Accused of racial bias at work by someone, and I feel sick over it

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You have falsely been accused of racial bias because she misunderstood the statement. You have, on the record, the statement. You should demand her retraction of the statement.

The rest is noise. Stop re-examining every action.

This.
I'd take it a step further and consult an attorney about suing her and the university for libel.
No way in hell would I interact with this liar or have any further business with her employer (the university.)

OP was accused of racial bias not only because the lead author misunderstood what OP said during the interview, but because she unfortunately only quoted what the loud co-author had said. If she had done any pre-interview research this situation could have easily been avoided, because no one intentionally leaves out a lead author's comment during an interview especially if you are being paid to do marketing for the lead author's product.

OP was FALSELY accused of saying something she has proof she did not say. The lying liar who lies is a liability for the university.

Yup and it did cross my mind the lying liar may have deliberately tried to screw with OP. Universities tend to have very toxic political environments.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP, don’t be the white lady who weaponizes her tears when accused of racial bias. It’s tiresome.

Use this as an opportunity to reflect. Yes, she misheard you. I’m sure you had no ill intent, but intent is separate from impact. Let’s look at the facts— you prioritized the words of a white man over the LEAD AUTHOR of the paper. The lead author who is 1) a woman and 2) a POC. It’s a bad look, OP. As a marketing professional, if this never occurred to you when writing the piece, then that is a pretty huge blind spot. Stop crying and being defensive. Be a grown up and own up to your mistake here and use it as a growth opportunity.

Seriously GTF over yourself. OP is allowed to have emotion if she is falsely accused of something. I am so damn sick of people complaining about white women tears. Society has gone off the deep end when ppl are not allowed to express emotions because they are white. OP was accused of something she did not do. OP was not racist. OP treated two ppl equally and took the more quotable phrase, she didn’t do it because the person was a white male. Ppl of color vs love to claim bias, but clearly the other person was more articulate. She took the more articulate quote since her job was to promote the book.

[Anonymous]

The author’s racial bias made her think OP made a racially bias statement.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP, don’t be the white lady who weaponizes her tears when accused of racial bias. It’s tiresome.

Use this as an opportunity to reflect. Yes, she misheard you. I’m sure you had no ill intent, but intent is separate from impact. Let’s look at the facts— you prioritized the words of a white man over the LEAD AUTHOR of the paper. The lead author who is 1) a woman and 2) a POC. It’s a bad look, OP. As a marketing professional, if this never occurred to you when writing the piece, then that is a pretty huge blind spot. Stop crying and being defensive. Be a grown up and own up to your mistake here and use it as a growth opportunity.

Seriously GTF over yourself. OP is allowed to have emotion if she is falsely accused of something. I am so damn sick of people complaining about white women tears. Society has gone off the deep end when ppl are not allowed to express emotions because they are white. OP was accused of something she did not do. OP was not racist. OP treated two ppl equally and took the more quotable phrase, she didn’t do it because the person was a white male. Ppl of color vs love to claim bias, but clearly the other person was more articulate. She took the more articulate quote since her job was to promote the book.

This x1000

[Anonymous]

As someone who worked in academics and gets the stupid political shit...how did you not know who the important person was on the call? That's your first problem. Second problem, why were you even speaking with the second author? Even if he was more quotable you did wrong here. You paraphrase, make her look good and move on.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The author’s racial bias made her think OP made a racially bias statement.

Frankly, the whole situation was set up to make the white guy look good. He shouldn't have been on the call, period. Who decided that? The client?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP, don’t be the white lady who weaponizes her tears when accused of racial bias. It’s tiresome.

Use this as an opportunity to reflect. Yes, she misheard you. I’m sure you had no ill intent, but intent is separate from impact. Let’s look at the facts— you prioritized the words of a white man over the LEAD AUTHOR of the paper. The lead author who is 1) a woman and 2) a POC. It’s a bad look, OP. As a marketing professional, if this never occurred to you when writing the piece, then that is a pretty huge blind spot. Stop crying and being defensive. Be a grown up and own up to your mistake here and use it as a growth opportunity.

Seriously GTF over yourself. OP is allowed to have emotion if she is falsely accused of something. I am so damn sick of people complaining about white women tears. Society has gone off the deep end when ppl are not allowed to express emotions because they are white. OP was accused of something she did not do. OP was not racist. OP treated two ppl equally and took the more quotable phrase, she didn’t do it because the person was a white male. Ppl of color vs love to claim bias, but clearly the other person was more articulate. She took the more articulate quote since her job was to promote the book.

+1. This. OP, you did nothing wrong. Glad that you have call recorded. The author sounds exhausting. She was incapable of speaking up, misheard you, and then called you a racist. I’m so tired of the crap culture we live in now

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Race aside, this is why I learned in a psych class not to use negatives. If you’d said, “I want to hear both of you,” there would be no misunderstanding. Relying on people hearing the word “don’t” or “not” causes many unnecessary errors.

I was thinking the same thing - who would even phrase it as “I don’t want to not hear you” - that’s a terrible sentence. That said, I think OP was wrong in quoting the loud, boisterous male at the (almost) exclusion of the woman. Even if they were equal, it would have been wrong. Considering she was the lead author, OP committed a serious faux pas. Hopefully she can fix it.

[Anonymous]

You messed up OP. Dry your yard and get back to work. How are you going to fix it? Can you offer to apologize to the lead author and strange to interview only her for a follow-up and do a rewrite?

TBH your first post seemed a little biased. Like you were granting the male author more gravitas than the female. Thus is a good lesson to check your biases.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The very broad strokes: I run my own marketing agency (not in DC, but I used to live here and still keep up on the boards).
I've been doing it for 20 years and have a really great reputation that I worked hard to earn. One of my clients is a university who wanted to publicize a research paper by two academics, so I put together a release after interviewing both authors, with the rep from the uni's comm department also on the line. I record all my calls, and this was recorded.

One of the authors, apparently the lead author -- which I didn't know, they were presented to me as co-authors -- was very young, Asian American woman who spoke more softly. The co-author was an older, very articulate white male.

At some point during the call, they began to talk over one another. I said, according to my recorded transcript: "Could one of you talk? I don't want to not hear you."

The call continued on, the story was finalized, but I quoted the man, who talked more, more in the release because he had more quotable phrases.

My longtime colleague who hired me from the uni called me yesterday and was very upset -- not at me, but at the situation, trying to figure out what happened, and said this wouldn't affect *my* relationship with the uni or future work, but that I should know that the younger woman apparently reached out to accuse me of racial bias because she thought I said, quote: "I don't want to hear you."

Now, that is not what I said, and the recording bears that out. I shared the recording with him as well as our correspondence where I gave equal attention and respect to both people.

The one thing I did was quote the man more, but the man was frankly the superior interview. It was not a racial choice. In fact, I had asked the softer woman to speak up to get her to talk more!

I burst into tears with my long time colleague. I have never had this happen before. I know people can be accused of micro aggressions in work environments all the time, but it has not happened to me, and it does not feel good, and I feel mortified. I also worry about my own reputation (although my colleague seems to have my back, and my recording bears out my side.)

DCUM, how would you handle? Do I ask to speak to these people directly? Do I let my client handle it? Will it blow over? I have been up sick, crying upset about this. I work with clients in the religious, disabilities, etc space. I feel mortified that I came off this way. Help? Thank you.

Do I ask to speak to these people directly? Absolutely not.

Do I let my client handle it? You already provided evidence which contradicts her account of things. I would say and do nothing more.

Will it blow over? Probably, although this woman may hold a grudge for a long time. I would consult an attorney if you perceive that she or the university starts defaming your business or reputation.

[Anonymous]

First, sit down with the lead author and profusely apologize. Second, figure out something you can do/offer to make it right. Third, make some changes to do better next time. Better research, actually read the work (at least the author information!) before an interview, don’t let one person monopolize the conversation, and have an option to submit written answers for anyone who doesn’t interview well.

[Anonymous]

Read up on white fragility. You made a mistake, mistakes happen but your reaction is where the fragility comes in. Own it, apologize, learn from it, and move on.

Accept that someone got upset with you and it was undeserved. Maybe strive to understand why they mis-perceived you, the kind of bias and experiences they’ve had.

People make mistakes, are misunderstood, or misheard all the time. Don't catastrophize this.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP, don’t be the white lady who weaponizes her tears when accused of racial bias. It’s tiresome.

Use this as an opportunity to reflect. Yes, she misheard you. I’m sure you had no ill intent, but intent is separate from impact. Let’s look at the facts— you prioritized the words of a white man over the LEAD AUTHOR of the paper. The lead author who is 1) a woman and 2) a POC. It’s a bad look, OP. As a marketing professional, if this never occurred to you when writing the piece, then that is a pretty huge blind spot. Stop crying and being defensive. Be a grown up and own up to your mistake here and use it as a growth opportunity.

+100 think of it as an opportunity to market yourself as a gracious, thoughtful person who can learn from a misunderstanding

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP, don’t be the white lady who weaponizes her tears when accused of racial bias. It’s tiresome.

Use this as an opportunity to reflect. Yes, she misheard you. I’m sure you had no ill intent, but intent is separate from impact. Let’s look at the facts— you prioritized the words of a white man over the LEAD AUTHOR of the paper. The lead author who is 1) a woman and 2) a POC. It’s a bad look, OP. As a marketing professional, if this never occurred to you when writing the piece, then that is a pretty huge blind spot. Stop crying and being defensive. Be a grown up and own up to your mistake here and use it as a growth opportunity.

Seriously GTF over yourself. OP is allowed to have emotion if she is falsely accused of something. I am so damn sick of people complaining about white women tears. Society has gone off the deep end when ppl are not allowed to express emotions because they are white. OP was accused of something she did not do. OP was not racist. OP treated two ppl equally and took the more quotable phrase, she didn’t do it because the person was a white male. Ppl of color vs love to claim bias, but clearly the other person was more articulate. She took the more articulate quote since her job was to promote the book.

I bet you are because you clearly dont get it and have no curiosity about why

[Anonymous]

It's far easier to chalk it up to racial bias rather than presentation performance.
OP needs to push back because allowing this to be mischaracterized as 'racial bias' does not force the Asian author to address her presentation deficits.
Sometimes we need to recognize that joining a speaker's club or something like toastmasters is necessary to hone and polish our public speaking skills. It sounds like the author needs this.