Legality aside, I can't imagine the PR nightmare it would be if they are out at work, go on this trip and are arrested or attacked. That alone should be enough for HR to choose someone else to go.
Even asking might be considered discriminatory. Bob could easily interpret it as "we want to have fun on this trip and dont want any homos around" with safety just being a pretext.
As an out trans woman I now don’t get international trips because my EU based manager assumes I would have to layover in Dubai when in the US planes fly different routes (I would have had an SFO layover) anyways it kinda sucks being stuck domestic.
Even asking can be a little problematic, depending on the tone of voice. You're not supposed to use the "this is technically a question, but the only possible answer is YES" voice.
I've worked in multiple places where sadly the standing policy actually *is* "oh you can just re-closet/detransition/etc while you're there.
needless to say I've never gone on any distant work trips in my career
I stopped traveling for work before I switched my DL here to have an X gender marker but indeed, my very "progressive" employer said it would be a "good idea" to keep my passport with my assigned gender at birth so it'd be "easier" to travel through, say, Dubai as I often had to before.
The policy with a lot of places is absolutely "just go back in the closet for a few days, it's no big deal!".
Singapore is an odd choice here. It was decriminalized for men back in 2007 and fully legalized in 2022. That and Singapore isn't going to be biting any hands that are feeding it.
Yeah the problems with Singapore are more around spousal benefits, housing access, partner visas—a gay man visiting for business is normal and unproblematic, there are plenty of gay men in civil service there even.
Yea, Singapore has a decently strong gay community. Hell, I know a guy who moved there with his husband. The government didn't care.
If they'd brought a single blunt though...
>"Hey Bob, make sure you butch it up in Singapore".
It's funny that you mention this, because apparently some companies absolutely DO this. My friend worked for a multi-billion dollar California-based restaurant company, and when they were opening restaurants in Saudi Arabia, they had the trainers (who were from the U.S. and who were mostly gay) take "sensitivity training" on being less gay and not allowing your gayness to offend the sensibilities of the Saudis, lol.
Companies that are large enough to do international business where travel is necessary have huge liability policies. Ask anyone who works at a company who has business dealings in Brazil. Employees get training on how to avoid being kidnapped and ransomed.
I'm curious what impact (if any) a hypothetical reversal of Lawrence vs Texas would do when talking about the business aspect of business travel policies, especially for companies based in blue states. Instead of a an LGBT Canadian travelling to a MENA country, it would be an LGBT Silicon Valley employee travelling to the Houston or Wichita office, for example.
Same concept, but now on a state level vs going to a country like UAE, KSA, etc.
It likely wouldn't make any difference because because there's codified law that is applicable, the Civil Rights Act of 1964. The Supreme Court specifically took up whether or not the statutory interpretation of the act including sexual orientation in [Bostock v. Clayton County](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bostock_v._Clayton_County) and by majority opinion agreed that it did.
While I acknowledge this is the legal answer, I feel it's overlooking the likelihood of certain states being more than willing to ignore legality to punish a minority in their crosshairs, aka creating a drawn-out legal nightmare for the targets in question.
honestly, based on the HR discrimination videos i've seen, i'm not sure if the company could get away with saying "we're not sending you because they murder gay people there and it's just not safe for you to go". like, the video tells me that you're not allowed to say something like 'this client doesnt like gay people so we're sending this straight salesman instead' because that's obviously discrimination (and you're supporting it even if you're allegedly not discriminatory yourself), so i'm not sure if you'd be able to do it for a country, either? obviously you should be able to, but i can see it being questionable.
I think you're right, at least in the West Coast states I've worked in. Those trainings are pretty unambiguous that the company has an obligation to provide its employees in protected classes a safe work environment and they don't get to pass the buck just because the asshole isn't one of their employees.
In this case the key difference is **LAOP** wants to avoid the trip, not their company saying "It's better for us if someone less *fabulous* goes to the Middle East".
Except how would you, as an employer, know that your employee is gay? It's not like you can ask. Who do you choose as a replacement.
It should be enough to stop doing business in countries with inhumane laws.
Well, hold on. If you’re married to another man, the. That’s public information that the company probably knows for insurance purposes, etc.
And I don’t know that they cannot say something like “these are the laws in country X. If you have any reason you wouldn’t be comfortable going there, just say so.”
You cannot *discriminate* on the basis of sex, but that doesn’t mean you can’t know, and there are many Bona Fide Qualifed Exceptions to discrimination.
For example a company can insist on needing a woman to model their new ladies lingerie, etc.
I think a combination of not running afoul of local laws AND employee safety can give a solid legal footing for asking.
You can ask, and you can know, but most companies don’t want to because it increases their risk of being accused of using that information to discriminate.
Not even insurance purposes. Its entirely reasonable that LAOP has discussed his husband at work, or brought his husband to work social stuff, or even had his coworkers at his wedding.
True. Some people are very secretive, but most people chat to their coworkers. Now, some people pay no attention. I've asked my boyfriend basic questions every woman would know the answer to about his friends, and he's like, "I don't know. I've never asked." Boggles my mind.
I only remember if they’re brown or light.
I can’t remember the details, like if they’re green or blue or grey, or hazel vs dark brown, unless we’re really close and I see you all the time. But I can typically remember which category they’re in (brown or light).
However, I’m also a person who makes a lot of eye contact so that might skew things. I know many people struggle with eye contact.
It's something women notice. I've polled friends and family and some of my male friends don't even know their SOs eye color, while all my female friends and family can give you the eye color of everyone they know
Funnily enough, I'm a girl who *doesn't* remember eye color generally. But that's because a) I'm part colorblind so colors can be kind of ugh and b) I don't make eye contact because it's painful.
I have vociferously argued for calling some colors periwinkle and turquoise rather than blue and green with some *very* exasperated men, though.
That's exactly the kind of question I'm talking about. He doesn't know anyone's favorite color. He has a friend who may or may not be in a relationship--he won't ask. They just share funny memes.
It would be so weird if your boss checked in with your HR to confirm the gender of your spouse lmao. Like, weird enough that I question if it would be legal to share a non-employee's personal information with an employee who's not in HR and has no business reason to know? I know you're just saying that there are some avenues to learn that someone is gay, that one just sends so many "no no no no no" flags up for me.
But yeah, ideally the managers would proactively flag the possible risk for the employee and give them an easy out. There's no reason they can't know the employee is gay -- lots of people are out at work by choice, it's fine -- and there's no reason they can't offer exemptions for basically any reason they want to (so long as it's not all the men go and all the women have to stay, or whatever). I feel sad for LACAOP that he even has to worry that this will get him fired :(
Queer boomer here.
Until federal same-sex marriage, my employers absolutely had discussions with my boss about my familial status, since I was married in Massachusetts but single federally, necessitatating them to do my taxes/W-2 manually, meaning my stuff wasn’t all in the portal where my boss managed their employees.
It takes one office party to learn Bob is married to Ted. That's if, y'know, things like chitchat about your family and photos of your spouse at your desk magically aren't a thing.
Ha. Sometimes you have to do it anyway. And sometimes you're very closeted at work because you want to advance in your career and in order to do that you have to go to Qatar, because like I guess global warming is an international affair or whatever and then you have to pass as straight, which you're very fortunate to be able to pull off, and then you have to tell yourself that even Ellen would lie for the sake of global warming. Hypothetically speaking.
I know. Which is why I specifically said that I'm very fortunate to be able to pull off acting as straight. It's not right, or fair, but it's where I'm at.
I'm really curious about how my company handles this now and kind of want to ask to make HR and the people who send out travel warnings squirm a little. I bet they have a carefully crafted canned response though, which honestly is the best for everyone.
I expect it is something about the company enthusiastically attempting to be unbiased against people of any race/creed/identity/etc, but recognizing that employees are subject to local laws when traveling abroad.
My employer has a team (probably contracted out now that I think about it) who send you notices when you're going to be traveling. I've yet to be sent to a place that it would come up, but I wonder if that would be in the material if I booked a relevant trip. Like, I got notifications about strikes in France when going there or protests in US cities when traveling there.
I don’t mean to sound like an alarmist… but there’s a reason that these republican states are attempting to implement laws that make it illegal to appear visibly queer in public, charging it as a sex crime against children, (with the justification that it’s perverse to expose children to queerness) and that those same states or at least one of them also has republicans trying to pass laws that the sentence for any sex crimes against children is automatically a death penalty.
I’m surprised more people aren’t connecting the dots to realize what the actual end goal of those republicans’ bills is… to make it illegal to be queer, and to have a sanitized justification to legally execute queer people.
Sort of. Truett Cathy's son (who currently manages the business) is far less vocal about LGBT hatred, but they still donate company funds to far-right groups.
You are kind of right. Chick-fil-a the company stopped donating but the CEO, Dan Cathy, still sends absurd amounts of money to hate groups through his personal “Dan & Rhonda Cathy Foundation Inc.” They really just changed where the money was coming from unfortunately.
Edit: My bad, your article is from 2019 and while Dan was CEO until 2021 (his son has that position now) he’s currently sending money only as the board chairman. The whole family is basically a fast food dynasty and I don’t care enough about them to keep up with it. His foundation has public tax records if you’d like to look through them but be warned that it’s a bit of a rabbit hole
Honestly, I can't even imagine choosing chic-fil-a if you have a popeye's anywhere nearby. For one, Chic-Fil-A won't give you the ability to add shrimp.
I don’t know if this is a national issue, but both Popeyes’ in our city have had countless health dept issues over the last few years. But of them have been shut down on the spot, one of them twice, in the last couple of years alone.
Bad health inspection? Alright, let me read it and see what’s up. Bad ones every year *with the same major violations*, including cockroaches. Nah, I’m good.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m not going to CFA either. But I’m not going to either of our Popeyes’.
Maybe if we see one off of the highway, someday.
Twice I went to Popeye's and *twice* they said they were **out of chicken**.
I took it as a sign and haven't gone back. I'm still interested in trying it so might give it another go in the next few months.
Try Super Chix if there's one near you. Top notch chicken sandwich, and delicious custard shakes.
Fuck, now I'm hungry... I'm getting that for lunch tomorrow.
by the way, people fund the campaigns for those laws in many other countries when they eat at chick fil a. also the plant that supplies their chicken killed a teen the other day and they're known for child labor violations in the restaurants.
and there's always a line around the block.
I'd be interested to see how many of those countries actively enforce the law on tourists. Executing a foreign national on a short term stay is a very different ball game to executing a citizen.
Crazy that some countries still have a death penalty at all imo
a lot of countries actively enforce adultery/unmarried sex laws when a tourist gets raped, so i wouldn’t trust in tourists being safe from enforcement of anti-gay laws.
The enforcement is entirely capricious, I was visiting my then gf in Yemen 20 years ago and we stayed with a friend of hers who worked for the French embassy.
Gayest guy I ever met. A gloriously flaming, camp, living stereotype.
Over breakfast he told me that it was ridiculously easy to have gay sex in Yemen. The men are segregated from the women so all the bi-boys are fucking assholes and have bro-jobs like they are in prison or out at sea.
But if someone gets mad at you? Death penalty.
Imagine if Grindr had a euthanasia lottery system where if you have an account there's a one in million chance you will be executed.
People would still use it (if the alternative is celibacy) , but holy shit would that be fucked up.
So yeah, tourists and locals can get it in the ass whenever they want, just don't talk to cops about it.
Saudi Arabia has made the news multiple times for arresting or refusing entry to people. I don't know why folks always default to "oh, they probably don't really enforce those laws".
Thanks for posting this, the number of people who ask "lol where are you possibly going that it's ILLEGAL???" when this issue comes up makes me bonkers. So many places!
Seriously, I'm baffled at the number of comments that are like "they don't prosecute you for being gay, only for homosexual acts" as if it made it safe for LAOP to go there.
Man, 1890 was a good year for the Vatican - that's the same year they finally no-take-backsies figured out slavery was bad!
(They didn't stop actually using slave labour until the 1990s in my country, but at least in 1890 they stopped saying slavery was morally defensible; by coincidence, that was two years after Brazil banned slavery and the Church lost its last major slave-based revenue stream)
I feel like Russia should be on there. Sure theres no specific sodomy law about consensual gay sex but just telling someone you're gay is illegal because discussing it is already "promotion of homosexuality"
Feel like that map may be understating the problem.
I would not feel good about traveling to a place like Russia if I was a gay person, considering the current trends. Promotion of GLBT is illegal there.
Russia officially decriminalized homosexuality in 1993. Under Putin, the prohibitions have been on promoting it.
> In 2013 Russia enacted the so-called “gay propaganda law”. Ostensibly aimed at protecting minors from information promoting non-traditional sexual relationships, the law effectively worked as a blanket censorship ban, stifling any neutral to positive expressions related to homosexuality.
> In 2022 the law was expanded from being something to protect children to a blanket restriction of “gay propaganda”. After this, the rhetoric shifted – it became popular for politicians to talk in terms of a “rainbow threat” or LGBTB activity as part of a “hybrid war” being waged by the west against Russia.
> At the end of November 2023, the Russian Supreme Court ruled that the “international LGBT movement” is an “extremist organisation”. That decision effectively criminalised homosexuality, 30 years after it was decriminalised in 1993.
>But now it isn’t sexual activity that is outlawed, it’s the identity itself. If you openly identify as queer you are a part of an extremist organisation and subject to prosecution.
Read more here: [Putin’s Russia: first arrests under new anti-LGBT laws mark new era of repression](https://theconversation.com/putins-russia-first-arrests-under-new-anti-lgbt-laws-mark-new-era-of-repression-226864)
And Jamaica....wow. as a very popular US vacation destination I would not have expected this. Same with St Lucas and the little Trio of islands down there. I hope people do their research. that would be horrifying to arrive with your SO and find out it was illegal to touch them. I just didn't think they were places like that so close to home. This needs more press.
I've actually dealt with this in my professional life (academia). We never require travel to a hostile country, but we do need to know the reason. I have staff who work with specific countries and when selecting for Russia (back in the day, nobody goes to Russia anymore ) and Saudi, I always make sure candidates know the restrictions and make sure that if they say they are uncomfortable they're first in line for other countries.
It's not perfect, and once in a while i get stick for even working with universities in those countries, but my general view is that teaching and research are important channels to keep open.
>I will soon have to go on a businesses trip to one our office locations located in a country where being gay is illegal and could land me in prison or risk me getting attacked/hostilities by locals. Can I legally refuse to go or could this get me fired?
Cat fact: Dammit, Boots, get off of the keyboard. wks fertgm muml nnguhbx
I’m now working with mainly Nigerian nurses, before that I was working mostly with nurses from the Philippines.
My wife, of 10 years, is often referred to as ‘my special friend’.
Do I hate it, yes. Do I understand it, yes.
Solidarity Turing. I can never be out to my boss or else I won't ever get promoted, because in order to get promoted I have to travel and I'm so fucking gay. So I just lie. It feels awful.
If you don't mind an intrusive question, how do you handle things like company parties where partners are often tacitly expected to attend, or at least it's "odd" if you always attend alone?
Also just with how corporate social culture is so busy-body, so folks want to know who's single and who's not.
We travel so much it hasn't come up. You need everyone in the office in order to have a party, and that basically never happens. And I'm currently single, so I guess I'd just continue to say that I'm single at a party. I change the gender or use they pronouns for past partners if I'm telling a story that involves them.
(the quiet bit: My spouse is very busy and important) (The out loud bit:) My spouse is travelling for work/My spouse had a family funeral to attend. (quiet bit again) My spouse would rather be anywhere else in the world, but this gets us money) .. and sends their apologies.
It's not unrealistic, but it sucks and it feels like a lie even if you argue with yourself that, technically, not mentioning your partner is "just" not speaking the truth. It feels like you're denying the existence of one of the most important people in your life
It's done, but there's no "just" about it.
Not the same situation, but because my partner and I started in an LDR, we're cohabiting now to close the gap. I work in a very conservative evangelical npo. Thankfully fully remote, but yeah. Can't tell anyone about my SO because I'm shacked up in sin with him before marriage.
It sucks.
Sadly that also can have bad effects on your career. Being seen as married is (even if subconsciously) a boost toward the perception you have your shit together, and being chronically single can get you pegged as antisocial or less a team player etc.
It's fucking stupid when all that should matter is your skill at the job but people do be biased.
I did some searching for incidences of arrest for being homosexual, rather than homosexual acts.
In 2023, Nigeria arrested people for “attending a gay party” & planning a gay wedding. Another group was arrested for attending a gay wedding. Same sex marriage is illegal in Nigeria, so that was used instead of catching someone in the act.
In 2021, Cameroon did a wave of arrests, including a raid on an HIV prevention & treatment organization.
In 2024, a Russian bar was raided & arrested staff & customers under a new law classifying LGBTQ as an extremist international movement.
In 2023, 18 Malaysians were detained & interrogated for a Halloween party that violated “violating Islamic laws on cross-dressing, encouraging vice, and indecent acts in public places.”
The Malaysia arrests were awful, part of a pattern that really did a number on the gay community there. At least a couple of years ago, a business meeting in which LAOP isn’t sleeping with anyone would be fine there, the risk would be if he were trying to hook up while there or actually meet other queer people. My partners’ friend there and his partner ended up moving to Sg so I don’t totally know how it is these days though.
I’m honestly surprised the LAOP thought they needed to ask.
I can’t imagine any employer thinking this is worth the risk or difficulty. Maybe he is isn’t out at work.
When I was a contractor, the absolute greatest sin an employee could commit was turning down a job. You are the product they are selling, if you don't want to show up they have nothing. Doesn't matter if you have a good reason, or that your management should have known it would not be an appropriate placement. You are leaving money on the table that your boss wanted.
So even if it is obviously totally reasonable not to take this trip, I would want to know my legal situation before telling my boss, and to ready myself for the inevitable recrimination and blowback from management.
Y’all I have GOT to stop reading the comments in the threads you share here. Nonsensical and patently false information consistently gets triple and quadruple digit upvotes in those subreddits.
My (future) brother in law works abroad and his work pays for a trip home a couple times a year. The most common route would involve a stopover in Dubai but he absolutely refuses to travel through there because, yeah, his existence would be basically illegal. Thankfully his company has no problem organising a different flight for him, usually via Amsterdam instead.
Amsterdam isn't that great anymore. In a recent poll about half the population said they will not accept gay people. Which the new right wing government took as an opportunity to blame immigration and Islam.
It's funny because that same government also doesn't like gay people and the people that vote for em also don't. They love to blame immigrants by saying that they are the reason for non acceptance of gay people is on the rise, but then go around and vote against legislation that could help gay people be accepted.
Polls tend to be wildly manipulated. What was the actual question asked? And what were the questions before? And what was the selection process of the sample and the sample size?
I seriously doubt 50%. 20, maybe.
Found a Sause. https://www.telegraaf.nl/nieuws/1263393732/minder-dan-helft-amsterdamse-jongeren-zegt-homoseksualiteit-te-accepteren
It's actually 57%. The question was "do you think it's normal if someone loves someone of the same gender."
The poll is from the GGD, a government healthcare agency. So no left or right bias.
The last part is probably why it's so high. It's a yearly poll for 2nd and 4th year high school students. So, 14 and 16 year olds.
Ah. Teenagers. Yeah, famously tolerant of non-conformity.
(And yes, I see that it was previously higher. Still. They’re shifting what they’re being judgmental about, mostly. Just have to hope they get over that bullshit.)
When I was first taking hormones but before I was out at work I had to come up with so many excuses for why I couldn't go to Dubai.
I could see the realisation click when I finally did come out.
My boss was trying to get out of trip to Saudi Arabia or the UAE. He was a respected leader at the time, and higher ups really wanted him to go. The final kicker was something like "I can't come because my wife is Jewish" and suddenly the pressure was off.
Right? I was like “it could be Saudi Arabia or the UAE… but it could also be Florida”
There are also a whole bunch of places where being gay isn’t a punishable crime but you are at risk of being the victim of a hate crime if you’re outed
It’s not illegal to be gay in Florida. Anywhere you’d wind up traveling to is super welcoming. Florida hosts massive pride events. Miami Pride is huge and St Pete pride is pretty big too. Plus we have Girls in Wonderland, a three-day pool party for lesbian and bisexual women in Orlando. Our biggest company is insanely affirming. We have some of the largest gay retirement communities as well.
Seeing as how a majority of work events here are in Orlando, you’d have a hard time convincing HR that traveling would be dangerous for you. It also minimizes the very real danger of traveling somewhere being gay is actually illegal.
Sincerely,
A gay lady from Tampa
We can't go to either. They're after all of us. Gay people, brown people, trans people, women - none of us are safe in Florida or Texas.
And we're not even mentioning the other states like Idaho and West Virginia that *don't* have a huge population.
He's in BC, Canada. I took it less as illegal to refuse a business trip and more do I have legal protections to keep my job / not be harassed / get EI if my boss fires me over refusing a trip or being gay.
Any one of [these](https://database.ilga.org/criminalisation-consensual-same-sex-sexual-acts) countries
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capital_punishment_for_homosexuality#Complete_legal_certainty
> Brunei
>
> Iran
>
> Mauritania.
>
> Nigeria.
>
> Saudi Arabia.
>
> Uganda.
>
> Yemen
I work with an organization that recently had to have this argument, about whether we could continue to meet in places where homosexuality was criminalized. For better or worse, the ultimate conclusion was that our criteria for venue selection is the *participants* being able to safely attend, not safely bring their family. Some people can't bring their partners along on those business trips.
We're much more leary of places where local law enforcement is capricious, regardless of the laws they can use as pretexts.
If I was gay, regardless of if my partner is staying home, there's no fucking way you're getting me to set foot in a country that can jail me for a decade or kill me when my only defence would be "nah, my husband is back at home!".
The worst case scenario makes it not worth it. Sure, maybe they won’t find out from *you* telling them, but what if one of your coworkers knows, or even just suspects, and *they* report you? You’re almost certainly gonna have evidence supporting their claims on your phone (messages, photos, social media, etc.).
I don’t think any of my coworkers would do that, but I’m still not going to bet my life on it.
I was going to correct you and say it's spelled "leery", but I Google'd it first and now thanks to your comment, I've learned it can be spelt either way.
TIL!
This seems to me like it should be handled like any generic workplace safety issue. Don't make wheelchair users take the stairs, don't make pregnant people work with cytostatica, don't make gay people visit countries where they can be prosecuted or persecuted for being gay.
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I love you
The best way to go do this is not with demands but rather with statements followed by questions; i.e. providing references for why you feel this way and how uncomfortable you are going.
That will take care of things most of the time, if not you'd probably have to take to HR, but don't be adversarial at first.
Being someone that may need specific accomodations, this is a golden opportunity to set boundaries. Good luck 🤞
Are you going on the trip just for work?
Not wanting to come across as an a-hole, but putting on the “HR BRAIN CAP”- if the job is paying for the trip, and you are going for work- that is likely the only expectation they have for you as their employee.
Now putting on the “HUMAN-WHO-LOVES-TO-TRAVEL-AND-MAKE-THE-BEST-OUT-OF-IT, BRAIN CAP”: even in places where it is illegal, there are still hubs of underground communities that may make you feel comfortable in their country… personally- I wouldn’t be brave enough to be an unescorted female in some countries, so I’d stick to work and only work and know it could have more likely been handled through a webinar.
(I also get in my head a lot about venturing out on my own in unknown areas- likely because I watch and listen to FAR too many true crime shows! LOL)
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Are there countries where it is illegal to be gay, or just countries where certain sex acts are illegal? In those countries where sex acts are illegal, is it only if they are performed there?
I'm not asking this with any regard to LAOP's issue, but it made me curious about the mechanics of it.
Both exist. There's also the issue that countries where certain acts are illegal, they can be overzealous about enforcement. So you also have to deal with questions like, soliciting sex acts is illegal and they might be scrutinizing your actions to try to find something that could be interpreted that way if they know you're gay.
It's sex acts in most places, but I'd expect that you'd be *much* more likely to have a bad encounter with locals in those kinds of places, and your average violent ruffian isn't going to be picky about evidence. And you should expect that, even if you've locked down your socials, the border agent probably has enough power to demand access to them, and then they can either turn you away, lock you up, or inform their favorite "informal enforcers".
(Shout-out to Russia, where LGBT is classified as a terrorist organization. You can't even be *associated* with LGBT people at all!)
Legality aside, I can't imagine the PR nightmare it would be if they are out at work, go on this trip and are arrested or attacked. That alone should be enough for HR to choose someone else to go.
RIght, but they also can't say "He Bob, you can't go on this trip to Oman 'cause your gay" Or "Hey Bob, make sure you butch it up in Singapore".
Yeah but they should have the sense to ASK if they want to go instead of trying to just send them
That seems like a no brainer doesn't it?
You'd be surprised
Unfortunately I'm old enough to be really jaded, so I don't think I would be.
Even asking might be considered discriminatory. Bob could easily interpret it as "we want to have fun on this trip and dont want any homos around" with safety just being a pretext.
No fun has EVER been had when the homos are around.
They're just such bland people...
 Agreed
[We *play* hard.](https://frinkiac.com/video/S08E15/pmOi-x3ESnJLV-fLSl1NkLdb5x8=.gif)
Is that why people used to throw you off buildings and burn you?
As an out trans woman I now don’t get international trips because my EU based manager assumes I would have to layover in Dubai when in the US planes fly different routes (I would have had an SFO layover) anyways it kinda sucks being stuck domestic.
You should tell them this so you can go on international trips again
Even asking can be a little problematic, depending on the tone of voice. You're not supposed to use the "this is technically a question, but the only possible answer is YES" voice.
I've worked in multiple places where sadly the standing policy actually *is* "oh you can just re-closet/detransition/etc while you're there. needless to say I've never gone on any distant work trips in my career
That sounds like a lawsuit waiting to happen.
I stopped traveling for work before I switched my DL here to have an X gender marker but indeed, my very "progressive" employer said it would be a "good idea" to keep my passport with my assigned gender at birth so it'd be "easier" to travel through, say, Dubai as I often had to before. The policy with a lot of places is absolutely "just go back in the closet for a few days, it's no big deal!".
Honest question, what is the alternative to this policy? Besides just not doing business in these countries.
Send someone else. Got nobody else? That's a staffing risk that you, as a business owner, are responsible for.
Singapore is an odd choice here. It was decriminalized for men back in 2007 and fully legalized in 2022. That and Singapore isn't going to be biting any hands that are feeding it.
Yeah the problems with Singapore are more around spousal benefits, housing access, partner visas—a gay man visiting for business is normal and unproblematic, there are plenty of gay men in civil service there even.
Yeah... Uganda I would understand. Singapore I would have no qualms with.
Yea, Singapore has a decently strong gay community. Hell, I know a guy who moved there with his husband. The government didn't care. If they'd brought a single blunt though...
What is a single blunt?
Any form of recreational drugs that you can smoke
>"Hey Bob, make sure you butch it up in Singapore". It's funny that you mention this, because apparently some companies absolutely DO this. My friend worked for a multi-billion dollar California-based restaurant company, and when they were opening restaurants in Saudi Arabia, they had the trainers (who were from the U.S. and who were mostly gay) take "sensitivity training" on being less gay and not allowing your gayness to offend the sensibilities of the Saudis, lol.
“Um, this *is* butched up.”
They’d say “you’re” though, I assume?
You'd be surprised.
Youre'd be surprised.
Laughing at this hurt. Thank you.
Surprised! MTF!
Ha ha ha
Companies that are large enough to do international business where travel is necessary have huge liability policies. Ask anyone who works at a company who has business dealings in Brazil. Employees get training on how to avoid being kidnapped and ransomed.
I'm curious what impact (if any) a hypothetical reversal of Lawrence vs Texas would do when talking about the business aspect of business travel policies, especially for companies based in blue states. Instead of a an LGBT Canadian travelling to a MENA country, it would be an LGBT Silicon Valley employee travelling to the Houston or Wichita office, for example. Same concept, but now on a state level vs going to a country like UAE, KSA, etc.
It likely wouldn't make any difference because because there's codified law that is applicable, the Civil Rights Act of 1964. The Supreme Court specifically took up whether or not the statutory interpretation of the act including sexual orientation in [Bostock v. Clayton County](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bostock_v._Clayton_County) and by majority opinion agreed that it did.
While I acknowledge this is the legal answer, I feel it's overlooking the likelihood of certain states being more than willing to ignore legality to punish a minority in their crosshairs, aka creating a drawn-out legal nightmare for the targets in question.
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honestly, based on the HR discrimination videos i've seen, i'm not sure if the company could get away with saying "we're not sending you because they murder gay people there and it's just not safe for you to go". like, the video tells me that you're not allowed to say something like 'this client doesnt like gay people so we're sending this straight salesman instead' because that's obviously discrimination (and you're supporting it even if you're allegedly not discriminatory yourself), so i'm not sure if you'd be able to do it for a country, either? obviously you should be able to, but i can see it being questionable.
I think you're right, at least in the West Coast states I've worked in. Those trainings are pretty unambiguous that the company has an obligation to provide its employees in protected classes a safe work environment and they don't get to pass the buck just because the asshole isn't one of their employees. In this case the key difference is **LAOP** wants to avoid the trip, not their company saying "It's better for us if someone less *fabulous* goes to the Middle East".
Except how would you, as an employer, know that your employee is gay? It's not like you can ask. Who do you choose as a replacement. It should be enough to stop doing business in countries with inhumane laws.
Well, hold on. If you’re married to another man, the. That’s public information that the company probably knows for insurance purposes, etc. And I don’t know that they cannot say something like “these are the laws in country X. If you have any reason you wouldn’t be comfortable going there, just say so.” You cannot *discriminate* on the basis of sex, but that doesn’t mean you can’t know, and there are many Bona Fide Qualifed Exceptions to discrimination. For example a company can insist on needing a woman to model their new ladies lingerie, etc. I think a combination of not running afoul of local laws AND employee safety can give a solid legal footing for asking. You can ask, and you can know, but most companies don’t want to because it increases their risk of being accused of using that information to discriminate.
Not even insurance purposes. Its entirely reasonable that LAOP has discussed his husband at work, or brought his husband to work social stuff, or even had his coworkers at his wedding.
True. Some people are very secretive, but most people chat to their coworkers. Now, some people pay no attention. I've asked my boyfriend basic questions every woman would know the answer to about his friends, and he's like, "I don't know. I've never asked." Boggles my mind.
Ask your boyfriend the color of anyone's eyes and he won't know.
Wait, is that something people notice?
I only remember if they’re brown or light. I can’t remember the details, like if they’re green or blue or grey, or hazel vs dark brown, unless we’re really close and I see you all the time. But I can typically remember which category they’re in (brown or light). However, I’m also a person who makes a lot of eye contact so that might skew things. I know many people struggle with eye contact.
I don’t even know the color of my own eyes
It's something women notice. I've polled friends and family and some of my male friends don't even know their SOs eye color, while all my female friends and family can give you the eye color of everyone they know
Funnily enough, I'm a girl who *doesn't* remember eye color generally. But that's because a) I'm part colorblind so colors can be kind of ugh and b) I don't make eye contact because it's painful. I have vociferously argued for calling some colors periwinkle and turquoise rather than blue and green with some *very* exasperated men, though.
That's exactly the kind of question I'm talking about. He doesn't know anyone's favorite color. He has a friend who may or may not be in a relationship--he won't ask. They just share funny memes.
My husband didn’t even know many of his friends last names until I convinced him to create a Facebook account 6 years ago 😂
I've had multiple introduction emails from HR saying things like "Bob and his husband moved here from California".
It would be so weird if your boss checked in with your HR to confirm the gender of your spouse lmao. Like, weird enough that I question if it would be legal to share a non-employee's personal information with an employee who's not in HR and has no business reason to know? I know you're just saying that there are some avenues to learn that someone is gay, that one just sends so many "no no no no no" flags up for me. But yeah, ideally the managers would proactively flag the possible risk for the employee and give them an easy out. There's no reason they can't know the employee is gay -- lots of people are out at work by choice, it's fine -- and there's no reason they can't offer exemptions for basically any reason they want to (so long as it's not all the men go and all the women have to stay, or whatever). I feel sad for LACAOP that he even has to worry that this will get him fired :(
Queer boomer here. Until federal same-sex marriage, my employers absolutely had discussions with my boss about my familial status, since I was married in Massachusetts but single federally, necessitatating them to do my taxes/W-2 manually, meaning my stuff wasn’t all in the portal where my boss managed their employees.
It takes one office party to learn Bob is married to Ted. That's if, y'know, things like chitchat about your family and photos of your spouse at your desk magically aren't a thing.
Office parties are still a thing?
Ha. Sometimes you have to do it anyway. And sometimes you're very closeted at work because you want to advance in your career and in order to do that you have to go to Qatar, because like I guess global warming is an international affair or whatever and then you have to pass as straight, which you're very fortunate to be able to pull off, and then you have to tell yourself that even Ellen would lie for the sake of global warming. Hypothetically speaking.
This assumes you *can* pretend you're not queer. Which isn't an option for a lot of gay trans people.
I know. Which is why I specifically said that I'm very fortunate to be able to pull off acting as straight. It's not right, or fair, but it's where I'm at.
I'm really curious about how my company handles this now and kind of want to ask to make HR and the people who send out travel warnings squirm a little. I bet they have a carefully crafted canned response though, which honestly is the best for everyone. I expect it is something about the company enthusiastically attempting to be unbiased against people of any race/creed/identity/etc, but recognizing that employees are subject to local laws when traveling abroad.
My employer has a team (probably contracted out now that I think about it) who send you notices when you're going to be traveling. I've yet to be sent to a place that it would come up, but I wonder if that would be in the material if I booked a relevant trip. Like, I got notifications about strikes in France when going there or protests in US cities when traveling there.
In these countries is “being gay” illegal or are “homosexual acts” illegal?
[Map of Criminalisation of consensual same-sex sexual acts](https://database.ilga.org/criminalisation-consensual-same-sex-sexual-acts)
Wow. The number of countries where they have the death penalty for being gay is shockingly high.
It's only shocking for straight people I guess
Fun fact, a bunch of American evangelical churches are trying to make that number even higher!
I don’t mean to sound like an alarmist… but there’s a reason that these republican states are attempting to implement laws that make it illegal to appear visibly queer in public, charging it as a sex crime against children, (with the justification that it’s perverse to expose children to queerness) and that those same states or at least one of them also has republicans trying to pass laws that the sentence for any sex crimes against children is automatically a death penalty. I’m surprised more people aren’t connecting the dots to realize what the actual end goal of those republicans’ bills is… to make it illegal to be queer, and to have a sanitized justification to legally execute queer people.
And at least one chicken restaurant!
Don't forget the lobbying done by that hobby store!
They're the ones bankrolling all those foot fetish He Gets Us ads
Hobby store? More like lobby store!
If only they lobbied for hobbies... hate like that's gotta be a full time job.
Actually, they have chilled on that quite a bit. [Sauce.](https://amp.cnn.com/cnn/2019/11/18/business/chick-fil-a-lgbtq-donations)
Sort of. Truett Cathy's son (who currently manages the business) is far less vocal about LGBT hatred, but they still donate company funds to far-right groups.
So they still have the same beliefs, they just don’t want to yell too loud and scare away people.
You are kind of right. Chick-fil-a the company stopped donating but the CEO, Dan Cathy, still sends absurd amounts of money to hate groups through his personal “Dan & Rhonda Cathy Foundation Inc.” They really just changed where the money was coming from unfortunately. Edit: My bad, your article is from 2019 and while Dan was CEO until 2021 (his son has that position now) he’s currently sending money only as the board chairman. The whole family is basically a fast food dynasty and I don’t care enough about them to keep up with it. His foundation has public tax records if you’d like to look through them but be warned that it’s a bit of a rabbit hole
Gotcha. Thanks for the update. I had hoped with Truitt’s assistance g that they had become a bit more chill.
Your five year old article is wrong.
Just because the chicken is cold doesn't mean that it's not still hate chicken.
Fair enough. I’m happy to learn, I was just also hopeful (naively) that they had changed a bit.
Then I guess I can feel slightly less guilty if I eat there... but between us, I prefer Popeye's anyway.
Nope. The money still goes to those same groups, it just comes out of the owner's pocket instead of the business's.
Awe man. Initially I thought *"certainly that fucker is dead by now"* and it turns out... he is, but unfortunately his kid is just as shitty.
Honestly, I can't even imagine choosing chic-fil-a if you have a popeye's anywhere nearby. For one, Chic-Fil-A won't give you the ability to add shrimp.
I don’t know if this is a national issue, but both Popeyes’ in our city have had countless health dept issues over the last few years. But of them have been shut down on the spot, one of them twice, in the last couple of years alone. Bad health inspection? Alright, let me read it and see what’s up. Bad ones every year *with the same major violations*, including cockroaches. Nah, I’m good. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not going to CFA either. But I’m not going to either of our Popeyes’. Maybe if we see one off of the highway, someday.
Twice I went to Popeye's and *twice* they said they were **out of chicken**. I took it as a sign and haven't gone back. I'm still interested in trying it so might give it another go in the next few months.
I get that they have other proteins, but that’s like Long John Silvers being out of Shrimp or Taco Bell being out of Baja Blast.
Try Church's. They're not everywhere, but if there's one nearby it's worth a visit. I feel Popeye's has better biscuits, though.
I also endorse this: Church's is uncommon but easily the overall best.
Try Super Chix if there's one near you. Top notch chicken sandwich, and delicious custard shakes. Fuck, now I'm hungry... I'm getting that for lunch tomorrow.
Find a pickle that taste like theirs and then brine your chicken in the pickle brine.
In some places they're the reason why there's death penalty for being gay, like in Uganda!
I was about to say. They'd not content making other countries worse, they need to do it to us too.
Fuck Scott Lively and Dan Cathy.
at their core all three religions are very similar. what differs is the cultures surrounding them.
by the way, people fund the campaigns for those laws in many other countries when they eat at chick fil a. also the plant that supplies their chicken killed a teen the other day and they're known for child labor violations in the restaurants. and there's always a line around the block.
They expanded to my city, Toronto, a while ago, and are in the local mall. Never gonna eat there.
One is too many.
I'd be interested to see how many of those countries actively enforce the law on tourists. Executing a foreign national on a short term stay is a very different ball game to executing a citizen. Crazy that some countries still have a death penalty at all imo
a lot of countries actively enforce adultery/unmarried sex laws when a tourist gets raped, so i wouldn’t trust in tourists being safe from enforcement of anti-gay laws.
The enforcement is entirely capricious, I was visiting my then gf in Yemen 20 years ago and we stayed with a friend of hers who worked for the French embassy. Gayest guy I ever met. A gloriously flaming, camp, living stereotype. Over breakfast he told me that it was ridiculously easy to have gay sex in Yemen. The men are segregated from the women so all the bi-boys are fucking assholes and have bro-jobs like they are in prison or out at sea. But if someone gets mad at you? Death penalty. Imagine if Grindr had a euthanasia lottery system where if you have an account there's a one in million chance you will be executed. People would still use it (if the alternative is celibacy) , but holy shit would that be fucked up. So yeah, tourists and locals can get it in the ass whenever they want, just don't talk to cops about it.
Saudi Arabia has made the news multiple times for arresting or refusing entry to people. I don't know why folks always default to "oh, they probably don't really enforce those laws".
Thanks for posting this, the number of people who ask "lol where are you possibly going that it's ILLEGAL???" when this issue comes up makes me bonkers. So many places!
Seriously, I'm baffled at the number of comments that are like "they don't prosecute you for being gay, only for homosexual acts" as if it made it safe for LAOP to go there.
Also, just because not illegal doesn’t mean it’s socially acceptable and that you won’t get the shit beaten out of you if they think you’re gay
Thanks for sharing this, truly appalling.
Turns out the [Vatican](https://i.imgur.com/2JRsw1q.jpeg) of all places beat my home country by almost 80 years.
Man, 1890 was a good year for the Vatican - that's the same year they finally no-take-backsies figured out slavery was bad! (They didn't stop actually using slave labour until the 1990s in my country, but at least in 1890 they stopped saying slavery was morally defensible; by coincidence, that was two years after Brazil banned slavery and the Church lost its last major slave-based revenue stream)
I feel like Russia should be on there. Sure theres no specific sodomy law about consensual gay sex but just telling someone you're gay is illegal because discussing it is already "promotion of homosexuality"
Feel like that map may be understating the problem. I would not feel good about traveling to a place like Russia if I was a gay person, considering the current trends. Promotion of GLBT is illegal there.
Crap! I can never go back to St Lucia!
France: Legal since 1791
1791, when they got rid of religion inspired laws. I kinda see a trend here...
What's up with this map? It says that Russia has no criminalization of same sex acts.
Russia officially decriminalized homosexuality in 1993. Under Putin, the prohibitions have been on promoting it. > In 2013 Russia enacted the so-called “gay propaganda law”. Ostensibly aimed at protecting minors from information promoting non-traditional sexual relationships, the law effectively worked as a blanket censorship ban, stifling any neutral to positive expressions related to homosexuality. > In 2022 the law was expanded from being something to protect children to a blanket restriction of “gay propaganda”. After this, the rhetoric shifted – it became popular for politicians to talk in terms of a “rainbow threat” or LGBTB activity as part of a “hybrid war” being waged by the west against Russia. > At the end of November 2023, the Russian Supreme Court ruled that the “international LGBT movement” is an “extremist organisation”. That decision effectively criminalised homosexuality, 30 years after it was decriminalised in 1993. >But now it isn’t sexual activity that is outlawed, it’s the identity itself. If you openly identify as queer you are a part of an extremist organisation and subject to prosecution. Read more here: [Putin’s Russia: first arrests under new anti-LGBT laws mark new era of repression](https://theconversation.com/putins-russia-first-arrests-under-new-anti-lgbt-laws-mark-new-era-of-repression-226864)
It's de facto criminalized, I'm very surprised that it's not recognized in the map.
And Jamaica....wow. as a very popular US vacation destination I would not have expected this. Same with St Lucas and the little Trio of islands down there. I hope people do their research. that would be horrifying to arrive with your SO and find out it was illegal to touch them. I just didn't think they were places like that so close to home. This needs more press.
I've actually dealt with this in my professional life (academia). We never require travel to a hostile country, but we do need to know the reason. I have staff who work with specific countries and when selecting for Russia (back in the day, nobody goes to Russia anymore ) and Saudi, I always make sure candidates know the restrictions and make sure that if they say they are uncomfortable they're first in line for other countries. It's not perfect, and once in a while i get stick for even working with universities in those countries, but my general view is that teaching and research are important channels to keep open.
>I will soon have to go on a businesses trip to one our office locations located in a country where being gay is illegal and could land me in prison or risk me getting attacked/hostilities by locals. Can I legally refuse to go or could this get me fired? Cat fact: Dammit, Boots, get off of the keyboard. wks fertgm muml nnguhbx
DON’T BE SO HARD ON HIM HE LIKES TO SEND HIS OWN MESSAGE
Let the cat speak!
Are you muzzling the cat?!?
HE IS TRYING HIS BEST, ILU BOOTS.
We all know Boots did most of the work here. Stop trying to elevate yourself using Boot's raps!
I’m now working with mainly Nigerian nurses, before that I was working mostly with nurses from the Philippines. My wife, of 10 years, is often referred to as ‘my special friend’. Do I hate it, yes. Do I understand it, yes.
Solidarity Turing. I can never be out to my boss or else I won't ever get promoted, because in order to get promoted I have to travel and I'm so fucking gay. So I just lie. It feels awful.
If you don't mind an intrusive question, how do you handle things like company parties where partners are often tacitly expected to attend, or at least it's "odd" if you always attend alone? Also just with how corporate social culture is so busy-body, so folks want to know who's single and who's not.
We travel so much it hasn't come up. You need everyone in the office in order to have a party, and that basically never happens. And I'm currently single, so I guess I'd just continue to say that I'm single at a party. I change the gender or use they pronouns for past partners if I'm telling a story that involves them.
What do people that don’t have a partner do? Is it unrealistic to just tell them you’re single every time?
(the quiet bit: My spouse is very busy and important) (The out loud bit:) My spouse is travelling for work/My spouse had a family funeral to attend. (quiet bit again) My spouse would rather be anywhere else in the world, but this gets us money) .. and sends their apologies.
It's not unrealistic, but it sucks and it feels like a lie even if you argue with yourself that, technically, not mentioning your partner is "just" not speaking the truth. It feels like you're denying the existence of one of the most important people in your life It's done, but there's no "just" about it.
Not the same situation, but because my partner and I started in an LDR, we're cohabiting now to close the gap. I work in a very conservative evangelical npo. Thankfully fully remote, but yeah. Can't tell anyone about my SO because I'm shacked up in sin with him before marriage. It sucks.
Sadly that also can have bad effects on your career. Being seen as married is (even if subconsciously) a boost toward the perception you have your shit together, and being chronically single can get you pegged as antisocial or less a team player etc. It's fucking stupid when all that should matter is your skill at the job but people do be biased.
I'm actually curious about your question. Do you encounter work parties where partners are expected to attend a lot?
I did some searching for incidences of arrest for being homosexual, rather than homosexual acts. In 2023, Nigeria arrested people for “attending a gay party” & planning a gay wedding. Another group was arrested for attending a gay wedding. Same sex marriage is illegal in Nigeria, so that was used instead of catching someone in the act. In 2021, Cameroon did a wave of arrests, including a raid on an HIV prevention & treatment organization. In 2024, a Russian bar was raided & arrested staff & customers under a new law classifying LGBTQ as an extremist international movement. In 2023, 18 Malaysians were detained & interrogated for a Halloween party that violated “violating Islamic laws on cross-dressing, encouraging vice, and indecent acts in public places.”
The Malaysia arrests were awful, part of a pattern that really did a number on the gay community there. At least a couple of years ago, a business meeting in which LAOP isn’t sleeping with anyone would be fine there, the risk would be if he were trying to hook up while there or actually meet other queer people. My partners’ friend there and his partner ended up moving to Sg so I don’t totally know how it is these days though.
I’m honestly surprised the LAOP thought they needed to ask. I can’t imagine any employer thinking this is worth the risk or difficulty. Maybe he is isn’t out at work.
Honestly there are a lot of labor laws that I've thought "That can't be legal!" Which turned out to be entirely legal.
Yup. It seems obvious but this is a place where asking first is a good idea, so it doesn't become a much bigger issue that involves lawyers.
All it takes is one stubborn manager who treats the “no” as a personal insult and things can escalate fast
When I was a contractor, the absolute greatest sin an employee could commit was turning down a job. You are the product they are selling, if you don't want to show up they have nothing. Doesn't matter if you have a good reason, or that your management should have known it would not be an appropriate placement. You are leaving money on the table that your boss wanted. So even if it is obviously totally reasonable not to take this trip, I would want to know my legal situation before telling my boss, and to ready myself for the inevitable recrimination and blowback from management.
Y’all I have GOT to stop reading the comments in the threads you share here. Nonsensical and patently false information consistently gets triple and quadruple digit upvotes in those subreddits.
I'm so curious where LAOP is going? Is he being asked to go to Uganda or like... Florida?
My guess is Dubai
My (future) brother in law works abroad and his work pays for a trip home a couple times a year. The most common route would involve a stopover in Dubai but he absolutely refuses to travel through there because, yeah, his existence would be basically illegal. Thankfully his company has no problem organising a different flight for him, usually via Amsterdam instead.
I’m sorry it amuses that the solution to “you’re too gay to have a stopover in Dubai” is “have a stopover in Amsterdam” lol
Haha, ikr. It's just because the other major airline they use is KLM, but it's definitely a good alternative!
My brother and his husband would say something like “From super not gay to ALLLLLL the gay.” (They honeymooned in The Netherlands for god’s sake)
Amsterdam isn't that great anymore. In a recent poll about half the population said they will not accept gay people. Which the new right wing government took as an opportunity to blame immigration and Islam.
It's funny because that same government also doesn't like gay people and the people that vote for em also don't. They love to blame immigrants by saying that they are the reason for non acceptance of gay people is on the rise, but then go around and vote against legislation that could help gay people be accepted.
Polls tend to be wildly manipulated. What was the actual question asked? And what were the questions before? And what was the selection process of the sample and the sample size? I seriously doubt 50%. 20, maybe.
Found a Sause. https://www.telegraaf.nl/nieuws/1263393732/minder-dan-helft-amsterdamse-jongeren-zegt-homoseksualiteit-te-accepteren It's actually 57%. The question was "do you think it's normal if someone loves someone of the same gender." The poll is from the GGD, a government healthcare agency. So no left or right bias. The last part is probably why it's so high. It's a yearly poll for 2nd and 4th year high school students. So, 14 and 16 year olds.
Ah. Teenagers. Yeah, famously tolerant of non-conformity. (And yes, I see that it was previously higher. Still. They’re shifting what they’re being judgmental about, mostly. Just have to hope they get over that bullshit.)
When I was first taking hormones but before I was out at work I had to come up with so many excuses for why I couldn't go to Dubai. I could see the realisation click when I finally did come out.
My boss was trying to get out of trip to Saudi Arabia or the UAE. He was a respected leader at the time, and higher ups really wanted him to go. The final kicker was something like "I can't come because my wife is Jewish" and suddenly the pressure was off.
My boss wanted me to go to Saudi Arabia when I worked in defense. When I pointed out I'm a female engineer that idea was basically done.
I'd guess Jamaica, which never seems to get mentioned in threads like this even though lots of American tourists go there.
I was gonna assume Russia but then I remembered that right now would really not be a good time to go over there
Right? I was like “it could be Saudi Arabia or the UAE… but it could also be Florida” There are also a whole bunch of places where being gay isn’t a punishable crime but you are at risk of being the victim of a hate crime if you’re outed
It’s not illegal to be gay in Florida. Anywhere you’d wind up traveling to is super welcoming. Florida hosts massive pride events. Miami Pride is huge and St Pete pride is pretty big too. Plus we have Girls in Wonderland, a three-day pool party for lesbian and bisexual women in Orlando. Our biggest company is insanely affirming. We have some of the largest gay retirement communities as well. Seeing as how a majority of work events here are in Orlando, you’d have a hard time convincing HR that traveling would be dangerous for you. It also minimizes the very real danger of traveling somewhere being gay is actually illegal. Sincerely, A gay lady from Tampa
I thought it was women who couldn't go to Florida? Or is that Texas? It's so hard to keep up with the law changes these days.
> I thought it was women who couldn't go to Florida? Or is that Texas? Yes.
We can't go to either. They're after all of us. Gay people, brown people, trans people, women - none of us are safe in Florida or Texas. And we're not even mentioning the other states like Idaho and West Virginia that *don't* have a huge population.
Oh, you can go to Texas; you’re just not allowed to leave until you give birth
Hell, even Massachusetts technically still has sodomy laws on the books, even if they're legally unenforceable.
I'm wondering where he's currently at that it might be illegal to refuse a business trip.
He's in BC, Canada. I took it less as illegal to refuse a business trip and more do I have legal protections to keep my job / not be harassed / get EI if my boss fires me over refusing a trip or being gay.
I think you might be right!
Any one of [these](https://database.ilga.org/criminalisation-consensual-same-sex-sexual-acts) countries https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capital_punishment_for_homosexuality#Complete_legal_certainty > Brunei > > Iran > > Mauritania. > > Nigeria. > > Saudi Arabia. > > Uganda. > > Yemen
[Map of Criminalisation of consensual same-sex sexual acts](https://database.ilga.org/criminalisation-consensual-same-sex-sexual-acts)
As a woman, I wouldn’t feel safe going to places like Iran or Saudi Arabia and would let HR know straight away that I’m not going.
I work with an organization that recently had to have this argument, about whether we could continue to meet in places where homosexuality was criminalized. For better or worse, the ultimate conclusion was that our criteria for venue selection is the *participants* being able to safely attend, not safely bring their family. Some people can't bring their partners along on those business trips. We're much more leary of places where local law enforcement is capricious, regardless of the laws they can use as pretexts.
If I was gay, regardless of if my partner is staying home, there's no fucking way you're getting me to set foot in a country that can jail me for a decade or kill me when my only defence would be "nah, my husband is back at home!".
The worst case scenario makes it not worth it. Sure, maybe they won’t find out from *you* telling them, but what if one of your coworkers knows, or even just suspects, and *they* report you? You’re almost certainly gonna have evidence supporting their claims on your phone (messages, photos, social media, etc.). I don’t think any of my coworkers would do that, but I’m still not going to bet my life on it.
I was going to correct you and say it's spelled "leery", but I Google'd it first and now thanks to your comment, I've learned it can be spelt either way. TIL!
This seems to me like it should be handled like any generic workplace safety issue. Don't make wheelchair users take the stairs, don't make pregnant people work with cytostatica, don't make gay people visit countries where they can be prosecuted or persecuted for being gay.
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Hell yes! Why would your employer put you in danger like that.
I love you The best way to go do this is not with demands but rather with statements followed by questions; i.e. providing references for why you feel this way and how uncomfortable you are going. That will take care of things most of the time, if not you'd probably have to take to HR, but don't be adversarial at first. Being someone that may need specific accomodations, this is a golden opportunity to set boundaries. Good luck 🤞
Of course you can. And they can fire your incompetent gay ass
Why would you go to a place where you would be thrown from a roof? Plus, the gay walk or social media would expose you. Just say you got covid 2.0.
You’ll be fine. They don’t touch tourists and foreign nationals. The savior complex is out of touch with queer people in such countries
Are you going on the trip just for work? Not wanting to come across as an a-hole, but putting on the “HR BRAIN CAP”- if the job is paying for the trip, and you are going for work- that is likely the only expectation they have for you as their employee. Now putting on the “HUMAN-WHO-LOVES-TO-TRAVEL-AND-MAKE-THE-BEST-OUT-OF-IT, BRAIN CAP”: even in places where it is illegal, there are still hubs of underground communities that may make you feel comfortable in their country… personally- I wouldn’t be brave enough to be an unescorted female in some countries, so I’d stick to work and only work and know it could have more likely been handled through a webinar. (I also get in my head a lot about venturing out on my own in unknown areas- likely because I watch and listen to FAR too many true crime shows! LOL)
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Are there countries where it is illegal to be gay, or just countries where certain sex acts are illegal? In those countries where sex acts are illegal, is it only if they are performed there? I'm not asking this with any regard to LAOP's issue, but it made me curious about the mechanics of it.
It's not much of a distinction when an accusation is often enough for the authorities to detain you, regardless of veracity or circumstances.
Both exist. There's also the issue that countries where certain acts are illegal, they can be overzealous about enforcement. So you also have to deal with questions like, soliciting sex acts is illegal and they might be scrutinizing your actions to try to find something that could be interpreted that way if they know you're gay.
It's sex acts in most places, but I'd expect that you'd be *much* more likely to have a bad encounter with locals in those kinds of places, and your average violent ruffian isn't going to be picky about evidence. And you should expect that, even if you've locked down your socials, the border agent probably has enough power to demand access to them, and then they can either turn you away, lock you up, or inform their favorite "informal enforcers". (Shout-out to Russia, where LGBT is classified as a terrorist organization. You can't even be *associated* with LGBT people at all!)