay bar. She says he does indeed. Her husband says, "we'll see about that", hangs up, and proceeds to call my husband! Which my husband tells him that he knows and could care less. Really- is a woman safer in a karaoke bar full of drunk straight guys, or a upscale bar full of gay guys? hmmmm..... At this point I am pretty pissed that he called my husband anyway, because it isn't like I needed his permission to go to the gay bar, although I did tell him I would likely be going there out of married courtesy. I mean WTF?!?! You actually called my husband to ask if I had permission? Are you freakin kidding me?!?!

Friend then asked her husband if he called my husband. He says he did. She asks what did my husband tell him. He says, "well I'm not going to tell you all what he thinks about it.." Insinuating that my husband actually had an opinion that I shouldn't be going. Now I am even more pissed because I had just gotten off the phone with my husband and he relayed a brief rundown of the conversation. Basically the "I don't care if she wants to go there, but I don't want to go, and I hope she doesn't spend too much money". To keep myself out of trouble and not make things worse, I went back inside the karaoke bar and waited for them to finish up their argument. Had I said anything it would have gotten really ugly. Partly because I had heard all his crappy remarks about gays and then for him to call my husband and say what he said... oh, it would have been really ugly.

So my friend tells him that if he will go back home, she will stay at karaoke bar. Fine with me. Her choice. I can be happy either way. Do I think its ridiculous? Sure. Do I think he is jackass? Yep. Do I want to ever hang out with him again? Not so much. Do I want to tell him exactly what I think of his bigoted filthy mouth? you bet. Would it do me any good? It might make me feel better, but I'm pretty sure it wouldn't change his closed-mind. Do I stick up for my friends who are gay and tell him his attitude is rude and hateful and I refuse to go anywhere with him? Maybe I need to. So.... I ask all of you.... what would you do if you were me?

6 comments:

Unknown said...

Are you kidding me? What a jerk! Also, I would be so ticked off if someone else's husband called my husband to see if I had really gotten "permission" to do something. That's absurd.

I don't have any idea what I would do. On the one hand, there's no excuse for making prejudiced remarks and generally being a jerk. On the other hand, I doubt you'll be able to change his mind, and confronting him might damage your relationship with his wife (because let's be honest, any woman who marries a man like that will probably allow him to dictate her choice of friends.) It sounds to me like this guy has a few screws loose. He's not worried about his wife hanging out at a bar where there are plenty of straight men, but he IS worried about his wife hanging out around gay men? Perhaps he doesn't quite understand the concept of homosexuality...

Unknown said...

Also, before anyone gets upset with me... let me clarify that I don't think it's a bad idea in general to confront people when they make bigoted comments. I'm just saying I don't know if you'll accomplish anything, and since he was making comments to his wife and not to you (even though you overheard), it might not be the best idea to go out of your way to confront him on things he didn't actually say intentionally to you. Perhaps the best idea would be to decide before you see him again what you will say if he makes a bigoted remark in front of you, but not to go out of your way to confront him about things that he said to his wife.

Anonymous said...

Jackass doesn't begin to describe it...

I've been to gay bars before... it's no big deal... I've found most guys who are rabidly anti-gay are the ones most likely insecure with their own sexuality.

Unknown said...

Man oh man!!! Ummmmm well hmmmmmmm how do I say this nicely??? That friend's husband is a dick! Sorry for the cursing.... AND me being the person that I am would have totally confronted him and called him out on it! But hey I'm gay! lol He probably wouldn't want someone like me hanging around anyway!! LOL! And to seriously call YOUR husband??? Are you serious? Dude!!!! He needs to get a friggin clue and a life! Maybe he is gay on the inside and he is just hiding it or something!? If I were a man and had a wife I think I seriously would prefer her to go to a gay bar rather than one with a bunch of straight drunk men! Come on now and get a clue dude!! Or is he more afraid that she will find some woman at a gay bar and ditch him?? Sounds like he is totally toooooooooo insecure!! Confront him big time! Better yet....LOL Give me his number and I'll tell him myself!!! LMAO!

Anonymous said...

i would have left friend at the bar and went on to the gay bar with everyone else and proceeded to get shitty.

Mrs4444 said...

And yet, she loves him, right? That's messed up. I'd avoid confronting him, even if he does bait you in person by saying something ignorant. He'll just hate you for it, and it sounds like your friend might need you in the future; don't burn the bridge for her. She obviously knows what a lunatic he is; she let you listen.