# Partner doesnt interact with colleagues much, red flag?



## lijana (Feb 3, 2016)

My fiance and I went to his work function the other day. This function was held outside in a park and was sort of like a picnic style.

There were a number of park benches and also some tables laid out on the ground with pillows to sit. 

We basically just sat on the park bench for the whole of the work function without talking to anyone. 

About 3 colleagues of his came up to us and talked a little to us however went away after a few minutes. One was his manager who came to talk to us, however after a few minutes of talking, my fiance diverted the conversation and said we should go get food at the buffet. He stood up and started walking towards the buffet, I felt obliged to stand up also and the conversation ended with the manager. 

His colleagues appear to be nice people, they work in the travel industry and seem quite relaxed. My fiance has never complained about anyone at work. 

After coming from the buffet area with food, we noticed our original seat had been taken by some of his colleagues. 
We were left without a seat to sit on, and had to sit on the tables which were on the ground with the pillows. My fiance then complained to me and said that his colleagues had taken our seat and caused us to 'eat off the ground'. In my opinion there are no labelled seats so there is no rule on who can or cannot take someone's seat as there were other places to sit. 

His work place has a few gay people who brought their partners and my fiance made a comment regarding whether gay guys walk funny after the type of sex they have had. I said for him not to say such things and then he said 'this is the only fun I get to have (i.e. attending this work function'. 

Some of his colleagues brought their children also. One father was hugging a daughter of about 12 years old. His wife was standing next to them and my fiance was also standing near them in line for the buffet. My fiance asked the wife 'is this allowed?' i.e. regarding the hugging of the father and daughter. The wife just smiled..but I cringed inside at my fiance's question.

Another gay colleague brought an asian partner with him and my fiance commented to me 'he brought an asian Thai boy'. I am also asian and my fiance is ukrainian. 

If the following happened at a work function with your partner, how would you feel? What do you feel of the above behaviour?
I feel the above made me uncomfortable yet I dont know if I am too analytical or critical or if this is seriously a problem or a red flag of something being wrong with him. 
How do I raise this with him without offending him and making him feel like I'm critical?


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## EleGirl (Dec 3, 2011)

How long have you been dating your fiancé?

Is he more friendly with people under different circumstances.

How long has he been on that job?

I would be concerned that either he has problems at work or he's just a very odd man who does not like to socialize and says strange things.

IF he is that standoffish with the people from work, he's not going to go very far in life.

The eating on the ground thing I can see in some ways. Some cultures would find that to be just wrong in that type of situation. When you mentioned that it was tables on the ground thought 'yuk'. Now I've been to pick nicks when we all brought blankets and sat on the ground. But tables on the ground with pillows?

What country are you in? Is he from the Ukraine or are you all living in the Ukraine. Or is he something like an American whose family came from the Ukraine.

I would not stay with a guy who acted like that at a company gathering.


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## arbitrator (Feb 13, 2012)

*Your fiancé seems like a "socio-phobe" who has low tolerances for gay as well as father-daughter relationships!

I think that you should check out these social priorities of his and start giving him a second look before ever professing your "I do's" to him!

He sounds a little bit "off," to say the least!*
_Posted via Mobile Device_


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## Lilac23 (Jul 9, 2015)

lijana said:


> My fiance and I went to his work function the other day. This function was held outside in a park and was sort of like a picnic style.
> 
> There were a number of park benches and also some tables laid out on the ground with pillows to sit.
> 
> ...


He just sounds very formal socially, might be a cultural thing. Is he affectionate in other public places where you don't know other people?


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## jdawg2015 (Feb 12, 2015)

lijana said:


> Another gay colleague brought an asian partner with him and my fiance commented to me 'he brought an asian Thai boy'. I am also asian and my fiance is Ukrainian.


You are not compatible culturally. All I need to read is this portion of your post.

I'm an American and I have dated several Asians and nearly married a Singaporean. Have you dated many Caucasians before? If not you have to adjust to what you will see as a more "blunt" or "harsh" way of communicating as perceived by you. It's a culture difference. If you date Caucasians for long you'll actually get used to it and not notice the difference. 

Obviously he is making gay jokes so you can surmise he's not a fan of them and/or just like to make crude jokes. This is who he is and if you find it offensive then my guess is the tip of the iceberg about compatibility.


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## frusdil (Sep 5, 2013)

jdawg2015 said:


> I'm an American and I have dated several Asians and nearly married a Singaporean. Have you dated many Caucasians before? If not you have to adjust to what you will see as a more "blunt" or "harsh" way of communicating as perceived by you. It's a culture difference. If you date Caucasians for long you'll actually get used to it and not notice the difference.


Um...no. It's not a cultural difference, my husband would never say anything like that! 

This guy is a chump. End of story.


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## jdawg2015 (Feb 12, 2015)

Yes, it is a cultural difference. A huge one. 

Have you met Ukranian people and know them in depth? Contrast that with a much more humble typical Asian. It's a HUGE gradient.

You also realize that you can make jokes about gays, or any other group and not actually be a homophobe? Some people have entirely different types of humor. 

Another part of me thinks the guy is more introverted so social settings give him anxiety.



frusdil said:


> Um...no. It's not a cultural difference, my husband would never say anything like that!
> 
> This guy is a chump. End of story.


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## Nanners (Jan 10, 2016)

Him not talking to people very much wouldn't really be a red flag for me, but it would make me wonder if he's not enjoying his job. I've been in a position before where I loved the people I worked with but hated my job so much that when we had these 'social' work functions I would just use the free time to spend with my H and DD. I was so bitter about everything management did that I didn't want them to see me actually enjoying myself. 

The strange comments, on the other hand, would concern me. But that's because I am a very open-minded person and I think his comments sound slightly homophobic and racist. That's not the type of person I'm into, but whether or not you're ok with that is totally up to you. 

What do you think is 'wrong with him'?


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## brooklynAnn (Jun 29, 2015)

A red flag to what? Are you asking if you should marry him?

He seems like he has issues socializing. Maybe he is awkward and not good in social settings. 

However, his comments about gay people, shows that he has biases. He is probably homophobic. 

His reaction to the father/daughter hug, shows that he does not understand family dynamics and how families interact. 

How is he at home? 
Is he a person who talks to you when you are together and alone?
How does he relate to his family? Are they warm people who hug and cuddle each other?
How does he interact with family and friends?
How does he treat your family?
How does he treat you?

These are all questions you should ask yourself.


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## phillybeffandswiss (Jan 20, 2013)

frusdil said:


> Um...no. It's not a cultural difference, my husband would never say anything like that!
> 
> This guy is a chump. End of story.


Maybe or maybe not. He sounds like someone I started training as an assistant instructor in martial arts. Also, another person who I thought was in high school, but is actually 31. If she really loves him, she needs to get him to a doctor to see if he has a specific form of autism or other mental disorder. If he doesn't he has issues bordering on bigotry and if this is her peek into their social life, OP better think hard about marrying this guy.


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## richardsharpe (Jul 8, 2014)

Good evening
Being compatible is important. If he is withdrawn in one social situation, that may not mean much. If he is like that in lots of social situations it could be important.


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## EVG39 (Jun 4, 2015)

Is it possible that this man is somewhere on the Autism/Aspergers spectrum? It's much more common than you think. When I read about the bluntness, the lack of emotional awareness, the failure to pick up on social cues, etc that was the first thing I thought of.


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## WonkyNinja (Feb 28, 2013)

lijana said:


> *We basically just sat on the park bench for the whole of the work function without talking to anyone.*
> 
> About 3 colleagues of his came up to us and talked a little to us however went away after a few minutes. *One was his manager who came to talk to us, however after a few minutes of talking, my fiance diverted the conversation and said we should go get food at the buffet. He stood up and started walking towards the buffet, I felt obliged to stand up also and the conversation ended with the manager.*
> 
> ...


For me there were a whole load of red flags here. Avoiding people and sitting alone at a work function suggests that either he doesn't like people or people don't like him. Walking away when your manager has come over to talk is just plain rude.

I'm surprised that he made such obvious gay and racial comments in your presence especially since you are asian yourself. Aside from what it shows about him personally if he is overheard making comments like those he could be in a lot of trouble at work also.

Speaking as a father the comment about a father hugging his 12 year old daughter being inappropriate was disgusting to hear and really should be making you carefully rethink whether or not this is a man you want to spend your life and raise children with. 

I know that sadly there are many parents like that but how a young girl is treated by her father is a big deal, it sets up how she should expect to be treated by boyfriends as she grows up. It can take a long time to get over unaffectionate parents, there are many threads here on TAM where that is a problem. 

He may be on the Autism or Asperger scale or it may just be cultural none of which commit you to spending your life with him.

For me any of those comments would be a relationship dealbreaker, all them together and i'd be leaving skid marks as I ran.


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## lijana (Feb 3, 2016)

Thanks for your replies and insight. 

I have been dating my fiance for three years. He grew up in Ukraine (Russian Ukrainian) and only came to Australia when he was 28. He has been here for 5 years. I grew up in Australia, came when I was 7. 
He has worked in the company for 4 years now. He works as an IT manager. He is the only IT person in the company, and doesnt work with a team of people. People in his company have IT problems and come to him. 

Some people commented on the homophobic/racist nature of his comments. From a cultural perspective, Ukraine is a very homophobic and racist country, it is quite backward from what I have read of the news articles of this country and what my fiance has told me. Its political correctness has not been developed very well compared to the likes of Australia and America. In Ukraine, my fiance had never seen an asian person before. 

I haven't interacted with other Ukrainians or Russians whom have lived here for a few years, so I can't say that all Ukrainians are like this or display these prejudices. However as I come from China, and my parents are Chinese immigrants, I can say that my parents (particularly father) displays similar prejudices against homosexuals. There are also many Chinese immigrants (my parents friends and people whom we know) whom display prejudice against dark skin individuals e.g. nigerians, indians etc, e.g. Chinese immigrants may not be happy for their kids to marry someone of that ethnicity. 

I am not saying the above prejudices are the right attitude , however many countries have not developed fully their discrimination laws and political correctness. Even in the US itself, there are many on the bible belt who have prejudices against others based on gender preference. Many also would not prefer their children to marry outsiders e.g. asian or others races. 

Because of knowing the above about my fiance's background, I have cut him slack many times due to any homophobic/racist comments (he doesnt say it very often) and have tried to teach him it is not the right thing to say. His company has a lot of gay men working in there, probably more so than avg company (not sure why).
He has acknowledged that Ukraine is much more prejudiced in terms of race and homophobia. However he tells me he is not prejudiced against race, particularly since he is dating me. He thinks how can he be prejudiced or racist if he is dating an asian? 

In relation to fathers hugging daughters, when I saw the father hugging the daughter I also thought in my mind for a second 'oh it looks unusual, as the daughter looked about 14 or so' , however it is not something I would say out a loud to the wife. I completely understand that father and daughters should be close however the way I was brought up, my father never was physically close to me at the tween age e.g. hugging me in the way that father did to the daughter. It is an interesting concept to explore e.g. what boundaries are there on at what age it would appear creepy to others if the father was touchy with the daughter. Similar to mothers and sons, it seems okay for mothers to kiss sons on the lips at a young age, however if the mother was doing that when the son was 14 or 15 or older, some people may say it is inappropriate. I am unsure myself as to the boundaries of at what age should extreme physical contact be less appropriate between father and daughter, mother and son..

My fiance is quite affectionate with me. He also has a young nephew in Australia, whom when I saw them interact, he was quite nice to, he had the kid on his shoulders once at a shopping centre. 

He is quite nice to me and treats me reasonably well. For example, I had some dust allergies and he volunteered to clean the house weekly instead of me. I had some neck pain and I wanted to get an ipad stand to help me read and he made one for me. 
We live with our parents and he helped my parents out with gardening and fixing things around the house.
I have considered whether he has aspergers however there are things which make me think he doesnt, e.g. he has no motor coordination problems at all (he is good at sports), he seems in tune with my feelings e.g. if im not happy he can tell. However he himself has said to me that he often feels 'different to others' even back in Ukraine. Sometimes I am left wondering whether it is cultural issues e.g. I understand russians are more blunt and direct in general, or whether it is aspergers.

The thing that makes me question him is the following:
He appears to be a person who doesnt like to interact much with others. He has come here for 5 years however he has not made close friends, only 1 other russian guy who is immigrant like himself. This guy lives far away anyway, so doesnt really meet him much. 
On one hand I am also a person who hasnt made many friends due to shyness (particularly after highschool), so I feel like I need to give him slack for that cause he is an immigrant who just came here so of course he wont have many friends.

There are things he says which come across as not socially aware or unusual, I dont know how to put my words on it. I often put it on cultural reasons however sometimes I think is it just him and got nothing to do with culture?:

1. A girl at his work, who often takes sick days all the time for small things such as hayfever, recently had a leaving party as she was quitting and going to go travelling. The company farewelled her and commented on her 'good work' and her service to the company. 
My fiance said the following to me, that he found it strange the managers would comment on her 'good work' when she often took unsubstantiated sick leave and doesnt seem like a good employee. He thought it wasn't honest for managers to say this and that it would be more honest if comments about her 'good work' was not made. 
I said since she was leaving, most people would just say something nice rather than reprimand her, usually it is a courtesy at most companies with nice bosses. He said he just felt it was less honest. 
2. We were watching TV and there was something on TV which said that a boy in the airplane was bothering another adult passenger e.g. kicking his seat. The adult passenger then threatened the boy and his parents. The people on the TV (a talk show) was talking about this adult passenger and how he needed to 'chill out'. My fiance commented after seeing this , what if you tell the boy to stop kicking and he keeps doing it, what would you do? It felt like my fiance was for the adult passenger's reaction which was to threaten the boy and his parents. He kept saying, what if some parents dont care much about their kid and the kid keeps on annoying the other person, what would you do then? 
I said to him that most parents would reprimand their kids and not let them go that far. Otherwise I said you could speak to flight attendant. He then said to me, what if the flight attendant doesnt have another seat for you to move to, what would you do then? As if to justify the guy threatening the kid and his parents. 

There are other incidences similar to the above, which would be too long to go into. However it is basically the feeling of him giving a contrarian view to how most people would feel about something, then me having to explain to him how people would usually think in this scenario. He would also sometimes bring up certain things that I haven't thought about too. There are times where I think how come he doesnt know this, like to me its common sense but to him it is not? 

He has this feeling that people who are involved in sales and people who talk alot in their jobs e.g. politicians, to be liars. He thinks they are not necessarily honest people as they often put spin on things. He doesnt necessarily trust them 100% and is not gullible. I can understand that in Ukraine there are a lot of gypsy and other types of people who are scammers and swindlers, more so than in Australia, so perhaps his thinking comes again from his cultural roots rather than aspergers? 

What do you think of the above? Am i reading too much into things or there is something wrong with him?


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## wringo123 (Mar 8, 2015)

Reading this I could not help but think of Sheldon on the Big Bang Theory. Definitely sounds like something on Autism spectrum. 

Sent from my QMV7A using Tapatalk


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## header (Nov 14, 2015)

lijana said:


> My fiance said the following to me, that he found it strange the managers would comment on her 'good work' when she often took unsubstantiated sick leave and doesnt seem like a good employee. He thought it wasn't honest for managers to say this and that it would be more honest if comments about her 'good work' was not made.


Totally agree. She was an unreliable irresponsible worker. Who gives a rat's ass that she's leaving. You want to throw her a party, find, no need to throw undeserved compliments at her. Certainly doesn't do her any good, if anything it will make her more likely to repeat the bad behavior at her next job. 




lijana said:


> 2. We were watching TV and there was something on TV which said that a boy in the airplane was bothering another adult passenger e.g. kicking his seat. The adult passenger then threatened the boy and his parents.


If the parents didn't stop the bad behavior I'd scream at them too, only if I was bigger and stronger than the father, of course.



lijana said:


> He has this feeling that people who are involved in sales and people who talk alot in their jobs e.g. politicians, to be liars.


He happens to be right.

I like his gay jokes too. Actually chuckled at the one about how they might walk funny after sex.



lijana said:


> What do you think of the above? Am i reading too much into things or there is something wrong with him?


He's an honest guy who doesn't like too many people, and for good reason. Most people are dishonest, unreliable and not all that bright.

He sounds a lot like me, and I have never been suspected of having Aspergers or any other major issues other than perhaps being somewhat emotionally distant and not in touch with my feelings. 

Give the guy a break.


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## lijana (Feb 3, 2016)

'Most people are dishonest, unreliable and not all that bright'

What kind of generalisation is the above? Its okay not to like people because of such a generalisation? Humans may not act with 100% consistency but it doesnt mean they are all dishonest individuals. Im not saying trust every person you see in sight, but at the same time you don't go about living the world thinking everyone is untrustworthy. I have a boss who is like this, untrustworthy of many people, he is 45 now, and no significant other/ hardly any friends, every employee who has worked with him has left (about 8) and he has cancer. 

What cause your emotional distance, was there something in your upbringing? 
My fiance has had some issues with family, he hasn't had the best role models in life.


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## jdawg2015 (Feb 12, 2015)

You guys are so politically correct. They guy said the joke to his gf not like he said it to someones face or in a group. So now gf says doesn't like it and he decides if he thinks she is too uptight.

Make a joke about gays you're a homophobe? Really
So what if you make JOKES about heteros that's ok but gay jokes are taboo?

Now, the guy may have social settings he does not do well in but part of this is an Asian will view jokes by westerners differently. That's what this seems to be.

You guys are going off the deep end over analysing things.


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## Cooper (Apr 18, 2008)

Red flags? Not so sure I would condemn the guy for just being himself. The "red flag" as I see it is your concern over him being who he is, if he isn't measuring up to what you want out of a man or a husband now's the time to bail, chances are his personality isn't going to change.


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## header (Nov 14, 2015)

lijana said:


> What cause your emotional distance, was there something in your upbringing?


Yes but this isn't about me.


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## EleGirl (Dec 3, 2011)

lijana,

The new info helps.

There are a lot of cultures that do not get all hung up in PC stuff. I can image that it's like that in the Ukraine for the most part.

The bottom line is that he his who he is. Do not try to change him. At the some time people do change over time. But I would not hold my breath that he will change exactly the way you'd like him to.

So the bottom line is can you accept him the way he is? There is no right answer to this. If you can accept him and love him, good. If you cannot, that's good too.. it's being honest.

What you see is what you get.


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## lijana (Feb 3, 2016)

I talked to him about it and he told me that he did not say 'is this allowed?' when seeing the father and daughter hugging. His version of events is that he was looking at them and then the wife introduced them as her daughter and husband and then my fiance said 'this is allowed'. Its funny because I remember his intonation as 'is this allowed?' with a questioning tone yet he is saying it is not the case. 
Even if he just said 'this is allowed' it doesnt make sense cause most people don't answer someone's introduction with 'this is allowed'.
He says he thinks its okay for a father to hug a daughter


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## Lilac23 (Jul 9, 2015)

lijana said:


> I talked to him about it and he told me that he did not say 'is this allowed?' when seeing the father and daughter hugging. His version of events is that he was looking at them and then the wife introduced them as her daughter and husband and then my fiance said 'this is allowed'. Its funny because I remember his intonation as 'is this allowed?' with a questioning tone yet he is saying it is not the case.
> Even if he just said 'this is allowed' it doesnt make sense cause most people don't answer someone's introduction with 'this is allowed'.
> He says he thinks its okay for a father to hug a daughter


Did he know it was the guy's daughter? Some 14 year old's look like adults and maybe he was just thrown off. How is he in other social settings? If this is a one-off I wouldn't worry to much about it but if he is constantly acting awkward or embarrassing you in public, you might want to think about if this is something you want to put up with for the rest of your life. I have met some Ukranian / Russian people and they generally seem kind of cold / formal in social settings, IMO. I think some of it might be cultural and maybe he was a dumb joke. Who knows?


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