You should expect to be treated with professionalism and dignity regardless of your sexual orientation. However, there are still employers who discriminate against those who are homosexual, bisexual, pansexual, asexual, or who exhibit any other sexuality that doesn't align with their own beliefs. There are laws in place that protect everyone from this type of discrimination and these laws apply to all employers. You can learn more about discrimination by reading below.
Expectations of your behavior in the workplace
While you are protected against any type of mistreatment, harassment, demotions, or job termination due to your sexual orientation there are also rules you need to follow. You should be able to casually mention your partner when talking with coworkers just the same as straight people do about their partners. However, you also need to follow the same rules that apply to others regarding unacceptable talk and behavior at work.
The discrimination laws do not protect you from being reprimanded or fired due to sexual harassment claims. So, while you can mention your partner in the same innocent and casual context others do with regards to their partners, you cannot speak about sex or anything else that would be considered sexual harassment in any case.
Examples of discrimination
If your employer finds out about your sexual orientation and they begin to treat you in a disrespectful manner, reprimand you for no reason, demote you, punish you by changing your work duties in a way that shows discrimination, or fire you, then you have every reason to believe that you are being discriminated against. However, you need to be able to prove that the treatment that you are receiving is due to discrimination because of your sexual orientation.
You should also be able to expect that you will also be protected from mistreatment from all employees while you are in the workplace. However, you can't expect management to take care of issues if they aren't brought to their attention. Therefore, should any of the employees start to harass you due to your sexual orientation, you will want to file a detailed complaint with management. If they don't address the issue in a timely manner, the company can still be found guilty of discrimination because it is the company's duty to offer its employees a safe work environment.
Conclusion
If you feel you are being treated unfairly, you are being harassed, or you have been terminated due to your sexual orientation, then you want to walk to an attorney who offers labor litigation services to find out if you have a case.