Dear Prudence,
I have a co-worker named “Jacob” who I’ve known for a very long time, close to a decade. He’s in another department than the one I work in, so he’s not a direct superior, but he’s in one that works closely with mine and I’ve always thought of him as something of a mentor and certainly a more senior employee. We see each other at work a lot, and we fairly frequently socialize outside of work as well.
We had a year-closing drinks party recently. Wasn’t anything fancy, just several of us going out to a bar we liked and staying there for several hours. Jacob and I wound up staying the last, and we both probably drank a bit more than we should have. I don’t remember exactly how we got onto the subject, but we were talking about things we regretted. That’s when Jacob floored me. He said he was intensely homophobic, and that the thought of two men having sex made him want to puke. He knows it’s wrong, and he tries not to find out about people’s sexuality because it’s not something he wants to judge them over.
Like I said, I’ve known him for close to 10 years and I never even got a hint of this before.
Whatever his prejudices, he keeps them tightly under wraps. But I know he manages a department, and I figure there’s at least a reasonable chance one of his about 30 subordinates isn’t heterosexual. I don’t know how he can manage to do so fairly if that’s what he’s really like, but I don’t know if I should report him to HR on the basis of a drunken confession for something that he certainly at the time didn’t seem to like about himself.
Should I speak up? And if so, to whom?
— Confused Coworker