I used to work as an interviewer in an office for a well-known park. One day, a nice man on crutches with cerebral palsy came in and asked about a job. I felt sorry for him and decided to offer him the telemarketing job, which was to just sit and take calls all day.

However, my boss took one look at him, chased him out, and then literally yelled at me for even considering hiring him for a park even though there were office jobs. Later, I was fired.

I’m glad that I never went back, even though I cried bitter tears. Discrimination is real and alive. I always knew this, but that day, I saw it.

I am helping an older male patron with the printer. I’m female. He asks what I think of a particular sexual abuse case that is in the news. I give a vague answer, which he doesn’t listen to as he starts rambling about all these terrible things coming to light now all over the world. He says that it is great that people can speak up now, but it’s terrible that it happened at all, and everyone knew but no one said anything, etc.

Patron: “I guess you ladies in the library wouldn’t have these problems?”

I start to reply but he carries on:

Patron: “It’s the pretty young girls who have to worry, isn’t it?”

I didn’t know where to start with that, so I just said the printer was fine now and left him to it.

I’m a transman. Before realising I wanted to transition when I was twenty, I struggled with my sexuality, believing myself to be a lesbian, which my parents — of course — passed off as a phase, before I realized I was “sort of bisexual.” (My actual sexuality is more complex than that, as I understood some years later.)

After I’ve been living as male for a while, I have a long-distance relationship with a lovely woman for a couple of years. It fizzles out, and a while later, I start talking to a sweet guy online.

Here is how my mother and my stepfather take that.

Mother: “Oh, did I tell you that [Older Cousin] is getting married?”

Me: “No? I didn’t even know she’d been seeing anyone since she broke up with her last boyfriend.”

Mother: “Yeah, he works in the medical industry. Quite well off. He’s called John.”

Me: “Huh. I’ve been talking to a guy called John who’s interested in me.”

Mother: “Wait. Really?”

Me: “Yes?”

Mother: “I thought you were straight now.”

Me: “What?!”

Mother: “I mean, after [Ex-Girlfriend]—”

Me: “I’ve always been into both men and women! That hasn’t changed because I finally had a longer-than-brief relationship with a woman!”

Mother: “Oh. Well, how do you know he’s really into you?”

Me: “…”

Mother: “I mean… what if he just wants—” 

She gestures towards my crotch.

Me: “Because. He’s. Gay.”

Also, I don’t think most straight men want to sleep with someone who is a man, and both looks and sounds like it, simply because he has a vagina. Come on, now.

After I get with this guy, this happens.

Mother: “I told your dad—” *meaning my stepfather* “—about you and John.”

Me: “Oh?”

Mother: “Yeah, he didn’t get it.”

Me: “What’s not to get?”

Mother: “Well, he doesn’t understand what the point of being a man is if you’re just going to have a relationship with a man anyway.”

Me: *Pause* “Oh, my God.”

Anyway, “John” and I eventually got married, once we were legally able to. He’s pretty fantastic. My parents behaved terribly on our wedding day, and that was the final straw on top of a whole bale of being awful. I’ve cut ties with them, and that’s also been pretty excellent!

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I went to an all-girls high school. One day, when I was fourteen or fifteen, we had a hired job counselor come and hold a presentation on possible careers. It bored all of us to tears.

But the worst part was that at one point, the counselor suddenly stopped, looked around, apparently realised that we were all female, and said this gem:

“Oh, you’re all girls. You don’t need to plan for a long career; you’ll all get married and have children.”

I walked out.

I’ve been wanting a scroll saw for a bit and I find one on Facebook Marketplace. I message the seller and, once I confirm it is available, I ask to bring the price down from $190 to $140; I am ready to go to $150, but the seller agrees to my initial offer. We make some basic plans to meet the next day and then he messages me halfway through that next day with his phone number asking me to call.

Seller: “Hello?”

Me: “Hi. It’s [My Name] calling about the scroll saw.”

Five solid seconds pass.

Seller: “I… I thought you were a man.”

Me: “Yeah, I figured.”

He’d called me “buddy” a few times in the messages the day before.

Seller: “It’s… It’s a man’s tool.”

Me: “Okay. Well, I have a band saw now and need a scroll saw for some more delicate work.”

This seems to be good enough for him and we settle on a time and place. As we finalize our plans, he says softly:

Seller: “It’s too much…”

Me: “Sorry? What was that?”

Seller: “What price did we agree on?”

Me: “$140.”

Seller: “It’s too much.”

Me: “I don’t understand.”

Seller: “Maybe 120.”

Me: “What’s 120?”

Seller: “120.”

Me: “Okay…”

For reasons beyond me, when I arrived to pick up the machine, he asked me again how much we agreed on and I said $140. He shook his head and said that it was $120. Weirdest online buy/sell I’ve ever experienced, and I’ve experienced a lot of weirdness buying and selling on these sites.