Employee gets fired from work because the boss feels she looks 'angry' all the time and people are telling her go to court

Women are often expected to appear "warm," and if they don't, they're labeled rude by co-workers. These workplace expectations from men cost a Reddit user (u/Zerkrog) her job after she was fired for having an "angry" face. She shared her bizarre experience online, receiving support from fellow users who advised her to take the matter to court.

On the popular subreddit r/antiwork, a female employee (u/Zerkrog) shared an ordeal she faced that cost her job. The employee, who shared that she worked as a blue-collar worker in a logistics warehouse, always maintained a neutral expression and never beat around the bush when communicating. "I don’t smile or talk 'flirty' when I’m serious or beat around the bush like most women act sometimes," the employee explained. The employee further revealed that she worked in a team consisting of international employees; therefore, direct communication was necessary, as she was based in the Netherlands.

However, when she engaged in direct communication, her co-workers and managers never appreciated her way of speaking. Specifically pointing at one team leader, she shared that he often found her communication style "cold." She said, "One (let's call him X) team leader once mentioned that I 'don't communicate with my face and look aggressive, cold, blah blah.' What does that even mean? I work in a blue-collar job, and it doesn’t make sense as my co-workers are not clients and not my friends." She added, "Also, X started pointing at my 'angry' face more when I made some minor mistakes, so maybe he had a problem with that but didn’t find a way to fire me?" Recalling the incident, the employee explained that she met a co-worker from her country, and they were casually joking in their native language. 

All hell broke loose when the team leader found out and decided to report it to her work agency for "aggressive speaking." "Even though he understood no word that was said, he gave my work agency info all of a sudden, that 'he wants to fire me because of the cold behavior towards the team.' Even though people never really had a direct problem with me, except some men that I refused to talk about myself with too much," she added. Interestingly, her other co-worker did not receive any warning, as she was described as someone who had a "smiley/flirty" attitude toward everyone. A 2016 study published by Ivan Carbajal and Jamie S. Hughes highlighted how gendered expectations of warmth shape professional judgments. The study found that women are generally expected to be friendly and approachable, and when they fail to display these traits, they are judged more harshly than men in similar positions. The Reddit user's "neutral" face was perceived as rude by her male leader, reinforcing biased perceptions that penalize women, just as she was fired from her position for unjust reasons.

Soon after the story went viral, many Reddit users urged the employee to file a complaint in court and shared similar experiences. u/AnamCeili wrote, "You may want to consider consulting with a labor & employment attorney." u/NapalmCandy commented, "I'm sorry this happened to you. It's absolute bullshit. No one should be told to act happy if they aren't, or to smile if they don't want to, but especially not women. It's performative bullshit." u/timinus0 shared, "I'm a man, and I encounter this all the time. I say "this is just what I look like." People tell me all the time to smile more."

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