We have a new worker in our unit who is a transgendered male. He works well and has a good
rapport with youngsters, but two of my colleagues find this really funny. They tease him all the time and make jokes that make me feel uncomfortable. He has not said anything, but he must be unhappy about it.
Given that the fundamental ethos of youth and community work is about valuing diversity and encouraging empathic communication, I am so disappointed that there are practitioners behaving like this.
However, as a kind of defence mechanism, some people make fun of the issues they find difficult to discuss or confront. So it might be that your colleagues are not being so much malicious as feeling nervous or embarrassed about the situation and are unable to deal with these feelings in a mature way.
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