My colleagues secretly mock my clothing choices. What can I do?

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I work for a company where people tend to wear expensive clothes. As I think it’s ridiculous to be paying $200 for a blouse or a skirt like they do, I wear more affordable – but not fast fashion – clothing.

The problem is that a trusted colleague has told me that I have become the butt of office jokes. I now feel ashamed, exposed and humiliated to the point where I want to work from home full-time. How do I deal with this situation?

This sounds like a clique of colleagues repeatedly descending to juvenile depths and mocking you for something that is both highly subjective and, in the scheme of things, inconsequential. At the centre of this behaviour is an effort to maintain a hierarchy.

Those who’ve made you an office joke want to reinforce their self-perceived “superior” position. And they’re using clothes as a signifier of status. Of course, their “ladder” doesn’t function as intended without people at the bottom – and they’ve cruelly decided one of those people is you.

What can you do? I spoke with Dr Zoe Krupka, a........

© Brisbane Times