Articles Posted in Discrimination and Unlawful Harassment

I’m often asked, “Eric, where do you find this stuff?”

Why TMZ, of course. Break ’em off TMZ:

“Whitney Wolfe claims in a new lawsuit — obtained by TMZ — she was mercilessly brutalized by the other execs who wanted to remove her title because no one would take a site like Tinder seriously if they knew it was founded by a 24-year-old chick.

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Mid-morning yesterday, the Internet broke shortly after the Supreme Court issued its 5-4 decision in HHS v. Hobby Lobby Stores, Inc..

Jeez, I’m still cleaning out my Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook feeds.

In case your wifi, 4G, 3G, dial-up, TV, radio, and other electronics picked the wrong day to quit sniffing glue, the long and short of yesterday’s Supreme Court decision is this: Smaller, closely-held (think: family-owned) companies don’t have to provide Obamacare access to birth control if doing so would conflict with an employer’s religious beliefs.

The Benjamin Moore color gallery contains, among others, Clinton Brown and Tucker Chocolate.

My virgin ears! I mean, how racist can you get?!? Or, so says Clinton Tucker, a former Benjamin Moore employee, who filed a complaint in New Jersey state court in which he alleges that these paint names are hella-racist.

According to Courthouse News Service (here), Tucker says that “being a black man named Clinton Tucker, the plaintiff found this to be extremely racially offensive.”

Over the weekend, I read this opinion in a race-discrimination with facts so egregious, they’d make David Duke blush.

Let me set the scene for you. This is a workplace where, allegedly, several of the white employees displayed Confederate flag paraphernalia. I’ll spare you a verbatim review of the racial graffiti and epithets — you can view it here — but, it was pretty darn bad. And what about multiple nooses in the workplace — eight in total.

[Sidebar: I once attended a deposition of an Ivy League-educated HR Manager who testified that there was a time when she did not understand how a hangman’s noose in the workplace would offend a black employee. Hubba-what?!? Folks, just so we’re clear here, a hangman’s noose is the single worst symbol of racial hate. Period. So eight of ’em is hella-bad!]

shrm.jpgAnd by coffee, I mean turkey legs and frozen blueberry-mango rum lemonade.

Whoa, whoa, whoa, slow down…

You see that badge over there? You know what I had to do to get that badge?
Buy the full version of Photoshop
Spike the Kool-Aid of everyone on the SHRM Annual Conference Speaker Selection Committee
I beat out thousands (trillions?) of other speaker submissions to be selected as a SHRM 2014 Annual Conference & Exposition speaker.

So much for that case of Monday writer’s block…

From a recent EEOC press release:

According to the EEOC’s suit, Disability Network denied a deaf independent living specialist reasonable accommodations and then fired him. For example, the nonprofit refused the employee his requests for TTY equipment, a video phone and the ability to use text messaging, and refused to provide him with alternate accommodations.

Thumbnail image for weknownext.pngIn two weeks, at the SHRM Annual Conference, I’ll be presenting “Meeting the Challenges That Leaves of Absence and Attendance Issues Present Under the FMLA and ADA.” 

The good news is that I have 75 minutes of HR greatness planned for my SHRM sesh. The bad news is that my presentation is at 7:00 AM on the day after the #SHRM14 Social Bash at the Hard Rock Cafe.

So, let’s just say “Hey, thanks a lot, SHRM!” that I anticipate an intimate gathering of HR hardcore FMLA/ADAthletes for my spiel.

If I could drink up your collective skepticism when it comes to these Americans with Disabilities Act cases…

…I’d need my stomach pumped.

Let’s see. There’s the one about the utilityman who couldn’t climb utility poles, but had an ADA claim against a utility company. And then who can forget the bridge worker with the fear of heights who presented a viable ADA claim? And what about the stripper who feared climbing the stripper pole?

Welcome to Alabama, where they see your one-grope rule and raise you two grabs of the derriere.

Why? Because, according to this recent federal court opinion, the average female employee would not find getting her ass grabbed twice by a male supervisor to be offensive.

Now remember, that for a woman to prove sexual harassment, she must show five things:

“Doing What’s Right – Not Just What’s Legal”
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