Dear Tiggy,
I am a bisexual woman happily married to a man for 24 years. I recently came out to one of my co-workers. We are friendly and have lunch together sometimes and enjoy a lot of banter and mild flirting. Discussing the recent legalization of same-sex marriage in Utah, where we live, a door opened wide and I walked through it telling her that I am bisexual.
She is one of two managers in our 30-person department, but not my manager. Owing to office dynamics I feel like I should tell my manager and our director as well. But I am just not sure how. I have worked in this department for two years now and because I am married to a man, people assume I am straight. Directly telling them I am not is my only option aside from waiting for another door to open so I can casually mention it, which seems unlikely to ever happen.
I am not sure how best to come out to them, I respect them and they are very open-minded and would in no way hold it against me. I did take the step of joining the LGBT associate group but I need advice on how to handle a direct conversation like this that will likely blow their minds.
-Annie
It sounds like you’re ready and eager to give your workplace pals a look into your rainbow-filled closet! But let’s get this out of the way first: you feel like you “should” tell your manager and director but the reality is that you don’t owe them that. In this situation, you owe it to yourself to live authentically and to protect yourself from being fired — more on that in a minute — as far as circumstances allow for each. You owe your partner respect and communication on the subject. So what does that leave you owing people at work? Right, not a blessed thing. I just want to make sure you know that the choice is yours and it would not breach workplace ethics to not tell. But hey, if you’re rarin’ to go, let’s pack up the “why” get on with the “how” already!
…right after I give you this caveat. See, this isn’t just your personal journey in sharing your multi-faceted selfdom with acquaintances. There are some real world implications here and unless you’re one of those one-percenters for whom employment is just a lark, I’d be remiss not to point them out.
Although folks across America have been working for two score to pass an Employment Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA) that protects LGBT people, there is no federal ENDA and none in Utah. Fortunately, the University of Utah and Salt Lake City have both passed protections for their queer employees. But if you don’t work in either UofU or SLC, you would have little legal recourse if your company fired you for reasons related to being bi. In short, queer people are vulnerable in the workplace.
The worry here isn’t that your current superiors don’t like LGBT people. It’s that somewhere down the line, you could end up with a conniving coworker or new manager/director who wants to stab you in the back for whatever reason. An easy way to do so would be to show Human Resources evidence that you’re exploring “sexual” stuff at work. Understand that that’s how bisexuals are seen — as sexual — whereas gays and lesbians now mostly bring up connotations of family and committed couples. (Wow, bisexuals really need their own “Modern Family”-style sitcom. Cam and Mitchell are public relations GOLD.)
Since it’s up to you to protect yourself in the odd circumstance that someone has it in for you, I suggest you simply don’t leave an online trail at work. Don’t write anything about your personal life from your work email account, ever. And if you surf this column or any other bi-related sites during the daily grind, even if they’re totally clean, erase your history whenever you leave your desk. As an out bisexual worker bee, it will behoove you to keep a spotless electronic history on the job lest you give this hypothetical person ammo on a silver platter.
I know I sound paranoid. Humor me. If you were to write back to me having lost your job because I wasn’t clear about the lack of safety net for bisexuals, well…Tiggy would have trouble sleeping at night.
Now that I’ve laid out my conspiracy theories, I’ll hand off the fun stuff to Heidi Bruins Green, longtime chair of the Bisexual Advisory Committee for Out & Equal, the world’s largest nonprofit specifically dedicated to creating safe and equitable workplaces for LGBT people. Hey, Heidi, how do you suggest Annie come out?
“One of my [favorite ways] is to look for an opportunity where I am having a personal conversation in which I can bring up something about a same-sex former partner,” says Heidi. “I then watch for how the other person reacts, and expand in one of multiple directions. This can include saying something like, ‘I don’t remember if I’ve ever mentioned that I’m bisexual, did I?’ If I’m not direct with the word ‘bisexual,’ I might try to casually show a pattern of going back and forth between male and female partners…though that route gets tricky in a conservative environment, as you want to avoid seeming like a slut.”
Heidi also encourages you to talk about this with friends from your workplace LGBT group. I’m pleased to hear that you have one, and it was a terrific idea to join it. Many people who don’t work for large companies aren’t aware that these affinity groups exist to celebrate diversity. In fact, the word on you might be out just from your joining that group. (It’s kind of nice for bisexuals when the gossip spreads because then we don’t have to come out to every person on Earth one by one. Far less time-consuming to farm it out to the rumor mill, really.)
Thumbs up on soon being an up-and-coming out-and-proud bi, Annie, and here’s to job security for LGBT people the world over.
Annie, be sure to put a cover sheet on your Bisexuality Report to the office. You got the memo on that, right?
© 2014 Tiggy Upland. Tiggy Upland reserves the right to use all submitted queries anonymously, in any medium.