Southwest Airlines employee subject to repeated N-word usage

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gtyellowjacket

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He is suing Southwest Airlines for allowing the racism as well as other nonsense like a Hitler sticker on a locker. The twist here is that the victim as well as the employees that used the n-word were black. I assume SWA will lose this one. It is going to put the defence in the unenviable position of explaining why its racist for some races to say a word but not a different race and somehow this different standard based on raced is not racist.

www.siliconvalley.com

‘Why would you do this to me?’ Southwest Airlines allegedly fired Black supervisor for complaining about racism at SFO

Pitts’ lawsuit echoes claims against other Bay Area companies accused of failing to properly respond to complaints of racism against Black workers.
www.siliconvalley.com www.siliconvalley.com
 
gtyellowjacket said:
The twist here is that the victim as well as the employees that used the n-word were black. I assume SWA will lose this one. It is going to put the defence in the unenviable position of explaining why its racist for some races to say a word but not a different race and somehow this different standard based on raced is not racist.
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Well, thankfully Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh, Sam Alito, and Amy Conan O'Brien are all experts on this topic.
 
I don't know exactly what it was, but that article seemed horribly written. Like a 4th grader trying to write a narrative paper and just saying "And then......" over and over and over.

I bet there's a lot of important info missing.
 
gtyellowjacket said:
He is suing Southwest Airlines for allowing the racism as well as other nonsense like a Hitler sticker on a locker. The twist here is that the victim as well as the employees that used the n-word were black. I assume SWA will lose this one. It is going to put the defence in the unenviable position of explaining why its racist for some races to say a word but not a different race and somehow this different standard based on raced is not racist.
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1. This is not a twist. It is common.
2. There is no "unenviable position" because the explanation you offer is irrelevant.
3. The law requires the plaintiff to demonstrate the existence of a "hostile work environment" -- that is, one "that a reasonable person would consider intimidating, hostile, or abusive" -- that is based on gender and race. Thus, the success or failure of the lawsuit depends entirely on the experience of the person at whom the epithets were aimed, and whether that person was reasonable in considering it intimidating, hostile or abusive. Again, that doesn't depend at all on the motivations of the name-caller nor even their propriety.

If the plaintiff tells a supervisor or HR or someone similar that "these people keep calling me the n-word and I really hate it, and it needs to stop," and the company did nothing to protect that worker, then the company can be liable. End of story.
4. Stop trying to talk about anything related to law. You don't understand how it works. At. All.
 
Without opening or reading anything... I'm going to assume this is another case of a white person being upset that black people can use the N-word while they cannot...
 
gtyellowjacket said:
I don't understand the point you are trying to make.
Are you saying that people that were calling the plaintiff an N.. at work were not using racist language?
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It doesn't matter if the language was "racist." It matters only if the language creates a hostile work environment, which is judged with reference to the plaintiff's point of view subject to a reasonability constraint. That's not the only burden of proof in a lawsuit like this, but that's the required proof relative to the point you are trying and failing to make.
 
gtyellowjacket said:
I don't understand the point you are trying to make.
Are you saying that people that were calling the plaintiff an N.. at work were not using racist language?
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I'm responding to your last sentence "...somehow this different standard based on raced is not racist."

There are all kinds of race based rules that are not racist. For example, I don't think the voting rights act is racist. Such rules are applied differently based on race, but not from the perspective that one race is superior to another.
 
Hizer said:
I'm responding to your last sentence "...somehow this different standard based on raced is not racist."

There are all kinds of race based rules that are not racist. For example, I don't think the voting rights act is racist. Such rules are applied differently based on race, but not from the perspective that one race is superior to another.
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Good point.
 
NYCBlueBlood said:
Without opening or reading anything... I'm going to assume this is another case of a white person being upset that black people can use the N-word while they cannot...
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No. I think its a black person upset that other black people are using the N-word around him at work among other issues. There were other problems like some other coworker, race unmentioned by the article, had a Hitler picture on their locker. But I doubt that garden variety racism makes an article and I certainly don't post it. But the man bites dog aspect and how it can be racist for one race and not another is what I find worthy of discussion.
 
I would say that the use of n-word, B-word in a work environment, in most any context, can most certainly be considered "hostile" regardless of your race.
 
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ZenMode said:
I would say that the use of n-word, B-word in a work environment, in most any context, can most certainly be considered "hostile" regardless of your race.
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Agreed. Crazy to me that at least one and likely several people that work at the Oakland airport would feel differently.

Southwest needs to get a handle on their personnel issues. They were in the news a few months back for kicking off some black guys for odor.
 
CallMeTyler said:
You don’t get to use the n-word if you’re a white person - it’s that simple. If you’re bothered by that, ask yourself why.
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A white professor couldn't use it talking about decades of slavery, white supremacy and racism?
 
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