Is "dark humor" normal? / Other Toxicity Concerns
I'm about two months into my training at a police/fire/EMS dispatch center housed in a police department. I come mostly from working in youth development and social work roles, however I'm learning a lot about dispatching and love what I'm doing thus far. I've heard from everybody I'm training with, as well as my supervisors, that I'm ahead of the curve on my training, and am doing a wonderful job.
One thing I've noticed, however, is the amount of "dark humor" that everybody uses in dispatch, and to a lesser extent the entire police department. Coming from a social work background, I understand that vicarious trauma can result in a desensitized mindset over time, but the amount of mocking/rude comments I've witnessed dispatchers make over stressed out callers who walked in on dead loved ones is a little bit...jarring? I usually give colleague a puzzled look when they try and engage with me on this type of thing, and I'm usually met with "this is going to happen a lot, so get used to it", or the "we're nuts around here 🤪" comments that just kind of brush off the situation. It doesn't bother me on a personal level when people cope this way, I just feel that we should maintain a certain level of professionalism when talking about delicate situations, especially surrounding suicide calls or DOA calls? Is this a common sentiment in dispatch centers? It's really hard for me to gauge if this is normal, because I've witnessed EVERYBODY, including supervisors, do this.
Additionally, I notice that there is a distinct level of racism at my center that seems to be ingrained in the culture. I took a lunch break today with police colleagues who were making jokes about arabs, and then came back to dispatch to hear colleagues mocking a callers accent, and it just seems...exhausting?
I try to have thick skin about it, and don't want to bring this up directly, due to the amount of gossip I observe in the center from EVERYBODY, but first shift veterans and supervisors in specific. I've worked with quite a few first shifters who are complete rumor and gossip mills, and I don't really want to deal with that type of toxicity again after many years in the nonprofit world. I'm going into this field trying to remain as drama free as possible, I truly just want to work and go home, but I've definitely noticed a lot of fake behavior from people that makes me apprehensive to bring up my concerns to quite literally anybody, including those who I should be able to speak to in a confidential manner.
I guess my questions to the general community would be, 1) Am I too cautious/emotional in believing we should respect traumatized callers after we hang up? Is this something I should work on getting over/continue to actively ignore if I want to be successful in the field? And 2) Is dispatching that is physically housed separate from a police department any different culture wise (toxic masculinity dominated, right-leaning, etc.)? I plan to stay at my current center for a few years (at least five if everything goes well), and then moving states and keeping options open in terms of dispatching for fire departments, specific municipality versus whole county/multijuris, etc., so any insights into cultural differences amongst different types of centers is helpful to me in the long term!
I also hope this post doesn't come across as too critical of my colleagues or the work that dispatchers do, I'm just looking to gain a bit more insight into my morality struggles with the job thus far.
Thanks!