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I was knocked on my ass today, figuratively, not literally.  There are a few things that I'm hyper sensitive to, so I'm not really sure if I'm blowing this out of proportion.  I'll give a little background by saying that there's a young man at work that I've grown pretty fond of. Not at all in a sexual way. He's completely straight and I'm not attracted to him in any physical way. But he's a very nice young man, with real life goals for himself. He's a very hard worker, he's kind and polite to everyone. Recently his Father decided he didn't want to be a husband or father anymore and abandoned his wife and two children, and moved back to his birth country of Ireland.  Of course this young man was quite distressed by this and confided in me, looking for advice. There wasn't much I could actually do to ease his pain, but I gave him encouragement. I also cooked his favorite dinner (my homemade macaroni) with all the sides and fixings and dipped it off at his house. He, his Mom and his Sister all thanked me profusely and I got a nice little Christmas confection package from them as well. His Sister also works at the Hardware store, and is a total sweetheart. I have had Grandfatherly feelings for both he and his Sister, and keep tabs on how they're coping (finish Carpenter joke). And I have received similar feelings of friendship from both of them. He's been going through all the steps to become a firefighter, and has been pretty successful thus far. Fast forward to today... He came by the lumber desk and just off the cuff made a very offensive joke. Something along the lines of "they should send mosquito netting to Africa to humanely save mosquitos from catching aides." 3 of my co-workers including my Manager were there. All of us found this highly offensive. My Manager first perceived the racial connotations,  while I sighted the homophobic implications as well. We were all pretty dumbfounded. I had my last break shortly after this, and had time to reflect on how offended I actually was by this. And am struggling with the idea that he couldn't understand how anyone, let alone a gay man or Black man wouldn't find this completely offensive.  After this my Manager mentioned a MAGA conspiracy rant by this same young man a week or so earlier. I'd never gotten any MAGA vibes before either. I'm kind of shell shocked. You can tell all the gay jokes you can come up with, and I will happily laugh along with you and repeat my favorite gay jokes as well. But as a gay man that survived the AIDS epidemic, and personally watched about a dozen friends die in their early twenties, I'm hypersensitive to AIDS jokes.  Is it possible this young man could in any way not understand this? Am I overthinking this, or blowing it out of proportion? I have no idea how to act, or approach this situation. I'm also afraid my Manager is going to say something to the higher ups, as I had trouble keeping my emotions in check and actually left work a few minutes early in tears. And he was angered that it upset me that much. I don't want to make a thing about this. And I feel that I have no right to expect others to share my values or ideas. I'm just more shocked than anything else, and I'm deeply hurt. But I don't want to retaliate in any way. I also don't want to give anyone else a negative view of said young man. He also has a right to his own ideas and views, political and otherwise. But I can't help feeling this was designed to offend me. I'm completely unaware of any situation that would have prompted any kind of negative feelings toward me. As I've stated, there have been zero reasons for him to feel anything inappropriate between us. He did recently move from the hardware dept. to the lumber yard, where the attitude can be a little more macho, and the jokes a bit more bawdy. But this seems extreme in any case. Am I misreading this? Am I just too sensitive? 

You Wish.  

Lunchtime assignation (with Joanne) Fish Taco's 'N Usual @Big Rock

Guess I need to get a pair of K1000s and start walking around with them. I'll be cool then, right?

a mashup of Ewan McGregor in Star Wars and talking about sea otters https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tfR4MCDx0Pw