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Comment by sacheendra | Hacker News Reader

Can you explain specifically whats wrong with the comment.

This could be making fun of a friend. How is this harassment?

In a workplace you are talking to a colleague that you respect. In my experience "princess" is either used to refer to a child or someone who is spoiled and weak. It's really all about context, if I call my friend a "cunt" at home when he uses a blue shell in MarioKart no one is uncomfortable but if I used it in the workplace it's a huge problem and will make people really uncomfortable.

"Making fun of" someone at work is harassment.

Context matters, and we have none. It could either be an incredibly rude thing to say, or an inside joke between the two people.

And the fact that it's on that list suggests that the recipient didn't like it. Why call someone a name they don't like? Who gets anything out of that interaction?

"Princess" in the UK at least would be pretty offensive in that context - I wouldn't dream of calling a colleague that.

Depends on the colleague, I have done that and similar many times previously and had similar back.

The comment is made, we laugh, he has his salad, I eat my burger, we moved on to something else.

(UK)

No it wouldn't. Try spending some time further up north.

I'm in Scotland :-)

and find that offensive?!

No - I wouldn't find that offensive (I've been called far far worse things in a work context) - but I'd be very worried about potentially causing offense, more for the sake of politeness than the HR impact.

> Can you explain specifically whats wrong with the comment.

Obviously casual sexism. Friend or not that's not professional to call a colleague that way at the workplace.

If it's a friend there's probably some flexibility depending on the context of the friendship.

But if the "friend" feels the need to file a complaint rather than talk to the person about it then clearly the comment wasn't appropriate.

... or it was simply misunderstood/taken the "wrong" way by someone particularly touchy.

I can understand most of the listed complains, but both the "princess" reference and the one about the hairdressers sending supposedly racists code messages sound more like if some problems are also somehow with the people that complained.

> by someone particularly touchy.

No. It's okay to say this to someone you know well and who you know won't mind. But the default position is "don't say this", and so the people who have a strong negative response to it are not "particularly touchy", they're normal.

I agree on the "default position", though I cannot see anything so inappropriate to justify a HR call or a complain to the (official or unofficial) company list, at the very most a comment like that could have provoked some snappy response and an immediate - on the spot - clarification between the parties, at least between "normal" (adult) people. That would be a "normal" reaction as I see it, saying nothing then writing to the list a complain seems to me like the act of someone that either has experienced much more serious "name calling" (or some other untold offence) or that is a tad bit oversensitive.

Most probably normality - like beauty - is in the eye of the beholder.

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